Students, youths, Nwoye’s main supporters

If the support of youths and students are anything to go by, the governorship candidate for the Peoples Democratic Party, Dr. Tony Nwoye, might emerge victorious in today’s Anambra State governorship election. As at Friday,  observed a massive influx of students and youths alike into the state capital – Awka, and they told our reporter that it was either Nwoye or no one else.

When cornered, most of them told our correspondent that they would vote for the PDP candidate simply because he comes from their constituency – the youth and students constituency.

A 300 level Business Administration student at Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka, Adaora Udezue, said most students of the university would cast their votes for Tony Nwoye. Udezue said that the lingering strike embarked on by the Academic Staff Union of Universities could not  work against Nwoye.

She said that  the seeming limitation had been sorted out, as a good number of NAU students returned for today’s election.

“Students from Anambra State University also returned and the yearning is that they would vote Nwoye and he must emerge victorious,”  she said.

A former president of the Student Union Government in Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Mr. Patrick Afubera, said seven out of every 10 registered youths for today’s election in Anambra would certainly vote Nwoye.

Afubera is also the Coordinator of Subsidy Re-investment Fund in Anambra North Senatorial Zone, and Coordinator of Community Services, Women and Youth Empowerment.

He said, “Nwoye has a lot of things going for him. Most of the youths voting in today’s election have in one way or the other benefitted from his past leadership positions, either as president of the Student Union Government at the University of Nigeria between 2002 and 2003, or as president of the National Association of Nigeria Students between 2003 and 2004.”

According to him, the grassroots spread of the Anambra PDP would also work in his favour, saying, “even though people tend to get confused because of the candidacy crisis of the party before now.”

However, Afubera does not envisage that the division in the Anambra PDP could affect Nwoye’s chances. He rather said there was an ongoing process to reconcile with aggrieved members of the party and those who lost the party tickets.

To him, Nwoye’s  only weakness is the delay in taking off the campaigns due to  court cases, but  he is optimistic that it won’t affect the party much.

“It has, however, been addressed up to 80 per cent because we had to work almost 22 hours a day to cover up,” he added.

The House of Representatives Committee Chairman on Capital Market, Mr. Herman Hembe, is also in  Awka to lend support to Nwoye. Though not an indigene of Anambra State, Hembe is certain of victory in the midst of several seeming weaknesses and loopholes.

The lawmaker does not agree that the seeming plan by the Ubas (Chris and Andy) to work against Nwoye would pay off.

Both Chris Uba and Andy Uba are very popular in the state and might have been instrumental to the emergence of most of those who had ruled the state in the past. But Hembe said all that was now in the past.

 “The Ubas do not have the capacity to work against Nwoye. They don’t even have the structure. If they did, Andy Uba would have pulled the structure to his side and would have won the primaries,” Hembe said