Chairman of the Southern Governors’ Forum and governor of Ondo State, Rotimi Akeredolu, has claimed that the presidency of Nigeria must come to the South next year in order not to deter the power rotation arrangement in the country.
He also denounced the incursion of religion into politics, urging that citizens should not be distracted by religion in making their choices during the 2023 general elections.
Speaking at the one-year remembrance of Prof. Bankole Oke of the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, University of Ibadan, Akeredolu said power rotation had been an unwritten agreement in the country since the return to civil rule in 1999, and that arrangement must not be altered now.
He advised Nigerians to make sure that power did not return to the North under what he described as the appearance of a party picking a Southerner as its vice presidential candidate.
“A party that picked somebody from the North as its presidential candidate is not doing so in the country’s interest. (Labour Party presidential candidate Peter) Obi has the right to contest because he is from the South.
“We are ready to give it whatever it takes to make sure power returns to the South in 2023. There appears to be an understanding that power must rotate between the North and the South. This understanding saw the contest of two candidates from the Southwest for the Presidency. It was part of the spoken agreement that the power equation must be balanced to allay the fear of domination harbored by the people of the South.
“There is a conscious attempt not to disrupt the existing agreement. There has been a seamless transition from one civilian regime to another since 1999, the longest in the political history of the country.
“The current political permutations raise strong anxieties on an undeclared motive to thwart the arrangement that has been working for the country. The rotation of the office of the President is between the North and the South since the inception of the Fourth Republic.”
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