All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential hopeful,
General Muhammadu Buhari, said today it was evident that President Goodluck
Jonathan knows he has not done enough for Nigerians to vote for him again since
2011.
A statement by APC spokesman Rotimi Fashakin asserted that
Mr. Jonathan knows that he has run an exclusive government laden with scandals
of grand larcenies in many institutions.
“For the first time, impunity reached all- time high with
the famous Fayose-led desecration of the Courts of Justice in Ekiti state under
the watchful eyes of security forces,” Fashakin’s statement read.
According to Fashakin General Buhari reiterated that the
Jonathan government is the most corrupt in Nigeria’s chequered history and
underscored the general’s resolve to forge ahead with a presidential run
despite carefully-woven insidious commentaries against him.
“He is hopeful that, with the support of the long-suffering
Nigerian people, the APC government under his guardianship shall sweep away the
fecklessness of the PDP in the February, 2015 elections.” Fashakin added in the
statement.
Full text of the
press statement:
The unfortunate riposte from Jonathan’s regime
That the Jonathan government is the most corrupt in
Nigeria’s chequered history has never been in doubt, what has become, clearly
intolerable, is the predilection of this administration for shameful
revisionism, denial of the truth and unpatriotic divisiveness.
Whilst it is not our desire to bandy words with this
administration that is steeped on perilous leadership of the Nation, we feel a
deep sense of responsibility to present the facts again for the perusal of
discerning Nigerian People.
On Wednesday, 15th October, 2014, while declaring his
intention (before a mammoth crowd of faithful Nigerian supporters), General
Muhammadu Buhari (GMB) stated, inter-alia:
“The economy continues to deteriorate while the Government continues to
announce fantastic growth figures but manufacturing is down, agriculture is
down, commerce is down
Simply because you sell oil and steal part of the money does
not entitle you to cook figures and announce phantom economic growth when all
the major indices namely, Employment, Manufacturing, Farming, Trading are
demonstrably on the decline. “
Expectedly, the Goodluck Jonathan presidency, rather than
giving truthful response to the message, lunged at the messenger in the most
indecent tradition that has become second nature to the operatives of the
communication of the administration.
In order to support its nebulous claim of the improvement of
the economy, the Jonathan Presidency stated: “As is well known, available
figures, statistics and ratings show that the Nigerian economy has consistently
maintained an unprecedented growth rate of 6-7% under the Jonathan
administration. They also show that the Nigerian economy is now the leading
economy in Africa and the 26th largest in the world with a gross domestic
product of over $500 billion per annum.”
Contrary to these bogus claims by this administration, the National
Bureau of Statistics (NBS), in its June 12, 2013 online release, stated that
112 million Nigerians (representing 67% of the entire population) live below
poverty line! Earlier, in its ‘May 2013
Nigeria Economic Report’, the World Bank said the number of Nigerians living in
poverty was increasing too rapidly.
The relevant question that readily comes up is, of what use
is gloating about with seemingly fantastic economic growth statistics when
two-third of the Nation’s populating is reeling in grinding poverty? It is an
incontrovertible fact that the reason for the manifested youth restiveness in
the national space is exacerbated by blatant inability of the Jonathan regime
to improve on Job creation. The mindset of the Jonathan Presidency is encapsulated
in the famous statement made by President Goodluck Jonathan himself in Davos,
Switzerland (earlier in the year) wherein he stated that his administration’s
backward integration has made a Nigerian the richest man in Africa! It did not
make a difference to this President that the grim fact is that there is
inequitable distribution of the Nation’s wealth. It is this fact that came into
the fore when five Power generating assets and ten power distributing assets
were sold to known cronies in another scandalous privatization deal. Meanwhile,
majority of Nigerians have not had improved supply of electricity to their
homes and business offices. All these are manifestations of an administration
that is unwilling to show sensitivity to the plight of the teeming population
of the Nigerian people.
Indeed, the denial of fact, as a character trait of Jonathan
government, should not surprise anyone, as the Jonathan administration has
abundant capacity for mendacity, chicanery and revisionism. In April 2014, when the news broke that over
two hundred young Nigerian female children had been abducted by unconscionable
beings, the first reaction of the Jonathan regime was to make spirited attempts
to conceal the fact of this abduction. It took a seventeen year old Pakistani
children’s rights activist, Malala Yousafzai, after more than three months,
before President Goodluck Jonathan agreed to meet the Parents of the abducted
girls. In a related matter, on February
25, 2014, gunmen violated the serenity of the Federal Government College, Buni
Yadi, Yobe state. After the dust settled, twenty nine male students were killed
and their female counterparts abducted. These dead young Nigerians were not
even considered worthy of respect with a minute silence at the centenary celebration
that opened about twenty four hours later. Till date, President
GoodluckJonathan has not thought it worthy to visit the school! Undoubtedly,
this administration has a huge capacity for stymieing the truth, in the vain
attempts at casting delusions on the minds of the people.
On January 21, 2013, as part of the administration’s
agricultural reforms, 3.5 million Jobs and 20 million metric tonnes of food to
domestic supply was promised to take effect by 2015. May we remind this
government that 2015 is just two months away and the reality that Nigerians
grapple with in their daily pursuit is a far cry from the utterly garrulous
deception!
GMB stated “Quality education for development, modernity and
social mobility” as part of the priorities his soon-to-happen administration
shall pursue with relentless fervour. But the Jonathan Presidency derisively
castigated this by stating: “All that General Buhari promises to do are already
being done by the Jonathan Administration to the acclaim of ordinary Nigerians
and there is no evidence before Nigerians that the APC leader and his acolytes
can do them better. “
Details of the June 2014 West Africa Senior School
Certificate Examination (WASSCE) showed only 529,425 candidates (representing
31.28%) out of 1.7million candidates who wrote the examination obtained credits
in five subjects and above, including English Language and Mathematics. Whilst
the performance of Nigerian students’ performance has been very dismal in the
last three years (under Dr. Goodluck Jonathan’s administration), Ghanaian
students dominated the three positions at the International awards for the best
candidates in the five member countries of WAEC. But this should not surprise
anyone because whilst the Jonathan administration has consistently spent less
than 13% of the yearly budget on education (a far cry from the UNICEF’s
recommendation of 26%), Ghana spent 31% of its 2013 budget on Education!
Jonathan’s Presidency had stated with obvious delusory
intent: “His most uncharitable and inexcusable accusation against the present
administration was that election rigging continues to thrive in Nigeria.” In
the two governorship elections conducted this year (2014), the Military and
other security forces were deployed in a manner to compromise the election. On
the eve of the June 22, 2014 Ekiti governorship election, over two hundred
leaders of the opposition All Progressive Congress were removed from
circulation in Gestapo-style manner by the over 36,000 security forces deployed
to the state for a ‘do or die’ electoral battle. Buoyed by the success of its
infernal impunity, over 70,000 security forces were also deployed to Osun state
for the governorship election on August 9, 2014, but the steadfastness of the
people saved the day. In its February 2014 report, the National Human Rights’
Commission branded INEC, Police and the Judiciary as election criminals! The
questions that need to be asked are: First, what section of the electoral laws
makes it mandatory for elections to be held under curfew? Second, why is the
PDP administration of President Goodluck Jonathan always insistent in using the
Military for election duties when sections 214, 215 and 216 of the Nigerian
Constitution clearly prescribe that the maintenance of internal security is
fundamentally vested in the Nigeria Police Force?
Without a doubt, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan knows he has not done
enough to convince the same Nigerians, who were gored (in 2011) into believing
that his presidency would impart positively on the Nation, to vote for him
again. He knows that he has run an exclusive government with scandals of grand
larcenies in many institutions of government. For the first time, impunity
reached all- time high with the famous Fayose-led desecration of the Courts of
Justice in Ekiti state under the watchful eyes of security forces. He knows
that the portent of GMB’s entry into the Presidential contest shall
automatically stymie his desire for a second term.
Finally, GMB is
unfazed by the carefully-woven insidious commentaries against him. He remains
focused on the greater task of assuaging the pains inflicted on the Nigerian
people by the pestilence of PDP’s fifteen-year rule of the Nigerian state. He
is hopeful that, with the support of the long-suffering Nigerian people, the
APC government under his guardianship shall sweep away the fecklessness of the
PDP in the February, 2015 elections.
God bless the Federal republic of Nigeria.
Rotimi Fashakin (Engr.)
For: General Muhammadu Buhari, GCFR
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