BY BENEDICT NWACHUKWU, ABUJA
As the debate for equitable leadership in the National Assembly continues, a body known as the APC Renaissance Group has called on the leadership of the All Progressives Congress to consider healing and reconciliation of Nigerians first, in selecting principal officers at the Legislature.
The group, in a statement on Thursday, by its national coordinators, Jideoffor Chebe and Tajudeen Gbadamosi, wondered why “the party is insensitive to the clamour for national healing of a country that is sharply divided along obvious ethnic and regional fault lines.”
It said that after four years of enduring an “administration whose choices were at variance with the hopes and aspirations of the people, a government whose appointments and selections did not consider the ethnic and regional diversity of Nigeria”, the APC should not be quick to repeat such feats.
The group noted, “The current selection where the North West is asked to be the Deputy Senate President and Speaker of the House of Representatives is like continuing the Buhari era.
“Or should we wonder if our great party has adopted a script of marginalisation of other regions and ethnic groups to feed the parochial interest of a few?
“The present situation needs to be quickly addressed so that every part of the country will have a sense of identity in Nigeria. Otherwise, what is there to tell anyone from the North Central which has contributed immensely to President Bola Tinubu’s victory, that His Excellency values loyalty to the party?
“We urge the National Working Committee (NWC) to do the needful, and correct a mistake already made before it becomes our national culture, as this will breed resentment, kill patriotic zeal in country men and women, as well as create a system of thinking where people wait for their turn to take their pounds of flesh.”
The group, however, expressed confidence in the Tinubu-led administration to bring the much needed national healing that the country so desires.
