Northern Youths under the aegis of the Joint Action Committee of Northern Youth Associations (JACON) has said that they are “shocked and dismayed by the anti-democratic and unjust decision” of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), to zone its presidential ticket for the 2027 elections to the South.

The group noted that the decision has shut out qualified Nigerians from the North from contesting for the presidency under PDP. Addressing a press conference in Kaduna yesterday, Ambassador Sanin Yaya, Director of media and public affairs of JACON, said the decision was not only an affront to the principles of fairness and justice, but also a monumental betrayal of the massive support the North has given the PDP since the inception of the Fourth Republic.

Yaya said for 16 years, from 1999 to 2015, the PDP held power at the federal level, a reign which was built on the solid foundation of millions of votes consistently delivered by the loyal electorate of northern Nigeria. He said: “It is undeniable historical fact that out of these sixteen years of PDP rule, the North was only allowed to produce the president for an extremely short period of two and a half years.

This is profoundly unjust. “The South, under the PDP, held the presidency for a whopping thirteen and a half years. “Therefore, the move by the governors to zone the ticket back to the South in 2027 is a deliberate attempt to permanently sideline the North and deny it the opportunity to complete its rightful share of leadership within the party that it nourished with its votes.” The group which threatened that the “marginalization will not go unanswered”, said: “We outrightly reject the zoning of the PDP presidential ticket to the South.