A group which identified itself as Concerned Northern Youths Forum (CNYF), has pledged support for the candidacy of President Goodluck Jonathan even as it faulted the endorsement of General Muhammadu Buhari of the All Progressives Congress (APC) by Northern Elders Forum (NEF). The youths described their elders’ decision as untenable and a mere fiction of their imagination, insisting that it does not represent the general feelings and opinions of the most northerners.
National Chairman of CNYF, AlKasim Charanchi, who made his group’s position known at a press conference in Bauchi over the weekend, assured President Jonathan and his running mate. Namadi Sambo of substantial votes from the north assuring that his forum has mobilised its members across the 19 northern states to vote for the PDP from top to bottom.
“We totally condemn the recent support of the NEF for the presidential candidature of Buhari of the APC in the forthcoming election. We view the so-called support as not only partisan but against the collective interest of the whole North,” he said.
Charanchi based their decision to condemn the NEF’s position on the believe that the elders’ standpoint does not allign with the collective resolve of the north and advised them to be neural as elders and play down bias when it comes to taking decisions that concerns the future of the North.
His words, “As elders, we expect that the NEF would look far ahead and plan accordingly. The North already has a vice-president in the person of Alhaji Namadi Sambo and allowing President Jonathan to have a second slot at the presidency means giving the North an automatic ticket for the presidency in 2019.”
The CNYF’s president described the achievements of President Jonathan’s administration in the North as unprecedented insisting they were enough for the NEF to canvass support for Jonathan in the February polls rather than conniving with retrogressive group to thwart the return of Jonathan. He alleged that the elders are championing a clandestine motive that was not known to the youth.
While clarifying that they were not holding brief for President Jonathan, he noted that the ‘pull-him-down’ disposition of the elders does not augur well for the unity and cohesiveness of Nigeria as an entity. He noted that in line with the PDP zoning arrangement, the presidency would be ceded to the region in 2019 and any plan to scuttle this cannot be said to be in the interest of the North.
“As a body of elders which seeks the collective interest of the North, we should have thought that the NEF would be neutral and not single out a candidate for its support because our votes alone cannot ensure the emergence of a President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. We need the support of other parts of the country to produce a president, we need a national president, not a regional leader,” he said.
The youth leader condemned NEF for travelling from one state to another, begging governors for money to fund Buhari’s campaign and their alleged pact with some officials of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to guarantee Buhari’s victory at all costs in this month’s election.
“This it has done by purchasing computers to ensure that as many voters as possible were captured in the recent Continuous Voter Registration in the APC strongholds with the view to giving Buhari candidacy an undue advantage, in their now-or-never attitude of installing President of Nigeria come February 14,” Charanchi said.
While chiding the elders for making the insurgency problem as their major campaign issue against President Jonathan, he claimed the President has done the needful in curbing the menace of insurgents by deploying troops to the troubled North-east region. This was as he called on all well-meaning northerners to cooperate with Jonathan in combating terrorism.
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