The Secretary General of Ohanaeze Ndigbo, Uche Okwukwu, has dismissed reports that the apex Igbo socio-cultural group endorsed the presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Alhaji Atiku Abubakar.
According to Daily Sun, Okwukwu said that what take place at the Nike Hotel, Enugu, last Thursday, where the purported endorsement took place, was not a valid Imeobi meeting of Ohanaeze.
Okwukwu’s stance is contrary to that of Ohanaeze President-General, Chief John Nnia Nwodo, who confirmed that the group endorsed Atiku and his running mate, Peter Obi, calling it the general will of Igbo people.
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The secretary denied seeing or signing any communique from the meeting in Enugu where Atiku was purportedly endorsed, describing the exercise as a nullity.
He said, “What I said and I want to be recorded is that the Imeobi that was held on Thursday, January 24, 2019, at Nike Lake cannot be considered to be valid.
“Major stakeholders were not present, there was no state governor, there was no speaker of any assembly and there was no senator.
“And more painful is that the Chairman of the Governors’ Forum, David Umahi, had earlier agreed with the president general for the Imeobi meeting to be put at 6:00p.m or 7:00p.m, and he announced that, only to use the voice vote to bring down the time to four o’clock. And, later, before 6:00p.m, some of the major stakeholders arrived.
“Now, I’m the secretary, you cannot issue a communiqué without the signatory of the secretary.
“The procedure to come up with a communiqué is that there is a communiqué drafting committee, the committee drafts the communiqué and they subject it to ratification by vote, none of that took place.”
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