In the Nigerian project, no race is more enterprising; doing exploits in their chosen fields of endeavor and can be found in any part of the globe where oxygen gives life than the Igbo race. But in the midst of personal achievements and accumulations, no race has continued to suffer marginalisation and acute deprivation in a collective form more than the same Igbo race. In the 2013 UDHR report of Anambra CLO, we had called on Ndigbo to sharpen their collective bargaining power with the Federal Government before ever they give their support to President Goodluck Jonathan for the 2015 general election going by the existential realities on ground. Unfortunately, the situation is worsening by day while the Jonathan for 2015 sing song is reverberating everywhere across the Igbo land with nothing to show for it.

Except for few Igbo men holding individual positions in the Federal Government of Nigeria, Ndigbo cannot boast of any single viable project that can change the fortunes of their people or give them a sense of belonging to be at par with other regions.

The Onitsha River Port commissioned on 30TH August 2012 amidst fanfare by President Jonathan has remained a pipe dream. The much touted 2nd Niger Bridge which they say construction work has started will operate under a Public Private Partnership where even Igbo Children yet unborn will have to pay tolls unlike their fellow Nigerians from other parts of the country that enjoy various bridges free of charge. Federal roads in the South East remains the worst while the enormous capital flight from the East to the west and North remains the highest because all cargo issues whether by land or sea are nonexistent in the East. Who is fooling whom? Chief Ralph Uwazuruike who said he is championing Igbo cause and is seeking for the declaration of the sovereign state of Biafra has suddenly turned around to be the chief campaigner for Goodluck Jonathan and is now singing a different tune after thousands of Igbo youths he brainwashed have paid the supreme price while others are still languishing in different prisons across the nation.

On Wednesday, June 11, 2014 when the Civil Liberties Organisation, Anambra State Branch, organised a peacefully rally to condemn terrorism and its associated vices in the country and called on Nigerians to join hands with President Jonathan in the collective struggle to confront whatever is confronting the unity of the nation in the midst of so many lives already lost, Chief Uwazuruike allegedly ordered his brainwashed boys in Onitsha to attack us because he erroneously thought we are being sponsored by the opposition to come and attack Jonathan.

Chief Emmanuel Iwuanyanwu, a prominent Igbo man was quoted recently to have said that the Igbos should wait for 2027 before aspiring to be the President of the country while some others have also said that Jonathan has taken the turn of Ndigbo for the presidency.

While everybody is entitled to his individual opinions and actions, Anambra CLO for the umpteenth time hereby calls on Ndigbo race to take a stand and stop playing this second fiddle in the Nigerian project. Let there be a collective bargain on so many infrastructural, manpower and all other developmental imbalances suffered by Ndigbo. Getting sure commitment to all these and more should be the only basis of supporting any candidate for the 2015 elections.

•Being excerpts from the 2014 World Human Rights Day Report of the Civil Liberties Organisation (CLO), Anambra State Branch, as released by the State Chairman, Comrade Aloysius Attah, whose photo appears alongside this piece.

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