APC Supports "Deportation" Of Igbos

THE All Progressives Congress (APC), on Sunday, came down heavily on Anambra State governor, Peter Obi, accusing him of playing politics with the unity of the nation over the "return" of some Anambra indigenes hitherto resident in Lagos by the administration of Governor Babatunde Fashola.

The party claimed Obi was whipping up ethnic sentiments over the saga for political advantage, as the governorship election approached in the state.

APC also gave the figure of the returnees as 14 and not 72 as widely reported.

In a statement issued in Lagos on Sunday by its interim National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, the party said instead of reaching out to his Lagos counterpart, as he had done on less important issues in the past, Obi fired an alleged over-dramatised letter to the Presidency and allegedly leaked such to the media, thus setting off an avoidable friction between the Igbo and the Yoruba that would not augur well for Nigeria’s unity.

It further alleged that indications were that Governor Obi’s resort to a media campaign, which had triggered a vicious Lagos State/Yoruba bashing, was  aimed at gaining an undue advantage ahead of the forthcoming Anambra governorship election, instead of being borne out of sheer altruism.

“We are not saying Governor Obi has no right to play politics, but he must fight clean and avoid any action that could hurt not just the enduring harmony between the Igbo and the Yoruba, but also the unity of the country.

“Resorting to primordial sentiments anytime election is approaching is Gov. Obi’s modus operandi. He did it just before the 2009 election, when he labelled the ACN under which Dr Chris Ngige contested as a Yoruba party, and he is going down the same path now. This is all about the November 2013 election. If Governor Obi is sure of his performance, he should allow that to speak for him and stop whipping up tribal sentiments.”