We Never Endorsed Umahi for Presidency – Ebonyi Founding Fathers

Chief Felix Mgbada, an Elder Statesman, and one of those who fought for the creation of Ebonyi state has refuted the insinuation that Elders of Ebonyi state have presented the Governor of Ebonyi state, Dave Umahi, for the Presidency of Nigeria come 2023.

Mgbada, during a chat at inauguration of the People’s Democratic Party, PDP new National Executive Committee, headed by Chairman, Dr. Iyorchia Ayu at the  International Conference Centre, Abuja, said if any group ever masquerades as Elders of Ebonyi state, such group is never far from the factional group of All Progressives Congress, APC  under the control of the Governor in the State. He said that such group are mere political associates of the Governor not the real Elders of Ebonyi state.

According to him: “The real Elders of the State are the founding fathers of the State in which I’m one them and at no time did the Elders of the state made such declaration.”

Should anyone else calls himself an Elder in Ebonyi to the exclusion of the the founding founding fathers of the state, Mgbada maintained,  such a person”is a fake Elder.”

Meanwhile, Mgbada disclosed that the only son of Ebonyi state who the Elders have known, recognized and pray that he wins the presidency of Nigeria is Senator Anyim Pius Anyim. Mgbada described Anyim as one man who enjoys not only the support and respect of Ebonyi Elders but majority of Ebonyi people, saying, he is 100 per cent convinced that a greater percentage of Ebonyi people are fully behind him.

Dr. Benjamin Igwenyi, the State Attorney General under Martin Elechi’s regime who is also among the founding fathers of the state, echoed Mgbada’s views. During a telephone chat, Igwenyi said, “Ben Oka, who issued the declaration endorsing Governor David Umahi for Presidency by Ebonyi Elders, is far my junior in age”.

He asked, “If he, Oka, is now an Elder of the State, what then are we, the ‘boys’, he enthused. Igwenyi who reiterated the fact that the so called Ebonyi Elders Council are a mere contraption which the Governor created to whittle down the influence and powers of the real Elders of the State, maintained that “the real Elders of the State always tell the Governor the truth, which of course he would never like to hear nor listen to, he said. But this Ben Oka group which he now assembled, Igwenyi explained, is the type who will tell him what he wants to hear all the time.

Therefore, he declared that he would not be surprised if the Governor had jettisoned the real Elders of the State for his own political allies, saying the last time the Governor called the real Elders of the State for a meeting, the Elders told him nothing but the truth. According to him, himself and Elechi, the immediate past Governor of the State, told him plainly that the PDP Secretariat which he now wants to convert to APC Secretariat does not belong to him as a personal property. That there’s no way he could  convert the PDP Secretariat built by PDP in the State to APC Secretariat simply because he was once a Governor under PDP but now switched to APC and he wants to now carry the property of another party to the other. That the secretariat in question was built by PDP not even under his regime and there’s no way he could convert the belongings of another person to another person just because he once occupied such house.

Igwenyi explained that the real Elders of the State advised him that no court would grant him such requests. Such genuine and truthful advice may not have gone down well with, hence his latest move to abandone the real Elders of the State to create a pseudo group and calls them Elders.

Igwenyi, however, bemoans the fact that despite such elderly advice by Elechi, who is even a member of his party, he still locks the PDP Secretariat in the state till date, using court injunction. He said that he is not surprised that he is using the likes of Ben Oka who will never tell him the truth for such nefarious roles, because they are what he describes  as the “hangers on” at the corridors of  Government House.

“Of course, there is no way they will have the courage to speak the truth to the Governor because they are under the influence of the table-manner political syndrome to speak less while the food is still in your mouth, Igwenyi concluded.