The former National Chairman of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and former Governor of Enugu State, Dr. Okwesilieze Nwodo, says Nigeria’s President-elect, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, has started serving Ndigbo “a piece of bread soaked in water” which he promised them during the campaign.
Tinubu had in January, during his Presidential campaign rally at Michael Okpara Square urged Igbos to work for his victory and that of the party, stating that unless they do so, “we will not give you but a soaked sliced bread.”
According to Tinubu, “… nobody will give you any credit, you are working hard, you’re sweating now. We want you to sweat well now for this party until you deliver victory.
“Until Bola Tinubu becomes the President of Nigeria, we will not give you but a soaked sliced bread.”
Nwodo said on Monday in an exclusive interview with Vanguard that Tinubu was already serving the Igbos the promised “soaked bread” with the exclusion of Igbos in his recently announced 14-member inauguration committee.
Nwodo stated that any President of Nigeria who is not making conscientious efforts to unite the ethnic groups in the country will fail woefully.
He equally bemoaned the repeated attacks on Igbos in Lagos State, saying that they were being punished for voting their conscience during the general elections.
On President Muhammadu Buhari’s appeal to people he might have hurt in the course of his duties as President and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the Federal Republic of Nigeria to pardon him, Nwodo said the President’s apology was belated and not enough to heal the trauma he caused Nigerians.
Nwodo, who gave an abysmal scorecard of 30 per cent score to the All Progressives Congress (APC)-led Federal Government, said insecurity, ethnic bigotry and hunger festered across Nigeria during its reign.
President Buhari, who spoke at the ninth and final Sallah homage to him by residents of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) at the Banquet Hall of Presidential Villa, Abuja, said:
“I think this is a very good coincidence for me to say goodbye to you and to thank you for tolerating me for more than seven and half years now.
“So, please whoever feels I have done wrong to, we are all humans. There is no doubt I hurt some people and I wish you will pardon me. And those that think that I have hurt them so much, please pardon me.”