Benue 2023: Is Either Idoma Takes Governorship Position Or Nothing…. Group Voice Out
By Daniel Agada Jos
A group known as Benue Rebirth Movement, BRM, comprising of critical stakeholders of the Idoma Nation as well as Igede has condemned the dominance of the Tiv Nation for the number one seat which has hindered other tribes from governing the state since the advent of democracy in 1999.
Addressing reporters in Jos, Wednesday on the need for an Idoma Governor in Benue state, the chairman of BRM General Godfrey Ejiga (Rtd) alongside the National coordinator AVM Monday Morgan (Rtd) threatened that the movement would not hesitate to declare any Idoma citizens who agreed to run as a deputy governor a persona non- grata and as well chest him or her out of ancestral land.
According to him, it should now be the turn of the Idoma’s to be Governor of Benue state in 2023 following the arrangement on zoning in 1998 agreed upon by current political leaders in Benue state which was agreed in 1999 that the governorship position will rotate to zones but from the political calculation and the antecedents of Governor Samuel Ortom would not favour the Idoma’s.
Ejiga said the zoning position before 1999 was revealed and was realized that the two previous elected Governors, Aper Aku and Father Adamu were all from zone A. It was therefore, to restart from zone B, and rotate to zone C, A and B. Akume from zone B was therefore selected. At the end of Akume’s tenure in 2007, the Tiv people rejected the rotation to zone C and give it to Suswan of zone A. From Suswan, it was rotated to Ortom of zone B for the second term. Now that Ortom is about to complete his tenure in 2023, they again zone it to zone A. Thus, making zone A to produce four elected Governors while the zone C where the Idoma’s fall into would not produce in any.
The movement however, accused Governor Ortom of denying the Idoma’s the opportunity to produce the Governor over his utterances that, ” an Idoma person cannot be governor because they don’t have the population, they did not vote for him in 2015 and 2019, BRM does not consult sufficiently in Tiv area and the Idoma people do not allowed Igede people to become senator.”
Ejiga further explain that the most ridiculous of all is the call to divide Igede from Idoma by Ortom, adding that “what is the benefit that the Governor derive in creating division in the state which he govern.
He argued that if Igede people are not Idoma, how come an Igede person became Och’ Idoma (king of Idoma Nation) for 35 years. While again the only political permanently assigned to zone C by the Tiv political leaders is the seat of the deputy Governor from 1999 to date in which it described as unfair and unjust.
The BRM however, lamented that, ” we are tired of being deputy or second fiddle because in our opinion Benue needs to try an Idoma Governor to see if it will improve the fortunes of the state.
The movement revealed that the Tiv Governors from 1999 have not improved the developmental fortune of the state as Benue with all its potentials is the least develop state in Nigeria.
Ejiga said the unjust deprivation of the Idoma people from leadership is bound to create insecurity in the state, pointing that very soon the Idoma youths will revolt.
