Ali Monguno Condemns Ohanaezes Call On Igbo To Vote For Jonathan

FORMER Minister of Petroleum and Steel and elder statesman, Alhaji Shettima Ali Monguno, on Thursday condemned the Ohanaeze Ndigbo leadership for urging the Igbo to vote en mass for President Goodluck Jonathan in todays election, warning that such calls could jeopardise the peace and unity of the country.Monguno, who spoke to The Guardian at his Maiduguri residence, said that it was rather preposterous for a revered socio-cultural group to declare in a public medium that it has thrown its full weight behind the candidature of a sitting President.The call according to the elder statesman was however, not only ill-timed, but also capable of tearing a heterogeneous country like Nigeria apart and against the tenets of democracy and popular choice of the electorate.When I heard that call made by the Igbo elders on television, which more or less directed or requested the Ndigbo to vote for the President, instantly I felt it is ill-timed, in the sense that it was coming about 73 hours to the presidential election.Asking its people to vote for one particular candidate in a country that has been lauded as one indivisible nation with so many tribal and religious groups should not have come up.It is ill-timed and uncalled for; in the sense that it smacks of division; it smacks of anti-peace, anti-progress and anti-security, said Monguno.He said he was very much glad that other major ethnic groups in the country did not beat similar drum of support in favour of any candidate, adding that in a country that believes in unity, peace and progress, such tendencies could threaten the values of democracy.He further disclosed that it will not be out of place if the authorities could call on those concerned to question, asking them to exercise some restraints, because it is ill-timed and damaging to our unity, especially at this critical time.  
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