Dele Momodu: Why Buhari must consider Igbo IGP

By KAYODE OYERO

Popular journalist, Dele Momodu, has urged the President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.) to appoint an Inspector General of Police of South-Eastern extraction.

According to Momodu, the President must be responsive to the dissatisfaction being voiced out by the Igbo people who claimed they were being marginalised regarding certain national appointments.

The Chief Executive Officer, Ovation Media Group, spoke on Thursday on a Facebook Live Chat monitored by The PUNCH.

The calls by interest groups for an Igbo IGP heightened this week with the expiration of the tenure of Abubakar Adamu as the IGP having reached the mandatory retirement age.

There were also similar demands last week when the President appointed four new service chiefs –Major-General Leo Irabor, Chief of Defence Staff (Delta State); Major-General Ibrahim Attahiru, Chief of Army Staff (Kaduna State); Rear Admiral A.Z Gambo, Chief of Naval Staff (Kano State); and Air-Vice Marshal I.O Amao, Chief of Air Staff (Osun State).

The PUNCH had earlier reported that the Presidency said the appointment of service chiefs was not by ethnicity but by their ability to secure lives and property in the country.

However, speaking on Thursday, Momodu said the Buhari regime must tap into the brilliance of the Igbo people in the fight against insecurity in the country.

He said the regime must not make it look like the Igbo people “committed eternal sins by fighting the civil war which ended 51 years ago”.

Momodu said, “For me, I don’t care where you come from. So, why should anyone tell me an Igbo man cannot be president, an Igbo man cannot be the Chief of Defence Staff, the Chief of Army Staff or an Igbo man cannot be the Inspector General of Police?

“I’m hearing now that the next Inspector General of Police will be a northerner or may be they have even appointed him, I don’t know.

“How can the outgoing Inspector General of Police be a northerner and then the incoming will be a northerner? I have nothing against this but every Nigerian should be given a sense of belonging and people have complained about this. A leader must be sensitive to the yearnings of his people. That is why people are crying of marginalisation.”

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The former presidential candidate noted that he has no ulterior motive by speaking for the Igbo people.

“When I speak about the Igbo, it is not because I want to contest an election or it is a political statement,” he said, adding that Nigerians must learn to live together and respect each other. (The PUNCH)