‘Presidential Candidate without Concrete Restructuring Plans for Nigeria Won’t GetYorubaVotes’
Sunday Okobi
A pan-Yoruba group, Yoruba SelfDetermination Advancement Forum (YOSEDAF), has vehemently vowed that no presidential candidate without concrete plans to restructure Nigeria as well as genuine federalism will get the votes of the South-westerners in the 2019 presidential election.
The group, which lamented that the Yoruba people, who gave their all, to enthrone the current government in 2015, have been bizarrely maltreated and abandoned to their fate, noted that only candidates with genuine interest in true federalism would be given audience during electioneering.
YOSEDAF leaders made these assertions yesterday at a press conference with the theme: ‘2019 General Election: Restructuring and Genuine Federalism’ in Lagos to probe and take a position for the Yoruba race in the Nigerian polity. They insisted that the region must be given autonomy in order to accelerate its developmental stride.
According to the Convener and Secretary of the group, Kunle Adesokan and Mr. Kola Are respectively who addressed journalists, “From the colonial days, the Yoruba has relentlessly worked towards the restructuring of Nigeria to reintegrate all Yoruba people in Nigeria under one regional government. But the military intervention in 1966 paved the way for all kinds of nepotismdriven balkanisation and clustering of peoples, nations and nationalities into states without regard for ethno-cultural contiguity.
“There is no gainsaying the fact that in the last two decades since return to civil rule, democracy has failed woefully to deliver on good governance.
“Therefore, for any political party and its presidential candidate to enjoy the support of Self-Determination Platforms and people in Yoruba land, a covenant on restructuring and genuine federalism that guarantee maximum autonomy for Yorubaland is non-negotiable!“To this end, our resolve that Yoruba people will not support a candidate on the basis of promises of bringing about highfalutin change. There must be a clear roadmap with the prospects of delivering on restructuring and federalism worth of the support of our people.”“It is only through the emergence of a leadership that shares the passion of a new Nigeria; which restructuring and genuine federalism guarantee, that the future could be secured out of the prevailing nightmares and miseries.”
YOSEDAF lamented that almost all the economic activities in Nigeria take place in Yoruba land but the region has nothing to show for it, adding that poverty in the region is growing at astronomic pace, “therefore, the presidential material that would be acceptable in deepening our democratic quest towards the agenda of restructuring and genuine federalism must be of the pedigree that is broadminded enough in the mold of the legendary MKO Abiola of the June 12 fame.
“It is only a presidential material like MKO that shares the worldview of imbuing capacities of the young and marginalised groups that can restore confidence in the economy and create a new momentum that will trigger socioeconomic emancipation of our peoples. We would mobilise our peoples to support an ethnically and religiously detached presidential candidate whose emergence will automatically reduce tension and fear of subjugation, hatred and political vindictiveness.”