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Former Deputy President of the Senate, Senator Ike Ekweremadu, has joined the race for the governorship position in Enugu state in 2023.
He made the declaration at a press conference in Enugu, tagged “media consultation,” on Friday, March 11, 2022.
Ekweremadu is nearing the end of his fifth term in the Senate where he has been representing Enugu West since 2003.
He stated that his aspiration is to be the governor of the whole Enugu state and not just a zonal governor.
Ekweremadu insisted that he's not a believer of zoning arrangement, adding that he would introduce an all-inclusive governance that will benefit, not only a zone, but every part of the state.
Enugu state is divided into three senatorial zones which are Enugu North, Enugu East, and Enugu West.
However, there is an unwritten political arrangement in the state which the political stakeholders have used over the years to determine the zone that produces a governor.
The current governor, Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi, comes from Enugu North and it's believed that it's the turn of the Enugu East zone to produce the next governor.
Meanwhile, Ekweremadu has dismissed the zoning arrangement while maintaining that he wouldn't have been in the Senate for five terms if such an arrangement was in practice.
He said, “If anybody said there was an agreement on zoning, let that person say it. I was never a product of zoning. If there had been zoning, I’d not have been in the Senate for five times.”
The politician also added that he's running for the office to carve a new pathway for Enugu state.
Ekweremadu said if elected, he would set up an independent security outfit that would complement the existing security structures in place to ensure that the state's security challenges become a thing of the past.
He also set a six month target to solve the perennial water scarcity in the state, especially in Enugu metropolis.