A group, Ebira Renaissance Group (ERG), has called for power shift in Kogi State as one of the major ways to address what it described as the poor socio-economic development of the state.
ERG, which made the call during its inauguration at the Federal College of Education in Okene, asked politicians from Kogi Central and West Senatorial districts to bury their distrust and work together in the interest of the state ahead of the 2015 general election.
ERG Coordinator, Pastor Joseph Suleiman, said the group should not be seen as a political party as its interest is the development of Ebira land and its people.
Suleiman, however, said the group was willing to work with politicians, irrespective of their party affiliation, as long as they have the vision to develop the state.
He said: “The Ebira of old were people of character. They never traded their integrity for bloodstained wealth. These are the values that we intend to rediscover and rekindle for the good of all.” Suleiman stressed that the group would work with stakeholders in the Ebira Project to bring about positive value reorientation among the people.
Chairman of the occasion, Vice-Chancellor of Sokoto State University, Prof. Nuhu Ya’qub, urged Ebira people to work constructively and peacefully with people of other Senatorial zones to actualise their mission of power shift in 2015. He said: “Ebira people must not play second fiddle in 2015, but they must not do so violently.”
Ya’qub, who lamented that education in Ebira land was no longer taken seriously, said members of the ERG should be commended for their mission of value reorientation.
