A GROUP of Northern youths staged a protest in Abuja on February 2 to demand that the region be allowed to produce Nigeria’s president when incumbent President Muhammadu Buhari leaves office in 2023.
Under the aegis of Northern Advocates for Good Governance, the youth specifically demanded that the Office of President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria be zoned to the North-East or North-Central.
The North-East states are Adamawa, Bauchi, Borno, Gombe, Taraba and Yobe.
States in the North-Central are Benue, Niger, Nasarawa, Plateau, Kogi and Kwara.
The youth, numbering about a hundred, converged at Wadata Plaza, the national headquarters of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
They brandished a large banner which spelt out their mission.
Large inscriptions on the banner read “Northern Advocates for Good Governance Calls for Equity, Fairness and Justice. The Presidency of Nigeria in 2023 should be zoned to the North-East or North-Central.”
Some of the youth also wielded placards.
Inscriptions on some of the placards read: “North-East or North-Central should produce Nigeria’s next president’, “North-East or North-Central deserve presidency in 2023,” “North-Central should produce Nigeria’s president in 2023′,” “Northern Nigeria demands equity and justice” and ‘”Northern Nigeria advocates for fairness and justice.”
The ICIR’s reporter, who monitored the protest at the PDP national secretariat, observed that the youth were clad in matching white shirts.
A man who was identified as the leader of the youths declined The ICIR’s request for an interview.
The man told The ICIR’s reporter to wait for the group’s leaders, who he said were still on their way.
But one of the youth, who identified himself as Sani, said the North-East and the North-Central deserved the presidency in 2023 because the two zones had been marginalised.
“For equity, justice and fairness, the North-East or North-Central should be allowed to produce the president in 2023. The two zones have been marginalised for so long and this is the best way to compensate them,” Sani said.
Another member of the group, who gave his name as Abdullahi Aminu, echoed Sani’s claims.
Aminu added that the North-East and North-Central did not benefit from Buhari’s administration, which would be rounding off next year.
According to Aminu, the two geo-political zones had been under-developed as a result of long years of neglect by the Nigerian government.
Producing Buhari’s successor was the most effective way of reversing the marginalsation and under-development of the zones, Aminu further claimed.
The demand by the Northern youths is coming amid indications that the power rotation arrangement between the North and the South may be jettisoned in the 2023 presidential election.
Going by the power rotation arrangement which was put in place by the PDP when Nigeria returned to civilian rule in 1999, the position of the president rotates between the North and the South.
Buhari, a northerner from Katsina State in the North-West, will complete eight years as president in 2023 and, going by the power rotation arrangement, it is expected that a southerner will take over.
But there are indications that northern politicians will contest the presidential ticket of the major political parties – PDP and All Progressives Congress (APC).
Already a former Senate President and former governor of Kwara State Bukola Saraki, from Kwara State in the North-Central, has declared his intention to run for president on the platform of the PDP.
Aminu Tambuwal, governor of Sokoto State in the North-West, has announced that he had begun consultations for the 2023 presidential election, also on the PDP platform.
A former Vice President Atiku Abubakar, from Adamawa State in the North-East, is also expected to declare his intention to contest the presidential ticket of the PDP.
PDP stakeholders had pushed for the zoning of the position of the party’s national chairman to the North in the hope that it would do ensure the ceding of the presidential ticket to a southerner.
But, although a former Senate President Iyorchia Ayu, from Benue in the North-Central, eventually emerged national chairman, some leaders of the party from the North are insisting that the presidential ticket should be thrown open to all the geo-political zones.
A committee chaired by Bauchi State Governor Bala Mohammed, which was set up to review PDP’s performance in the 2019 election, had recommended that the party should not zone its presidential ticket in 2023.
Mohammed, from Bauchi in the North-East, has also shown interest in contesting the presidential election.
The Southern Governors Forum, comprising governors of the states in the South-East, South-South and South-West, have demanded that the region produce the president in 2023.
Governors of the northern states, under the aegis of the Northern Governors Forum, opposed the demand of their Southern counterparts, arguing that the call for power shift violated constitutional provisions.
Leaders of the South-East are also demanding the presidency in 2023, as the zone is yet to produce Nigeria’s president since the country returned to civil rule in 1999.
Recently, leaders of the South and the Middle Belt, under the aegis of Southern and Middle Belt Leaders Forum (SMBLF), demanded that it was the turn of the South to produce Nigeria’s president in 2023.
The Middle Belt is in the North-Central and the position adopted by leader of the Middle Belt Forum (MBF) Pogu Bitrus in solidarity with the South varies with that of the northern youths who are demanding power shift to the North-Central or North-East.
In both the PDP and APC, some southern politicians have declared their intention to run for president in 2023.
They include a former Lagos State Governor Bola Tinubu (APC), Ebonyi State Governor David Umahi (APC), a former Senate President Pius Anyim (PDP), a former Imo State Governor Rochas Okorocha, and a former Abia State Governor and Senate Chief Whip Orji Uzor Kalu (APC).
The national leadership of the PDP and the APC have not taken any official position on zoning of the presidency in 2023.