Ike Ekweremadu (left)
Dr Ike Ekweremadu, the senator representing Enugu west
constituency, has on Tuesday declared his intension to represent his
constituency for the fifth time in the senate.
According to Vanguard, Ekweremadu who disclosed this in a statement
on Tuesday morning, averred that he was persuaded by his people to
return to the senate.
“My people, the good people of Enugu West Senatorial District,
including the Enugu West Peoples Assembly, Members of the National
Assembly, Council Chairmen, members of the Enugu State Executive
Council, Enugu State Chapter of Ohanaeze Ndigbo, leaders of the PDP from
Enugu West, among others gave me a surprise on Sunday.
“They presented to me the PDP nomination form for the Senate,
which they purchased for me, requesting that I return to the Senate in
2019.
“My people, my primary employers have spoken. I have no choice than to humbly accept to run for the Senate again”, he said.
Recall that the Deputy Senate President had since May 2003
represented his people when Chimaroke Nnamani was then governor of Enugu
state. He retained the seat in 2007 when Sullivan Chime on 29 May took
over from Chimaroke.
Sullivan served for two terms before handing over to Ifeanyi
Ugwuanyi. Gburugburu is still serving for his first term and Ekweremadu
is still retaining his seat. Numerically Ekweremadu has served for
fifteen (15) consecutive years.
However, startled with the nomination form purchased by his people, Ekweremadu opined that “Instructively,
only a Few weeks ago, I reflected on my past engagements with the
people of Enugu West and I was satisfied that, by the grace of God, we
were able to make so many improvements in the lives of our people.
“I reflected on my next move and the available options. One
option is to come back to you in Enugu and run my Foundation, which will
give me opportunity to mentor young men and women in leadership. The
second is probably to go to a university and take a fulltime academic
job and also try to mentor young people in school. And behold my people
came calling.
“My people, my primary employers have spoken. I have no choice than to humbly accept to run for the Senate again.
Pointing on pure democratic principles and political inclusiveness Dr Ekweremadu stated that, “Nevertheless,
I believe that the beauty of democracy is the enlargement of the
political space in which everybody is free to participate, bring and
exchange ideas, and disagree in order to agree. Just yesterday, I got a
call from a man who introduced himself as an engineer from Achi, but
lives in Jigawa. He later came with his family to tell me that he wanted
to run for the Senate in Enugu West. I congratulated him and offered to
help purchase his nomination form. But he told me he had already bought
his form. He was quite surprised when I offered to buy form for him.
But it has always been my philosophy to help nurture the opposition, for
as far as I am concerned, all power belongs to God and we should never
try to reduce the political space. We must allow and indeed encourage
other people to participate.”