President of the Pharmaceutical Society of Nigeria, PSN, Mazi Sam Ohuabunwa, yesterday, declared to contest for the position of the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria in the 2023 Presidential election.
Addressing Journalists yesterday in Abuja where he formally declared for the position, Ohuabunwa said that his coming out for the number one position of the country has debunked what he described as the erroneous impression or assertion that no South Eastern Nigerian was showing serious interest in running for the office of President in 2023.
According to him, the time has come for an Igbo man to become the President of Nigeria against the backdrop that the South East geo- political zone of the country has suffered the highest level of injustice and discrimination in Nigeria, promising to re-write the story of Nigeria, with a vow to make appointments on the basis of geo- political zones of the country as a against the present lopsided appointments and provision of infrastructure across the country.
Ohuabunwa, a former Chairman of the Nigerian Economic Summit Group, NESG, who described Nigeria as the poverty capital of the world said Nigerians are now more divided than we were in 1970 after the civil war. He added that many are retreating into their ethnic enclaves as the internal cleavages and divides widen by the actions and inactions of the nation’s political leadership and promised that within 100 days in office, he would secure Nigeria as the President of the country.
“On 30th J uly 2019, we got a very strong motivation to birth the New Nigeria Group and to announce to Nigerians that a new Nigeria was in the offing. This message was urgent as many Nigerians had lost hope in the country because of the depressing economic challenges where 53 per cent of the Nigerian youths are unemployed and nearly another 22 per cent remain underemployed. The country has also become the poverty capital of the world with nearly 70 per cent of Nigerians classified as poor by the World Bank.
“Many Nigerian youths, including professionals pharmacists, medical doctors, nurses, engineers, etc, are daily trodding to foreign embassies seeking visas to every country in the world. Then the Nigerian ‘ insecurity situation (terrorism, banditry, kidnapping and murder) compounded the problems and now, even some older and retired Nigerians are fleeing for safety wherever they can find it. If this is not a crisis situation, I do not know what can be so described.
“Today, Nigerians seem more divided than we were in 1970 after the civil war with many retreating into their ethnic enclaves as the internal cleavages and divides widen by the actions and inactions of our political leadership. Every day, one set of Nigerians issues a quit notice to another set in a supposedly united country and nobody suffers any consequences. The youth in Nigeria are asking: “Where is the hope for us in Nigeria?Students and youth corpers are kidnapped with reckless abandon while the elders are forced into poverty as their salaries and pensions cannot buy much with the combination of devaluation of the Naira and high inflation rates.
“Fellow countrymen, there is certainly a worsening feeling of hopelessness and powerlessness in many Nigerians as the misery index worsens. More than half of Nigerians are classified as miserable and many Nigerians across the six geo-political zones of Nigeria complain of one form of injustice or another. Many decry the lack of justice, equity and fairplay in the way they are governed and when they complain, they are ignored and when they complain loudly, they are silenced. Many feel the democratic space is highly constricting and in many places, Nigerians live in ‘fear of their leaders who act as autocrats and emperors, having acquired so much wealth and power with which they harass and intimidate poor and hapless citizens.
“We want a nation where law and order will reign supreme, where lives will be sacrosanct, where private endeavour will be courted, where the average Nigerian will have easy access to quality education (through scholarships, bursaries, and student loans), affordable healthcare (through universal health insurance), housing supported by mortgage and where technology will drive service delivery. “
“Since we began to propagate this idea of a New Nigeria, many citizens have jumped on to the New Nigeria Group, NNG, bandwagon. Today, we have Chapters in the 36 States Of Nigeria (P1118 Abuja) and in the Diaspora. Our Registered Membership is grossing seven million people and the number is growing by the day. But everywhere we went, the question kept recurring: Is the NNG a political party or on what political party Will you run to take power to implement the birth of the New Nigeria?
Ladies and gentlemen, this press briefing is called today to essentially answer this recurring question. I have been a registered member of the PDP almost from the founding of the party. Though” membership of the NN G cuts across many other parties, including those with no party affiliations, we have prayerfully decided to run on the platform of my party the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP.
“We are bringing most of our members who are currently not members of PDP into the party as a way of strengthening the party and infusing new blood, new thinking and helping to support the party in its new mission.”
