Tony Okafor, Awka
Recuperating from the agony of the industrial action of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) that kept them at home for eight months, Nigerian students have vowed to mobilise 10 million votes for the candidate of the Labour Party (LP), Mr Peter Obi, in the 2023 general elections.
The Students, under the aegis of Students Obi-Datti Network (SON), made the vowed at the weekend during the inauguration of South East zonal and state executive members of SON in Awka, the Anambra State capital.
They vowed not to elect any government again that would keep them down by jeopardizing their academic growth and development like in the last ASUU strike.
The students’ structure, it was gathered gathered, comprised current and former executives of students/youth leaderships, including Students Union Government (SUG), National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS), National Youth Council of Nigeria (NYCN), NAPS, NACES, NYP
Others are: student/youth leadership from religious organisations like CYON, Anglican Youth Fellowship, Scripture Unions, Penticostal Students Fellowship, Muslim Students Fellowship and Student leadership of Club/Volunteers Organisations (Kegite, Rotracts, Environmental Union.
The occasion attracted students from universities, polythnics, Colleges of Education and other higher institutions of learning across the five states of the zone- Anambra, Enugu, Imo, Abia and Ebonyi.
Speaking, the Students ObiDatti Network National Coordinator, Comrade Kenneth Okeke, said Peter Obi and Datti Ahmed’s aspiration had taken Nigeria by storm and the OBIdients students were100 percent prepared to mobilize 10 million votes from the SON structure across geopolitical zones, states, local government, ward and the pooling unit level.
He said the purpose of setting up Students Obi-Datti Network in all the states of the federation and school campuses was to have foot soldiers who would be spreading the message of hope and redemption which Peter Obi and Datti Ahmed represent.
He said, “We are poised in deepening the conversation of domesticating the deployment and penetration of STUDENTS OBIDATTI NETWORK, in the Tertiary Institutions through voter education, booth -to-booth mobilization, awareness and sensitization campaign in all the pooling units within and around campuses across the nation.
“Our resolve to support the OBI-DATTI agenda is burn-out of the consistency between his words and his antecedence while holding sway as governor of Anambra State and his intellectual disposition towards the challenges facing Nigeria.
“Obi, during his consultation and campaign across the North and the South, he has always dealt with issue based campaigns and he has cited the vast land of the North being the new oil well of Nigeria, and his thoughts on changing the sharing formula to production formula.
“The impoverished Nigerian masses especially, students have seen Peter Obi and Datti Ahmed as their only hope of emancipation from bad governance, the more reason why they are trooping out in large numbers to support them.
“Therefore, as a group of passionate Nigerian students/youths, we took time to deliberately understudy the manifestos and body language of all top contenders for the exulted office of President of Nigeria vis a viz their track records bearing in mind their approach to security, job creation, economy and national integration. It is upon this premise that after careful observation we all agreed that the Obi-Datti mandate fits into our yearnings and aspirations and resolved to through in our support, Okeke narrated.
He noted that similar inauguration would be carried out in other remaining five geopolitical zones of the country by next week to ensure a landslide victory for the Obi-Datti ticket in the 2023 general elections.
Keynote Speaker at the event, Chinedu Idigo, who also administered the oath of office to the newly inaugurated members of the support group, said the Peter Obi and Datti Ahmed aspiration had become the biggest movement in the history of Nigeria since independence.
He said the movement had changed the Nigeria’s political equation and landscape at the moment, charging the leadership not to compromised their responsibilities while discharging their duties at their various state of origin.
A member of the new executive from Ebonyi State, Comrade Ugochukwu Joshua Dike, who spoke on behalf others, promised that they would not let down the trust and responsibilities reposes in them.
