TheCable

Ayo Adebanjo, leader of Afenifere, a Yoruba socio-cultural group, says the north cannot dictate who becomes the next president of Nigeria.

According to the PUNCH, Adebanjo spoke on Monday during a public lecture held at the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs, Victoria Island, Lagos.

The lecture was themed ‘Nationalism and nation-building in Nigerian history’.

Adebanjo said the north does not have the population to decide who wins the 2023 election, and as such, it is wrong to ask the south-east to negotiate with the zone.

“It was said that the south-east must come to negotiate with the north because politics is a game of numbers,” Adebanjo said.

“The case for the east is not to beg for a favour; it is their right. Yet, each time I hear that they should go around because the north has the population, what fraudulent population? You can’t sell that to me.

“They tell us to work together but unfortunately, because they now have produced a president at the helm of affairs, they say ‘no one can become president except you come to the north and unfortunately, some southerners have been brainwashed that they can’t do anything except they bow to the north. I don’t believe it.

“What right has the north to dictate who will become our president? We were brought together not by peace, not by agreement, they forced us together and we agreed.

“So, to continue to live together in peace must be by agreeable terms. The east has the right not because it is Igbo but because it is in Nigeria. The principle of Afenifere is on ideological basis and principle of rightness, inclusiveness and not any sentiment.”

While Adebanjo is backing Peter Obi, candidate of the Labour Party (LP), for the 2023 elections, Rueben Fasoranti, former leader of Afenifere, has endorsed Bola Tinubu, standard bearer of the All Progressives Congress (APC).

The situation has created conflict among the leaders of the Yoruba socio-cultural group.