2023: PANDEF sticks to pact with Afenifere, Ohanaeze, MBF; rules out northern candidate

South-South influential group, Pan Niger Delta Forum, PANDEF, is sticking to the decision of the Southern and Middle Belt Leaders Forum (SMBLF) to mobilize support for only parties fielding southern candidates in the 2023 presidential election.

SMBLF comprises of PANDEF, Afenifere (South-West socio-political group), Ohanaeze Ndigbo of the South-East and the Middle Belt Forum and took the position to back southern candidates based on power rotation between the North and South of the country.

The group took the decision sometime last year ahead of the emergence of the presidential candidates for the 2023 election.

Whereas some parties toed the line of SMBLF by picking southern presidential candidates to succeed President Muhammadu Buhari who is from the North, others acted in blatant disregard of the position.

The National Publicity Secretary of PANDEF, Mr Ken Robinson, at the weekend, said “we will not support any political party that has a northern presidential candidate in 2023”.

Asked pointedly if the SMBLF stand stays ahead of the 2023 elections, Robinson told Sunday Vanguard in an interview: “Exactly, we will not support any political party that has a northern presidential candidate in 2023.

It is essential to emphasize that this is a collective position of the Southern and Middle Belt Leaders Forum (SMBLF) comprising Afenifere, Ohanaeze Ndigbo, the Middle Belt Forum and, of course, PANDEF.

“The decision was taken at a meeting of SMBLF in Abuja on the 30th of May last year (2021) and it has maintained that position to date.

“And it is based, purely, on the fundamental principles of equity, fairness and justice, and the age-long pact of power rotation between the North and the South, particularly the office of the President, which has helped to stabilize the nation’s polity since independence.

“Therefore, the collective stance remains that President Muhammadu Buhari, a northerner, would be completing the statutory eight years for the office of President in May 2023, it would be unwelcomed to have another northerner, whether Muslim or Christian, as President and Commander-in-Chief of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, in 2023.

“As the late South African Nobel Peace Prize winner, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, eloquently surmised, ‘If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse, and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality.’”

Credit: Vanguard

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