The Movement for the Actualisation of the Sovereign State of Biafra, on Tuesday, declared that an Igbo man would never become Nigeria’s president.

In a statement signed by MASSOB leader, Uchenna Madu, entitled, “We insist on Biafra through non-violence, not Igbo presidency,” the pro-secession group berated Igbo leaders, describing them as “political slaves” who had no chance of ruling the country.

Leading Igbo politicians are nursing strong hopes that the presidency would be zoned to the South-East in 2023, even as former President Olusegun Obasanjo recently suggested that the Igbo should run for the office in 2019.

But MASSOB described the expectations that an Igbo man would become the country’s president in 2019 or 2023 as mere wishful thinking.

“The Movement for the Actualisation of the Sovereign State of Biafra has declared that an Igbo man may not be President of Nigeria again because Igbo leaders are political slaves in Nigeria.

“Even 2019 and 2023 will come and go, an Igbo man will not be President of Nigeria.

“We insist on the actualisation and restoration of Biafra through non-violence, not Igbo presidency,” the group said in the statement, which was made available to journalists in Enugu.

MASSOB insisted that the presidency would remain beyond the reach of the Igbo because of the way Nigeria was “structured politically”.

It said that although the Igbo were the “largest” ethnic group in the country, Nigeria’s political structure had reduced them to a minority tribe.

The group said, “The way Nigeria is structured politically, it will be very hard for an Igbo man to be the President of Nigeria.

“The structuring almost reduced the Ndigbo to a minority tribe in Nigeria but history has always proved that the Ndigbo are the largest ethnic nationality in Nigeria.

“Even though five states were accorded to the Ndigbo in Nigeria but we are the largest ethnic group in every state after the indigenes of that state. In all the nations of the world, the Ndigbo are also the largest Nigerian ethnic nationality.

“During the Yuletide, all the states in Nigeria become temporary deserts when the Ndigbo return to their hometowns.”

MASSOB went ahead to claim that despite the population of the Igbo and the political collaboration with other ethnic groups, an Igbo man would still not be able to become Nigerian President.