Chief Emeka Anyaoku expresses worry over comments on 2015 elections

Abuja – Chief Emeka Anyaoku on Friday in Abuja expressed concern about
what he described `the worrisome statements' being made about the 2015
elections by a number of high-profile citizens.
Anyaoku, a former Secretary General of the Commonwealth, made the
observation in Abuja on the occasion of a lecture to commemorate the
2013Nigeria Public Service Day.
"We hear declarations from notable nationals that the president in
2015 must come from a specific area of the country.
"We also hear at the same time from similarly notable nationals that a
different area must have its full two terms of eight years.
"In our ethnically and religiously diverse country that is still to
cohere fully into one nation, the potential consequences of the
failure by either side to win the presidency in 2015 arethe grounds
for my worry.''
He, therefore, called on politicians and opinion makers to stop and
think of the implications for the country's stability of the battle
lines for the elections being drawn on sectional and ethnic basis.
Anyaoku, who was the Chairman of the occasion, said, in order to
promote national solidarity and entrench democracy, "our politicians
and leaders of thought must move away from section-based to
policy-based politics.''
He said that campaigns and advocacy of support for candidates should
be based on the manifestos of political parties outlining policies and
programmes for addressing the various challenges facing the country
and its citizens.
Anyaoku added that competition among individual candidates for
political office should be driven by specific pledges of how to serve
the various concerns of the electorate rather than sheer quest for
position for power.
He also appealed to politicians not to politicise the current "very
serious insecurity challenge confronting the country.''
"Politicisation of the challenge reinforces an environment that
conduces to the activities of the Boko Haram.''
Citing similar incidents in the U.S., UK and India in the past,
Anyaoku said leaders of political parties and ethno-cultural groups
should, in the interestof national security, support the Federal
Government's moves to checkthe excesses of the group.
"The latest killings of 16 students in Borno and Yobe, and the burning
of 50schools should stir our national conscience,'' he said. (NAN)