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Tag: Dr. Goodluck Jonathan

  • Adeniyi’s book contains distorted claims, says Jonathan

    Adeniyi’s book contains distorted claims, says Jonathan

    Former President Goodluck Jonathan has said the recent book written by Segun Adeniyi, ‘Against the Run of Play’ contains distorted claims.

    Content of the book has generated a lot of reactions from those who played different roles in the 2015 election.

    He said at the appropriate time, the true account of what happened will be written by him and other characters in the election.

    Reacting to the book, Jonathan said: “I have just read Segun Adeniyi’s new book, ‘Against the Run of Play’ which has so far enjoyed tremendous reviews in the media.”

    “My take on it is that the book as presented contains many distorted claims on the 2015 Presidential election by many of the respondents.
    “There will obviously be more books like that on this subject by concerned Nigerians.

    “However, I believe that at the right time, the main characters in the elections including myself will come out with a true account of what transpired either in major interviews or books,” Jonathan said.

  • Ensure peace in your domains, Jonathan task rulers

    Ensure peace in your domains, Jonathan task rulers

    Former president Dr Goodluck Jonathan has tasked traditional rulers to ensure peace in their domains.

    Jonathan gave the advice on Tuesday during the official presentation of Staff of Office to the monarch of Gbaramatu Kingdom, Oboro Gbaraun 11 Aketekpe, Agadagba, Pere of Gbaramatu Kingdom.

    The ceremony was performed in Oporoza, the administrative headquarters of Gbaramatu Kingdom.

    The king who is the 26th Pere of Gbaramatu kingdom ascended the Royal Stool on March 15, 2016.

    The former president said that no meaningful development could be achieved in an atmosphere of rancour.

    ”There cannot be development without peace so it is the duty of the traditional rulers to ensure that peace reigns in their communities,” he said.

    Jonathan said that he was quite impressed with the level of peace in Gbaramatu despite the perception outside that the kingdom is volatile and unsafe.

    ”Today we are all happy, the way we hear of Niger Delta and indeed Gbaramatu, you may think that people cannot gather together here peacefully,” he said.

    Jonathan urged the people to support the new monarch to enable him to have a successful reign.

    Also speaking the Delta State Governor, Ifeanyi Okowa said there was no alternative to peace.

    He expressed joy at the different ethnic nationalities present at the ceremony saying that his government was committed to entrenching unity among the diverse ethnicities.

    The governor also urged the people to only agitate in a constructive manner by way of embracing dialogue.

    He said that his administration was committed to developing the riverine communities.

    ”It is time to start embracing peace. We need to stay together to move forward as a state and as a people.

    ”We need to start showing our presence in the creek and the only way we can do that is for people to create the right atmosphere to generate resources.

    ”If after two years you do not begin to see changes, you can hold us responsible,” he said.

    The monarch, Oboro Gbaraun 11 said he would build bridges of understanding with all the neighbouring ethnic nationalities to engender oneness.

    The highlight of the event was the presentation of staff of office to the king as well as a boat regatta by various Ijaw communities in the kingdom.

    Mr Kingsley Otuaro, Delta Deputy Governor, Mr Monday Igbuya Speaker, Delta House of Assembly attended the ceremony.

    Others were: traditional rulers from Urhobo, Itsekiri, Ijaw nations, members of the National and Delta House of Assembly, Commissioners, Clergymen and representatives of US Consulate among others.

  • Group accuses Amaechi of ganging up against Jonathan

    Group accuses Amaechi of ganging up against Jonathan

    The forum of Niger Delta Clan Chiefs and Elders has observed with dismay the heightened gang-up by political detractors within the current Government to completely tarnish the reputation of former President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan.

    The forum which rose from an emergency meeting in Warri, Delta State, Tuesday, fingered the Minister for Transportation, Rotimi Amaechi as being the arrowhead behind efforts to clampdown on former President Jonathan and his wife Patience Jonathan, with whom Mr. Amaechi has had a long history of political rivalry and conflict, respectively.

    In a communique made available to the media, the group through its spokesman, Chief Comewell Derioteidou, urged President Buhari not to be further drawn into a conflict with the Niger Delta on the advice of enemies of the region, whose sole aim is political capital, but to see how amicable resolutions can be reached in order to douse escalated tensions and promote peace in the region.
    The group expressed dismay that the statesmanship of the former President in conceding defeat voluntarily in spite of the many controversies surrounding the election is being mocked by the Nigerian nation and warned that the Niger Delta people will not sacrifice their own for Nigeria.

    According to Chief Derioteidou, “Our people will not fold our arms and watch the good name of Jonathan destroyed by politicians. We have heard all sorts of amounts being bandied in the media against Jonathan’s wife and wonder why Abacha’s wife, YarAdua’s wife and the others who have universities in their name are not being subjected to the same scrutiny. Why is Jonathan being picked on? What are they afraid of? Did he not leave them with the power?”

    The group further wondered why the Abachas who are renowned looters are enjoying clemency while leading voices of the Niger Delta are being clamped down.

    “It portents danger for everyone,” the group added. “Crisis in the Niger Delta at this time of economic downturn is grave crisis for Nigeria. It is high time the attacks are put to an end. Amaechi and his buccaneers must know that they are not unknown to our people.” Chief Derioteidou maintained.

  • Niger Delta declares ‘War on Books’

    Niger Delta declares ‘War on Books’

    • “A book must stir you up to do something. To be, we have to think.” ~ Ken Saro-Wiwa”

    For decades, the Niger Delta has been engaged in agitations over the exploitation and neglect of the region by the Federal Government of Nigeria. The region is responsible for over 90% of the revenue that accrues to the Nigerian State.

    Isaac Boro, an Ijaw Nationalist is a forerunner of the Niger Delta struggle. Being a man of conviction, youthful passion and exuberance, he led the region into an historic declaration of the Niger Delta Republic characterized by arms bearing which has since defined the Niger Delta struggle.

    But things are changing in the Niger Delta, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan, an Ijaw man became President of Nigeria and the zone was pacified.

    Niger Delta Books 2The former President, who launched a National bring back the books campaign and oversaw a Niger Delta amnesty programme that witnessed a lot of emphasis on education and training, seems to have set an agenda for his people unsuspectingly.

    Mr. Udengs Eradiri, the President of the Ijaw Youth Council (IYC) who was preceded by the fiery Asari Dokubo and Kaima declaration signatory, Mr. Felix Tuodolo has taken up the charge and has decided to declare a war on books in an attempt to change the course of the struggle in changing times.

    What is not lost upon him is the simple quote ‘Knowledge is Power’ and Mr. Eradiri has taken this message to the Niger Delta youths as the new alternative to violence, arms bearing and insurgency.

    Eradiri’s IYC has sent a strong message to impress this philosophy with the launch of a Library and Information Communication Technology (ICT) Centre at the Ijaw House in Yenagoa, Bayelsa state. He said ‘First of all, they must be educated’ and added that the initiative was set up ‘to create an environment to develop young people’, he said the motives of  ‘a library and an ICT centre’ is primarily ‘to change the perception of our young people’ while it o provide costless means of studying and quality research through internet-linked laptops and computers.

    Mr. Eradiri, said that the center will be used as a resource and also a training hub for youths while noting that it shall develop programmes and ‘enter into agreements to encourage learning among the youths’.Niger Delta Book 1

    Mr. Eradiri’s IYC has entered into partnership with Books to Africa, a UK based international Non-governmental Organization, which donated about 1000 books that formed the first stock of the library and ICT center which has dozens of Computers. The NGO is known to give books from donors majorly in the UK to need areas in Africa.

    The library was named in the honor of the late Dr. Oronto Douglas, a renowned intellectual and writer who has traversed the globe in pursuit of the Niger Delta struggle.

    The Ijaw Youth Council pledged to contribute its quota to ‘ensuring that it (the forum) becomes a breeding ground for leadership.’

    ‘And how do you breed leaders?’ asked Eradiri who intimated the people present at the launch of the facility of the Educational Endowment which his leadership has instituted. He challenged other eminent indigenes and business interests  in the Niger Delta region to contribute to the endowment funds.

    Meanwhile the fortunes of Oil which the bedrock of the agitation is in steady reversal. The instruments of the impending Ijaw resurgence will be data not bazookas.

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  • Events that shaped Nigeria’s politics in 2015

    Events that shaped Nigeria’s politics in 2015

    The most significant event of the out-going year was the election of Muhammadu Buhari, who defeated incumbent Dr. Goodluck Jonathan. The year witnessed a flurry of political activities from the beginning to the end. Deputy Political Editor RAYMOND MORDI highlights the major political events of the year.

    THE year 2015 has been significant politically for Nigeria. Being an election year, political activities dominated the year. Owing to the merger that produced the All Progressives Congress (APC) in 2013, it was clearly foreseen that the 2015 general elections was going to be a keenly-contested one. Indeed, there were no dull moments throughout the period; since the election was scheduled to take place in early in the first quarter of the year, there was a flurry of political activities from the beginning of the year to the end.

    The purported prediction by the United States that the country will breakup in 2015 added to the tension surrounding the election. Tension soaked the entire country in the buildup of activities prior to the contest.

    The month of January provided a foreboding of what would later happen during the general elections when Enugu State-based Rev. Father Ejike Mbaka of the Adoration Ministry fame prophesied to the chagrin of the authorities then that former President Goodluck Jonathan was likely to lose his re-election bid.

    Mbaka had said: “Jonathan has ruled for six years. We need change; NEPA is not working because of corruption; the privatisation of public companies has not yielded any fruit because of corruption; Nigerians are sick and tired of wasting innocent lives without government doing enough to stop the destruction.”

    In the same month, President Muhammadu Buhari’s qualification to contest the election became an issue in the media, following the declaration by the Nigerian Army that it was not in possession of the West African School Certificate (WASC) with which the then presidential candidate of the APC enrolled into the Nigerian Military Training College in 1962.

    The Director of Army Public Relations (DAPR) Brig-Gen. Olajide Laleye stressed at a press briefing in Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) that the Army had to make the clarification following barrage of requests from individuals and corporate organisations seeking to know the true position of Buhari’s credentials.

    On February 7, the then Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Prof. Attahiru Jega, shocked the nation when he announced a postponement of the general elections earlier scheduled for February 14 and 29 by six weeks; with the Presidential and National Assembly elections to take place March 28, while the governorship and State Assemblies election was shifted to April 11. Jega, who announced the postponement at a press conference, said the delay until March 28 was necessary because of a lack of troops available to protect voters.

    The postponement was however greeted with protest from the then opposition party, the APC. The party accused the military of forcing the electoral commission into the delay to help the sitting president’s campaign. APC chairman John Odigie-Oyegun said the “highly provocative” move was a “major setback for Nigerian democracy”.

    The much-awaited March 28 presidential election came and Nigerians trooped out to cast their ballots and the rest is history. When the results were announced, former military ruler and the APC flag bearer in the election became the first opposition candidate to win a presidential election, by beating the then incumbent President Jonathan by more than 2.5 million votes. The APC got 15,424,921 votes and the PDP received 12,853,162 votes.

    In a show of sportsmanship, Jonathan telephoned his rival to concede defeat. “I promised the country free and fair elections. I have kept my word,” Jonathan said in a statement. He did not even wait till the end of the exercise before he congratulated Buhari. A spokesman for APC praised Jonathan, saying: “He will remain a hero for this move. The tension will go down dramatically.”

    Subsequently, Buhari’s supporters took to the streets, to celebrate, by dancing and singing in APC strongholds, including the northern cities of Kano and Kaduna. According to observers, the March 28 presidential election was the most keenly-contested one so far in the Fourth Republic.

    Buhari’s victory produced a bandwagon effect on the April 11 governorship and State Assemblies elections; with the APC winning a landslide over PDP. The APC won 19 of the 28 states where governorship election were held, thereby relegating the once-powerful PDP to a regional party. The PDP failed to get a national spread of votes, doing well only in the Southeast and the oil-rich Southsouth states. Most states in the North went to the APC, along with the commercial hub of Lagos in the Southwest. Elections were not held in seven states.

    While the election was largely peaceful, experts were of the opinion that the participation of Nigerians in the election in terms of turnout was low when placed side-by-side the number of voters who trooped out en masse to cast their ballots in the presidential election. The situation in Lagos State was made peculiar by the Oba of Lagos, Rilwan Akiolu’s threat on the Igbo community that they should vote his preferred candidate, Akinwumi Ambode, or get drowned in the lagoon.

    The month of May witnessed the change of guard in the nation’s leadership as former President Jonathan handed over to his successor, President Buhari on May 29. The high-point of the event was Buhari’s declaration that he “belongs to everybody and belongs to nobody.”

    The following month (June), the 8th National Assembly was inaugurated in an event that witnessed lots of intrigues, particularly at the Senate. Members of the ruling APC had, earlier in the day, gone for a purported meeting with President Buhari, of which they returned only to discover that the majority PDP lawmakers that were on seat then had elected one of their own, Chief Ike Ekweremadu as the Deputy Senate President, while helping Senator Bukola Saraki to become the Senate President against the wish of his party leaders.

    In the House of Representatives, Hon. Yakubu Dogara from the Northeast got elected as Speaker in contravention of the resolve of the APC hierarchy to install Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila from the Southwest as Speaker. The party leadership could also not have its way in who becomes Dogara’s deputy as Hon. Yusuf Lasun from the Southwest clinched the position.

    In July, a major breakthrough was recorded in Nigeria’s fight against Boko Haram insurgents as the Nigerian Air Force on the 29th announced that its patrol and surveillance activities have blocked routes through which petroleum products and other materials are supplied to the extremist sect. It disclosed that over 4,000 drums and jerry cans of petroleum products and other smuggled items meant for the terrorists were intercepted.

    The following month, the Centre for Crisis Communication (CCC) announced that some of the Boko Haram terrorists have started making contacts with the Centre to help initiate a dialogue process with the Federal Government on their behalf. Executive Secretary of the CCC, Air Commodore Yusuf Anas (rtd), said: “The efforts by some members of the group to get across to the Centre and the discussions we have had, have been encouraging. We have taken measures also to ascertain the genuineness or otherwise of these persons. We believe they are ready for genuine dialogue.”

    In the early days of the arms procurement scandal for the nation’s military shortly after Directorate of State Security (DSS) operatives raided his homes in Sokoto and Abuja in August, former National Security Adviser, Col. Sambo Dasuki (rtd) released images of the weaponry procured by the Jonathan administration in which he served. He listed the acquisitions to include Alpha jets, Armoured Personnel Carriers (APCs), Mine Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) vehicles, advanced artillery pieces, assorted arms and ammunitions, highly sophisticated surveillance drones, T72 main battle tank, stressing that the administration carried out modification of F7 supersonic jet fighters.

    Courtesy of a British Broadcasting Service (BBC) Hausa Service interview, President Buhari explained to Nigerians in the month of September why he carried out appointments many claim are “lopsided” and are tilted to favour the President’s northern part of the country. He pointed out in the interview that the Constitution allowed him full control over the choice of his closest officials, explaining: “If I select people whom I know quite well in my political party, whom we came all the way right from the APP, CPC and APC, and have remained together in good or bad situation, the people I have confidence in and I can trust them with any post, will that amount to anything wrong?”

    In fulfillment of his pledge that he would appoint ministers in the month of September, the President on the last day of the month submitted a list of his ministerial nominees to the Senate President, Bukola Saraki after the Upper Chamber adjourned for the day.

    The list had the long-time associates of the President, politicians, as well as technocrats with no known political affiliations. The nomination of the immediate past governor of Rivers State, Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi, was vehemently opposed by Senators from his state such that the Senate’s public petitions committee was tasked to investigate the petitions written against his nomination and that of others. On the day, the Senate was to confirm the screening of Amaechi and 17 others, members of the PDP in the upper chamber staged a walk-out after they unsuccessfully tried to convince their APC counterparts to heed the recommendations of the public petitions committee by not confirming Amaechi as minister.

    But, Nigerians had to wait till November for the inauguration of the Federal Executive Council (FEC) and the assignment of portfolios to the new ministers. The month also witnessed the sad news of the demise of the APC governorship candidate in Kogi State, Prince Abubakar Audu. He died the same day the November 21 governorship election was declared inconclusive by INEC. The Returning Officer, Prof. Emmanuel Kucha declared the election inconclusive because the margin of votes with which Audu defeated his closest rival, Governor Idris Wada, was less than the 49, 953 number of cancelled votes. Though INEC has concluded the Kogi governorship election, the complications arising from the incident are yet to be resolved.

    The month of December witnessed another inconclusive election; this time in Bayelsa State. It was declared inconclusive following the eruption of violence in Southern Ijaw Local Government Area, which is believed to be a swing local government.

    During the year, a number of prominent citizens including royal fathers and politicians lost their lives. Some of the deceased passed away suddenly and unexpectedly, while others went quietly. Other prominent Nigerians who lost their lives in 2015, aside from Prince Audu, are: Emir of Gusau, Alhaji Muhammad Kabir Danbaba (March 5); the Special Adviser to former President Goodluck Jonathan on Research, Documentation and Strategy, Oronto Douglas (April 19); the Ooni of Ife, Oba Okunade Sijuwade (July 28); former Ambassador to the United States of America Adebowale Adefuye (August 27); . the Olu of Warri, Ogiame Atuwatse II (September 5); and the wife of the late nationalist, Hannah Idowu Dideolu Awolowo (September 19). The list also includes: former Bayelsa State governor Diepreye Alamieyeseigha (October 10); the Emir of Borgu, Senator Haliru Dantoro Kitoro III (October 10); and athe Tor Tiv, Alfred Akawe Torkula (November 23).

  • One hundred days later

    One hundred days later

    One hundred days ago, heady optimism filled the air as President-elect Muhammadu Buhari took the oath of office.  The momentum had built up steadily through the campaign, and not even Dr Goodluck Jonathan’s panicked postponement of the presidential election could stop it.  Buhari’s emphatic victory consolidated the momentum, rendering the change that lay at the core of his agenda more insistent still.

    Not since 1975 when Murtala Muhammed and Olusegun Obasanjo shoved aside General Yakubu Gowon’s exhausted military regime has such optimism swept the country.

    The enthusiasm was understandable.  Jonathan had inflicted grave damage on virtually every aspect of Nigerian life in his six years of misrule, the culmination of which was a systems collapse.  There could not have been a more eloquent epitaph to his tenure.

    The change Buhari and the APC had promised was about to be launched and, finally, the translation of Nigeria’s vaunted potential into actuality was going to start in earnest.

    However, large swathes of the country refused, for all kinds of reasons, to be caught up in the wave, some from habit, some from genuine doubt, some from indifference and some from fear of retribution, especially those individuals and groups and blocs that had profited immensely from the systemic corruption and impunity that were the directive principles of the Jonathan administration.

    Iyiola Omisore, a stalwart of the PDP, spoke a greater than he intended or realised when he admonished the faithful on the eve of the last election that the PDP was “nothing without the Presidency.”  Message:  Win the presidential election at all cost, or face decline and oblivion.

    That prospect is real.  Desperately short on cash, the PDP secretariat recently served notice that it was going to cut its army of staffers and hangers-on by 50 per cent, and then cut by 50 per cent the pay of those who survive the attrition.

    Back when the PDP, the self-proclaimed biggest political party in Africa, was in power, that was unthinkable. The so-called Presidency, of which it was an arm — or was it the other way around? – would have stepped in with a train-load of cash to keep it going.

    But it is a tribute to the PDP’s tenacity that as it struggles for its life, it is showing the kind of innovativeness it could not muster in its glory days, even its life depended on it.   It has launched a hi-tech national campaign, biometrics and all, to recruit young persons into its thinning ranks – the same young people whose lives and prospects it blighted for 16 years.

    For six of those 16 years, the Jonathan-led PDP government saw the young people mainly as a reservoir from which to rent its crowds to create the illusion of popularity, only that the young men and women were sometimes not paid the promised rent at all, or were heavily short-changed.

    None in the PDP is trying more desperately than its pathetic National Publicity Secretary, Olisa Metuh, to shore up its sinking fortunes.  Day in day out he is grinding out hysterical screeds that say more about his detachment from reality than about Buhari’s failings, real or imagined.

    Does he seriously believe his own charge that Buhari has in just 100 days destroyed not only the robust economy he allegedly inherited from Jonathan, but indeed all the wonders allegedly wrought by Jonathan’s transformation agenda?

    The truth is that Jonathan inflicted grave damage on every aspect of Nigerian life, and the consequences will be with us for a long time.  What he handed to Buhari was a poisoned chalice.

    That is the background against which Buhari’s first 100 days in office must be judged.

    Those who saw him as the new messiah who would build all the road networks and hospitals and fast trains within that period and deliver to every home trays of fresh-baked potato bread that was reserved exclusively for Dr Jonathan’s breakfast table will doubtless be gravely disappointed.

    So also would those who expected Boko Haram to hand over the Chibok girls or morph into an international relief organiszation, or that Nigeria would overnight become a net exporter of electric power, or that importers would resume paying premium price for Nigeria’s crude oil, or that the Naira would attain parity with U.S. Dollar and greater purchasing power than the Euro.

    And so also would those who believed that Buhari would make life more abundant for all Nigerians within his first 100 days in office.

    They all are entitled to their disappointment, but they must blame it more on their delusions than on what the man said he was going to do or what he could reasonably be expected to do.

    If Buhari’s supporters and opponents can agree on one thing, it would have to be that he has not moved mountains.  He has not moved mountains.

    But he has arrested the drift of the Jonathan years and given purpose and direction to governance.  He has served notice that the depredations of the Jonathan years will no longer              be tolerated, and that the brazen impunity of that era will have no place under his watch.

    In the past, you could abuse the public trust with the utmost contempt, confident that you could use the elastic framework of the law not merely to escape but to prevent justice, and then live happily ever after with your loot.

    Henceforth, that will not be so easy. Buhari has set up a committee of eminent jurists and scholars to devise ways of removing, without doing violence to fundamental legal principles, those loopholes and technicalities that have stood as barriers to justice.

    To be effective, the war on corruption must be as comprehensive as possible.  But in practical terms, it must have a boundary.   However you draw it, the boundary will necessarily be arbitrary. The important thing is to start somewhere, and make sure that appropriate lessons are taught.

    Corruption has reached such an alarming degree in public life in Nigeria because no lessons were taught. And because no lessons were taught, no lessons were learned.

    Nigerians are used to judging government performance mainly on the basis of tangibles – roads and hospitals built or rehabilitated, electric power generated, jobs created, etc. On this score, Buhari has achieved next to nothing.  The period in review is too short even to process a contract for a major project.

    But governance is also about restoring faith and confidence in the system, creating a climate for recovery, in which people believe that government can be made to work for them rather than for a few — intangibles on which the attainment of other deliverables may well hinge.

    Buhari has instituted a dynamic of accountability.  By making public his material assets and those of Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, he has set an example that other public officials will find it hard to ignore.  He has begun the difficult task of re-building the value system that the political class in and out of uniform has destroyed.  He is establishing an environment in which mountains can be moved.

    I suspect that most Nigerians now feel more optimistic about the country’s prospects today than they did in the twilight of the Jonathan era, if not throughout its duration.

    That, as I see it, is a good start.

    But there is much more work to do.  Buhari should name a cabinet immediately, not only to give shape and direction to his administration, but also to stem growing criticism that he is running the country as if he was leader of a military regime rather than a democratically-elected president

    His cabinet should reflect the abundance of talent and expertise with which Nigeria is endowed,  as well as the country’s plural identities.

  • Photo: Jonathan’s valedictory photo with ministers

    Photo: Jonathan’s valedictory photo with ministers

    President Goodluck Jonathan and Vice President Mohammed Namadi Sambo with the Female Ministers in a Valedictory Group Photograph at the Presidential Villa in Abuja. PHOTO: AKIN OLADOKUN
    President Goodluck Jonathan and Vice President Mohammed Namadi Sambo with the Female Ministers in a Valedictory Group Photograph at the Presidential Villa in Abuja. PHOTO: AKIN OLADOKUN

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

    President Goodluck Jonathan (centre),Vice President Mohammed Namadi Sambo, Secretary to the Government of the Federation Senator Anyim Pius Anyim, the Head of Service Danladi Kifasi and other members of Federal Executive Council in a Valedictory Group Photograph at the Presidential Villa in Abuja on Tuesday. PHOTO: AKIN OLADOKUN
    President Goodluck Jonathan (centre),Vice President Mohammed Namadi Sambo, Secretary to the Government of the Federation Senator Anyim Pius Anyim, the Head of Service Danladi Kifasi and other members of Federal Executive Council in a Valedictory Group Photograph at the Presidential Villa in Abuja. PHOTO: AKIN OLADOKUN
  • From GEJ to GMB: A poisoned chalice

    From GEJ to GMB: A poisoned chalice

    Early in Dr Goodluck Jonathan’s presidency, I asked an eminent and influential public figure who was in a position to know — I asked him whether Dr Jonathan was up to the task.

    ‘Without hesitation, no,” he said, his voice tinged with pained disappointment.

    He went on to relate how Dr Jonathan would arrive at meetings not having studied his briefing papers, and how he would often doze off during meetings he himself had convened.

    Nor was the eminent person impressed by Dr Jonathan’s inner circle, men and women who had  no business being on such hallowed ground – “ ragamuffins,” — he called them.  They caroused far into the night, with their host holding court– as it were.

    I had no reason to doubt my source, a person of few but measured words. But I checked his assessment with two other public figures, persons of consequence in their own right, who were also in a position to know whether Dr Jonathan was up to the job.

    Each, separately, concurred in the assessment of my first source.

    That was early in the Jonathan presidency.  As the years passed by, he may have cut down on the night-time carousing and learned to stay attentive and engaged during meetings. But mastery of his brief, or of any public issue for that matter, eluded him throughout his presidency, now mercifully set to end next Friday.

    You could never accuse him of having a firm grasp on any issue, be it commonplace routine or recondite, despite his advertised doctorate in ichthyology.  You could never accuse him of profundity, of lofty thought, the type that springs from a lofty mind.  You could not even accuse him of honest-to-goodness blandness.

    Dr Jonathan was, well, Dr Jonathan.

    It has to be said, however, that he did not seek the office.  He did not envisage public office outside the bucolic enclave where he had spent his entire life until national service took him to Osun State. And as soon as he completed the one-year deployment, he returned to familiar surroundings. All his three degrees came from the University of Port Harcourt, which further locked him into the insularity that he was never able to shed.

    Catapulted from deputy governor in Bayelsa to state governor, to vice president, and then to president of the Republic in two dizzy years, from obscurity to celebrity and to the global stage as it were, Dr Jonathan was more than overwhelmed.

    Nothing had prepared him for such preferment. He never rose to its opportunities.

    Instead he took refuge in a Transformation Agenda that was more slogan than substance, so much motion but, alas, very little movement.   Meetings of the Federal Executive Council became contract bazaars, at the end of which contract awards were solemnly announced as if they were epochal achievements.  And for the most part, nothing was heard again about them.

    Dr Jonathan felt much more comfortable traipsing all over the country in gaudy apparel to attend to the affairs of the dysfunctional PDP than sitting down and contemplating how to make Nigeria work for the masses of the people.  Nigeria was working well for him and his cronies. The formerly shoeless boy had a fleet of 11 executive jets at his beck and call, a one billion naira budget for food and beverages.  What could be sworn with a system like that?

    Despite all the talk of transformation, Dr Jonathan could not build an independent power facility for the Presidential Villa and its complementary facilities.. Nor could he raise to world class the National Hospital that serves the Presidency to world class.  Why bother when he could always hop off in an executive jet for treatment in European hospitals?

    Being at the helm and reveling in the perks was what mattered the most to Dr Jonathan.  Performance was of no consequence, whether at the national level or in the states where the PDP held sway, more by crook than by hook.  Perversity and impunity thrived without even perfunctory remonstrance, especially in the PDP states or in the ministries, departments and agencies headed by its stalwarts.

    It is in fact the case that, the greater the perversity and the impunity perpetrated in those domains, the greater the tacit support of the Jonathan presidency.

    The PDP was never a political party, in any case.  It has always been a patronage organisation, held together by the power of federal patronage.  One of its chieftains, Iyiola Omisore, spoke a greater truth than he intended or realised when, in a plea for party unity, he urged squabbling camp followers to remember that the PDP was nothing without the presidency.

    Omisore was splendidly vindicated when, following the PDP’ rout two months ago in the general elections, its senior officials and card-carrying supporters started jumping ship by the thousands.  The cookie on which they had gorged themselves remorselessly for 16 unbroken years had crumbled.

    Jonathan presided over a comprehensive collapse of state institutions and the national value system.   In almost no area of national life can Nigerians say with confidence that they are better off today than they were four years ago when Jonathan was voted into office on his own.

    At its best, Nigeria generated in the Jonathan years only a small fraction of what a platinum mine in South Africa generates for its operations.  When they work at all, Nigeria’s four oil refineries produce less than one-half of the nation’s needs; the balance is imported through a system that is about as transparent as a steel door.

    Nigeria has been mired in corruption on a scale beyond belief.  But to Dr Jonathan, the problem is ordinary stealing, and we only compound matters when we call it corruption.

    Faced with the devastation over which he has presided, it might be thought that a contrite Jonathan would accept that he was not up to the task, thank Nigerians for the jolly good ride he has had, and humbly vacate the scene.

    Instead, he engineered a false consensus to clinch the PDP’s presidential ticket and sought desperately to buy or steal the presidential election, employing in the process some of the most despicable tactics ever seen in these parts.

    Instead of consolidating the ethnic solidarity that had triumphed over the machinations of a cabal  bent on preventing him from taking power following the death of his principal, and had thereafter given him a strong mandate for a substantive term of his own, he resorted to ethnic-baiting and incitement.

    In the twilight of his disastrous tenure, Dr Jonathan launched out on an activist streak, making major appointments, dismissing senior personnel, setting up new institutions,  threatening to link all 36 state capitals by rail, and even vowing to become a statesman, as if that is a position to which one can appoint oneself.

    He has even cast himself as a super patriot who has always been ready to lay down his life for Nigeria. Coming from a president and commander-in-chief of the armed forces who could not bring himself to go near Chibok where Boko Haram abducted 230 young women from their      school hostel and stole their future, this has got to be the height of delusion.

    The system collapse Nigeria is experiencing now is an eloquent epitaph to Dr Jonathan’s inept rule. The damage he has inflicted on every aspect of Nigerian life will be with us for a long time. What he is handing to President-elect Muhammadu Buhari is nothing less than a poisoned chalice.

  • Forgive us if we offended you, Jonathan pleads

    Forgive us if we offended you, Jonathan pleads

    President Goodluck Jonathan on Sunday delivered his valedictory message to worshipers at the Aso Rock Chapel during a thanksgiving service.

    Excerpts from the message follows:

    “No system is perfect. Every human system must have an element of imperfection. For the period of eight years that we have been here. I will take the period as a block because my transition from VP to President was gradual and complicated. It was intertwined so you cannot actually draw the line.

    “Because when the President was challenged within major health issues, I was running the country for sometimes even before the doctrine of necessity made me as acting president. Then I took over at first and conducting the 2011 election I won and I had to run my full four years as an elected president.

    “So for the eight that one has been there, definitely one is not perfect. We have certainly done things that probably we wouldn’t have done that way, but we didn’t do things deliberately. So for those who we have offended it was not deliberate, it was circumstances of the office.

    “So we also plead that those people should forgive, we think we have done our best. You can do your best and your friends may misunderstand you. Today we are talking about leaving, it is only God that knows why things go the way they do.

    “We came in as Vice President and my wife, today we are leaving as the former president and former First Lady. We have achieved it through you. Let me specifically thank the chaplain, the clergymen, the pastors and their wives.

    “For the past eight years we have every reason to be thankful to God. Every individual has his/her own calling. I also believe that people who take over political leadership have their own callings to do specific things. No one, head of a government, be it at the national level or the sub- regional levels can do every thing.

    “But when you leave, you will want to do something to show that yes I was here. The chaplain has said that nothing is perfect, if you wait for perfection, you cannot achieve anything.

    “Ordinarily 24th of May would haven been the last Service here. But that 24th, we will all go to the National Christian Centre for the inauguration service. So for me and my wife, this is our last day of worship here.

    “Though we are leaving as president and First Lady, but we have not left you, because we are still in this country, we will continue to interact one way or the other, probably along the line we may even come closer. I believe some of you may even come closer, and even do more meaningful things together when we leave office.

    I don’t really believe that it is only in government that you can do thing, even outside government you do a lot of things. The richest people in the world don’t even serve in government.

    Dangote has never been in government, so you don’t need to be in government to be rich. Bill Gates has not been in government. So outside government a lot of things happen, it is for us to be committed and continue to be focus. Me and my wife really love all of you.”

  • Religious politics is bad for Nigeria – Bishop Ighele

    Religious politics is bad for Nigeria – Bishop Ighele

    Bishop Charles Ighele is The General Superintendent of Holy Spirit Mission (Happy Family Chapel) read Political Science at the then University of Ife. He spoke with David Lawal on the lamentable roles of religion in the just-concluded general elections. Excerpts:  

    How have you been able to use your background in political science to advance religion?

    After graduating in 1980, I have seen that my background in political science and history has helped me to see how decision-making brought about a lot of suffering to families in different parts of the world.

    You now see that the way government is run, the way government is advised to do things, the quality of the citizens and how much the citizens are ready to be a part of the system. All these helped me. When I studied bureaucracy in the university, it made me understand bureaucratic bottlenecks.

    It is helping me so much in the ministry, and when you look at the bible; in the New Testament, in the Acts of Apostles, you will see people sell parts of their properties to take care of the poor and this is what the church has always stood for.

    This is how it supposed to be because it is not about we men of God getting extremely rich and the people getting extremely poor. We were not anointed just for us to feel good and be rich. We were anointed because God has other people in mind. That is what I keep telling people, it is not about us – it is about the people.

    Can religion and politics walk together for the good of the people?

    Well (smiles) you know as a preacher when you look at the Old Testament, you would see the mixture. You see religion and you see politics or should I call it governance. People like King David. You can’t divorce the two but the church has to be interested in the quality of the leaders that are arising.

    So you can’t separate the two. As far as I am concerned, I don’t believe in this is spiritual and this is secular; everything goes together.

    So, you are saying that religion and politics go together. You didn’t mention that clearly enough.

    Well, I didn’t really talk about partisan politics. Consequently, there is something known as partisan politics. What is politics? I don’t want to go into defining what politics is. But you see, man critically cannot be divorced from governance; man cannot be divorced from the people in charge unless you want to live on an island like Robinson Crusoe.

    So, there is also one known as partisan politics. Personally, I am interested in politics; I follow it to the minute details, just as I also follow football. I am not a footballer but I follow it and then I am not a politician but I follow it. I am interested in politics but I am not in partisan politics.

    What do you really mean when you say partisan politics?

    Well, partisan politics is when you decide to join a party then be a politician in that particular party, which I have personally said I will not go into. Now, I’m not saying that some of my colleagues who have gone into it have done anything wrong. As far as I am concerned, there are two groups of pastors, two groups of preachers.

    There is a group of pastors called to go into partisan politics just like somebody can also be a journalist and a pastor. Somebody can be a medical doctor and also a pastor. Somebody can be a pharmacist and also a pastor; somebody can be a footballer and a pastor. So, somebody can be a pastor and also be into partisan politics.

    I don’t condemn them at all but there is yet another group. This particular group, God has taken them to a status and God has put them in a place whereby their own is to act as fathers in the land but it does not mean that a father cannot support any of the children. People like Pastor Enoch Adeboye and Bishop Mike Okonkwo would not go into partisan politics; they belong to this other group I am talking about.

    How do you assess the last general elections?

    I did not like the last elections. I am not talking about those who won and those who lost. I am not going into that at all but you see the forces of religion and ethnicity. These two forces played a major role. Jigawa state governor, Sule Lamido, said during the campaigns that if you were campaigning for Jonathan in the north they will call you a pastor.

    In the north, people were told to vote for Buhari. Now in many churches in parts of the south, there was a lot of campaign also in the churches. People were told not to vote for a Muslim. In the north, Muslims were told not to vote for Christians.

    So, that is what I didn’t like at all and you see this is taking us back to the days of Northern Peoples Congress (NPC), NCNC and Action Group when the election was terminated through the January 16, 1966 coup. That is the element I did not like at all. I liked what happened during the SDP and NRC days when Abiola and Tofa contested. I like it that way because religion did not play a role. When religion become a major issue in campaigning in any nation, it is dangerous. I didn’t like it at all.

    I cannot see what happened during the 2015 election as political progress. It is not political development. I didn’t like it. I don’t want this country to turn to another Lebanon.

    Our two main parties have been stained with religious garbage. Those clothes need to be washed. I am not a preacher of doom but all I am saying is that corrections can be made. The APC-led federal government can begin to see how it can fill the religious gap for us.

    This is what I believe would be in the interest of our nation. Religion is worse than Indian hemp; it makes people go crazy and makes people not to think again. Religion is more than opium. It makes people to kill.

    Were you pleased with the roles religious leaders played in all of these? 

    What happened in the last elections was that APC was smarter than PDP in playing the religious card. Both parties played the religious card heavily. They were able to re-brand General Buhari from the way he had been known even four years ago. So they were able to put their hearts together.

    He brought his brain box and put it in APC to iron the whole thing. They did a very smart campaign and played a better job with the religious card.

    It was silently played in some sections of the north while some of the Christians were busy making noise about it. You won’t see the Muslim core North, you won’t see the Imams talking in papers vote for this. It was not so but here it was so because you will find out that the Muslims were highly well organised and I really commend them for that. The Christian community does not know how to move as one body under Christ to achieve what they want to achieve.

    What will be your advice to the incoming government?

    My advice for this incoming government is that they should make sure they deliver what they promised during campaigns. When I look at their package, I look at the area that they lay emphasis on being corruptions and that seemed to have struck a chord in an average Nigerians because there is corruption in this land. And so many Nigerians have now seen General Buhari as a symbol of fighting corruption.

    So hopes are high. The people are beginning to see that perhaps within six months corruption should be off from Nigeria. The first 100 days, there should be light everywhere but I think that as I speak as a leader and I want to plead with Nigerians to go and learn how to speak as leaders.

    If this government really means business, instead of just handling corruption from the top, there should be what I will call a socialisation progress – from the grassroots. In the village there is corruption, secondary school there is corruption, everywhere there is corruption. So there should be a team of think tank that should be quietly assembled and this team should be asked to produce a blueprint on how to fight corruption.