Government of Anambra state claims that its rejection of the Ohanaeze  Ndigbo’s endorsement of Alhaji Atiku Abubakar of the main opposition Peoples Democratic Party, PDP,  has nothing to do with politics or Mr. Peter Obi.

Mr C-Don Adinuba , the State Commissioner for Information and Public Enlightenment, made the clarification at a press briefing in Awka on Monday.

According Adinuba, the clarification was necessitated following the story trending in the media and instigated by the group that the state rejected the endorsement of Atiku, because of his running mate, Mr. Obi.

He owns to the facts that the state had not in any way made reference to Obi directly or indirectly in any of its interviews on the issue.

“The government and people of the state are disheartened by decisions of Ohanaeze to desecrate the memory of Zik which coincided with the date the endorsement was made,” the commissioner said.

He insisted that efforts were made to reach the leadership of Ohanaeze to shift their time to 7pm as it was not fair to hold the meeting by 10am when they knew the President was visiting the state.

Adinuba said that the plea for a change of time was to give Anambra delegation, the chance to partake in the meeting, instead they hurriedly held the meeting scheming out Ebonyi and Anambra.

The Commisioner said that the Obiano government was not concerned about who the Igbo Apex Social Cultural group throws weight on rather that the timing of their meeting clashed with President Muhammadu Buhari’s visit to the state.

He stressed further that the Ohanaeze leadership led by Chief Nnia Nwodo should have taken into consideration that Zik of Africa was being honoured on the same day of their meeting.

“Wisdom should have been applied by the leaders to give honour to whom, it is due,” he said.

And Ohanaeze Ndigbo was supposed to be part of the delegation receiving the President on such a notable day.

While pointing out that for 23 years, many administrations had come and gone without giving due reflection to finishing the mausoleum and on the day of its commissioning, Ohanaeze desecrated the memory of a worthy son of Igboland.

“The act is considered sacrilege or sabotage. Zik is the only patron of the group and he was insulted by his own, so sad,” he said.

Adinuba tagged the action Ohanaeze Ndigbo as a “political fraud” saying that group should not be political and should stop endorsing political candidates.

He recalled that Ohanaeze had in the past endorsed Jonathan, Shagari and they never won the elections, so they should stop.

In an instantaneous reaction, Chief Damian Okeke-Ogene, President of Ohanaeze Ndigbo in Anambra said that the reactions of the state government does not hold any water..

He said in a telephone interview with the News Agency of Nigeria that at first instance, the group was not in the know about the President’s visit and its timetable.

Okeke-Ogene said that the group had observed all its due process in holding meetings.

He said that the meeting was statutory and would not have been cancelled for anything and said that they honoured the request of time change from 10am to 4pm.

He said that the group had been endorsing candidates before now like other geopolitical zones.

“We endorsed Obiano and urged that the North should complete their tenure before going to South,” he said.

Okeke-Ogene said that Obiano was enjoying the endorsement of Ohanaeze Ndigbo and wondered what changed.

Also, Chief Chris Eluemunoh, the immediate past President of Ohanaeze said that the group was desecrated by the state government for not involving such an important group in a special visit like that of the president.

He said that at their level, nobody from the group would attend any function not invited and said that political leaders should learn how to respect the body.