Apex Igbo socio-cultural organization, Ohanaeze Ndigbo has again attacked the Presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar.
This time, the Igbo group urged Atiku not to entertain any hope of polling any significant vote from the South-East in the 2023 general elections.
In a statement issued on Tuesday by Mazi Okechukwu Isiguzoro, Secretary-General, Ohanaeze Ndigbo Worldwide, he urged the PDP candidate not to “squander his time and resources for any reason in the South-east and Igbo-speaking areas of South/south and Middle belt.”
He told Atiku that all the people from the said areas flocking around him were merely after their pockets.
Isiguzoro said though the PDP Vice Presidential candidate, Governor Ifeanyi Okowa was a true Igbo son, he was in the wrong pairing.
He added that, “our people gave Atiku all the support in 2019 but shortly after the election, he abandoned them to their fate only to return four years later.
“Now, he has even come openly to say he is merely a Northern candidate. He should know that all those flocking around him are doing ‘Yahoo-Yahoo’ to him.
“Igbo political elites, including the PDP Governors, know that Atiku will lose in the Southeast without getting the required constitutional 25% votes after his infamous Kaduna declaration that he belongs to the North only.
“Nigerians from the North, West, South, and East are encountering severe hunger, unemployment, and insecurity challenges. Any Presidential candidate dwelling on ethnicity and religious cards, without showing evidence of rescuing the country from the abyss of economic crisis and social dilemma Nigerians found themselves, will be disgraced at the polls.
“What Nigerians need now is someone who will unify the entire country, not a sectional leader like Atiku.”