Anyim Pius Anyim’s Politics of Perpetual Patience is a Betrayal of the South-East -By Jeff Okoroafor

Former Senate President Anyim Pius Anyim went on Arise TV and told the South-East that it cannot produce a president “in isolation.” He said the APC should not be blamed for the PDP’s failure to zone the presidential ticket to the South-East. He said President Bola Tinubu is “entitled” to a second term. He said the South-East must support others so that others can support it.

On its face, this sounds like elder-statesman realism. In truth, it is a counsel of perpetual servitude—and it collapses under its own logic.

Anyim Pius Anyim asks what political alignment the South-East is talking about. The answer is all around him. Orji Uzor Kalu sits in the Senate and has openly pledged to nominate Tinubu for a second term. Benjamin Kalu is Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives and a loyal APC man. Dave Umahi is Minister of Works and one of Tinubu’s most vocal defenders and anchor boy. Governor Chukwuma Soludo of Anambra State, a self-described “Lagos boy,” has reconnected with Tinubu and now praises his administration. Governor Peter Mbah of Enugu State is dining and winning with the same Abuja establishment. Rochas Okorocha, Arthur Eze, and a host of other South-East figures have either joined the APC, praised Tinubu, or dismissed Peter Obi’s candidacy.

If “alignment” were the missing ingredient, the South-East would have produced a president long ago. Instead, these alignments have produced appointments, contracts, and photo opportunities—for the aligners. They have not produced the presidency for the people.

That is the first contradiction in Anyim’s sermon. He presents alignment as a precondition the South-East has failed to meet. In reality, the South-East’s political elite has been aligned with power since 1999. It voted for Obasanjo. It voted for Yar’Adua. It voted for Jonathan. It has served in every government. What it has not done is use that proximity to demand the one thing that matters: a turn at the presidency. Anyim’s “alliance” is not a strategy for Igbo presidency. It is a strategy for Igbo elite survival inside someone else’s presidency.

His absolution of the APC and PDP is equally dishonest. The presidency has rotated between the North and the South-West since 1999: Obasanjo from the South-West, Yar’Adua and Buhari from the North, Jonathan from the South-South, then Tinubu from the South-West again. The South-East has been the only major zone never to hold the office. After Buhari’s northern presidency, 2023 was the South-East’s turn by every honest reading of zoning. Instead, the PDP threw its ticket open, and the APC handed its ticket to another South-Westerner.

Anyim says there is “nothing to blame anybody about.” That is not neutrality. It is complicity. He was a former Senate President of the PDP. He knows the zoning convention was not a suggestion; it was the glue that held the federation together. When it was broken, the South-East was robbed. He should be leading the protest, not issuing indulgences.

And then there is Peter Obi, the NDC presidential candidate. Anyim says the South-East must build alliances with other regions. That is exactly what Peter Obi has done. He has reached across the Niger and built a political bridge to the North through Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso. He has assembled a national coalition that speaks to northern farmers, southern traders, young people, Christians, Muslims, and the vast mass of Nigerians who are tired of the same two-party rotation between northern and south-western elites. Peter Obi is not running as an Igbo candidate seeking Igbo votes alone. He is running as a Nigerian candidate with a South-East identity, and that is precisely the formula Anyim claims to recommend.

If Anyim truly believes what he said, he should be supporting Peter Obi, not defecting to the APC and defending Tinubu’s second term.

Instead, Anyim has made Tinubu’s re-election sound like a natural law. “Certainly the president had taken it for the South-West, and he’s entitled to a second term,” he said. No. In a democracy, no one is entitled to a second term. The Constitution allows a president to seek one; it does not command the people to grant it. Entitlement is the language of monarchy, not democracy. The people of Nigeria—northerners, southerners, Christians, Muslims, rich and poor—will decide who is entitled to what, and when. Anyim’s courtier politics is an insult to the electorate and a betrayal of the South-East he claims to defend.

Anyim is not alone. Since Peter Obi began to wax strong as the only opposition candidate with the national spread to defeat Tinubu, a procession of South-East elders has taken turns to tell the world that Peter Obi cannot win, that the South-East is not ready, that Igbos should support Tinubu, that “alignment” matters more than justice. Orji Uzor Kalu mocks Peter Obi while promoting Tinubu. Dave Umahi tells Igbos to “educate” themselves away from Peter Obi. Chukwuma Soludo questions Peter Obi’s viability while embracing Tinubu’s Abuja. Arthur Eze advises Obi to wait. Rochas Okorocha and others have made similar noises.

These are not elders. They are political contractors who have chosen the comfort of the ruling party over the liberation of their people. They fear Peter Obi because his rise exposes their irrelevance. They prefer to be big men in another man’s kingdom than to be builders of their own.

The South-East does not need more alignment with power. It needs power. It does not need more patience. It needs justice. It does not need elders who tell it to wait until 2039. It needs a candidate who can win now.

That candidate is Peter Obi. Anyim Pius Anyim’s sermon is not wisdom. It is surrender dressed in elder’s robes. The South-East should reject it—and stand with Obi.

Jeff Okoroafor

Jeff Okoroafor is a social accountability advocate and a political commentator focused on governance, accountability, and social justice in West Africa.