Ndubuisi Francis and Adebiyi Adedapo in Abuja 


The Arewa Youth Integrity Forum has promised to mobilise 20 million votes across the 19 northern states for President Goodluck Jonathan’s second term ambition.

The group in a statement signed by its National President, Hamid Usman, described Jonathan as a statesman who is sympathetic to the plight of his followers.
Usman also lauded Jonathan for the courage and bravery demonstrated in visiting Nigerian troops in Maiduguri’s, describing it as a bold step.

“Travelling to Maiduguri which is seen as a hotbed for crisis as not only commendable but exemplary for all intending leaders,” he said.

While expressing support for President Jonathan, Usman said the candidate of ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) had proven his worth and deserves support from every Nigerian.

“He has what it takes to drive Nigeria to the next level, having defeated the local content of insurgency and ready to fight the foreign elements that have joined insurgents to make Nigeria ungovernable for the citizenry.

“The president had proved wrong a section of northern elders who said the president can not campaign in the North. We are confident that Mr. President will campaign anywhere in Nigeria even the north where it has been proven that he is popular against the propaganda advanced by spent horses.”

Also, the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS)  has  made a public declaration to massively support President Jonathan in the February 14 presidential poll, assuring that millions of students, who  are solidly behind him for re-election and will not let him down.

The declaration came just as the Special Adviser to the President on Niger Delta, Hon. Kingsley Kuku, accused some key opposition leaders of being hypocritical  and sympathetic to corruption based on their pedigree, even as he stated that force alone cannot resolve the current insurgency in some parts of the North.

Kuku said political, traditional, religious leaders and other elite from the north hold the key to resolving the puzzle associated with insurgency, challenging them to borrow a leaf from their compatriots from the Niger Delta who took up the gauntlet  in the heydays of militancy in that region, culminating in a truce and the eventual granting of amnesty by the federal, which ushered in the extant peace in the area.

Led by its current President, Tijani Usman Shehu,  current executive members as well as past leaders of NANS  at the weekend thronged the Maitama, Abuja office of the Special Adviser to the President on  Niger Delta in their numbers from all the zones in the country, to convey their support for Jonathan.

Present and past leaders of NANS took turns to express their resolve to rally millions of students across the country to ensure Jonathan’s victory at the polls, citing what they described as his laudable record of achievements and disposition towards upholding the rule of law.

Presenting the letter conveying NANS’ decision to support Jonathan at the February 14 poll to Kuku for onward transmission to the president, NANS President, Tijani Usman Shehu, who read out the content said “the choices facing the country today in the course of nationhood are simple: To move forward or to recede backward.

Read the concluding part of the story here :

http://www.thisdaylive.com/articles/arewa-youths-nana-endorse-jonathan-for-presidency/199559/