A founding member of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Chief Chukwuemeka Eze has described the ongoing scheme by some northern leaders to return former President, Goodluck Jonathan to Aso Rock in 2023 as deceitful and a grand conspiracy against the South.
Eze, in a statement in Port Harcourt on Friday, said the plot was a packaged trick by some northern leaders to make Jonathan President for one term and retake power in 2027 thereby denying the southern part of the country a complete term of eight years.
Eze said that the northern schemers knew that with President Muhammadu Buhari successfully completing his second term by 2023, the South, in all honesty and fairness, would produce the next President.
But to truncate a southern eight-year rule, the schemes intended to feature Jonathan for one tenure in 2023 thereby throwing the 2027 presidential election open for a fresh zoning arrangement and contest favourable to the North.
Eze urged all Nigerians to speak up and condemn such a dastardly act that might plunge the nation into unprecedented chaos.
The APC chief, however, claimed that Jonathan had rejected the plan, describing the former President’s rejection as consolatory.
He said: “This plot is an unacceptable insult on both Jonathan and the entire southern political class as if we lack credible political leaders from the South that can turn the fortunes of this country around.
“It is imperative to commend Dr. Jonathan for reading through the deceit of these leaders, trashing their dishonest entreaty and ensuring that his political feats and present status as a great promoter of democracy is not ruined, tarnished but kept intact by keeping these undemocratic elements at bay.
“I am very glad that Dr. Jonathan has done his best to keep these undemocratic forces at bay, who are hell-bent to deny the South the chance to preside over the affairs of this country according to the terms of power rotation between the North and the South, not minding that the northerners have through the military and democratic dispensations governed this country to their heart contents.
“Funny and sad enough, same leaders who ensured that Dr. Jonathan was not reelected in 2015 are the same crop of leaders that are doing everything to lure him back to finish whatever that is left of him politically.
“As much as I am not a supporter or sympathiser of Dr. Jonathan and his type of politics, as I was one of those who ensured he was not reelected, I will not sit and allow his haters drain the little integrity left of him.
“Luring him to contest the 2023 does not in any way wash him off the sins and reasons behind why he was not reelected in 2023, but a careful ploy to portray the Southerners as lacking better and credible leaders to improve on the fortunes of the country.”
Eze also commended Governor Nyesom Wike of Rivers State for insisting that he would not support Jonathan if he decided to contest the 2023 general election on the platform of the All Progressives Congress (APC).
Eze said if Jonathan allowed himself to be fooled by those luring him, he would face the worst political defeat in 2023.
He advised Jonathan not to allow himself to be used as an object of division and tension in the country, appealing to him to continue to enjoy his 2015 feat, which earned him an international figure.
