Buhari, Ekweremadu, others meet over South East lawmakers

President Muhammadu Buhari on Wednesday met behind closed-doors with some Federal lawmakers from the South East at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.

The group, South East Caucus in the National Assembly, presented some of the concerns and challenges of the South East to the President.

Among the delegation are the Deputy Senate President, Ike Ekweremadu, Chairman of South East Caucus, Eyinnaya Abaribe, Sam Egwu, Hope Uzodinma, Andy Uba and Chukwuka Utazi.

Speaking with State House correspondents after the meeting, Ekweremadu said: “For us from the South East, we believe that dialogue is better than any other form of engagement. So we decided to visit the President and present to him some of the concerns of the South East including the issues of roads, general infrastructure: the rail, airports.

“We also discussed the issue of security with him and of course the issue of IPOB. We had a good conversation and he promised to look into the issues.” He said

Abaribe said that the delegation also sought for more federal appointments, adding that the South East is shortchanged more than any other zone in the country.

He said: “This is the South East caucus in the Senate and we came to see the President because of the issues we have in the South East.

“We had a fruitful discussion with the President. He has promised us that he is going to look into the problems of South East.

“We know that there are problems everywhere but we also believe that the South East is the zone that is far much shortchanged at this time than other zones.

“We also talked about the issue of appointments from the South East, especially with respect to the National Security Council. The President also told us that governors of the South East have also engaged him on the same problems we engaged him on.

“There is a concerted effort from the people of the South East to be sure that we engage with this government meaningfully.

“We are reassured with the response we got from the President and we look forward to further interaction with him in this manner.” He said