Former President Olusegun Obasanjo is one man who thrives in controversy. In and out of power, Obasanjo has remained a newsmaker because of what he does, what he says, how he says it as well as what time and forum he chooses to say it.
Apart from the peculiar air of selfesteem with which he moves around, he is endowed with what some people refer to as an uncommon native intelligence and sense of humour that many Nigerian stand-up comedians would envy.
By sheer providence, he remains the only one dead or alive who has steered the ship of the Nigerian state twice and in two different eras. First, he became the Head of State following the assassination of General Murtala Mohammed in the February 13, 1976 military coup. Obasanjo supervised a political transition programme that culminated in a general election. He voluntarily relinquished power to President Shehu Shagari on October 1, 1979, and retired to his farm in Ota, Ogun State. Thereafter, he assumed the role of an elder statesman and social critic. He never spared any of his successors until 1999 when again, fate thrust upon his shoulders, the leadership of the country. Obasanjo’s diatribe Since his last exit from power in 2007, Obasanjo has been in the news more for his comical rhetorics, scathing criticisms and sarcastic punches which he often throws at political friends and foes.
In his latest outing, the Balogun of Owu hit President Goodluck Jonathan below the belt when he dismissed the latter’s performance in office as “below average”, a poor rating by all standards. “I rate this current administration below average,” he said. Obasanjo gave this damning verdict last Friday while addressing a group of writers at the Ake Arts and Book Festival in Abeokuta, Ogun State.
Realising that by pointing one finger at Jonathan, he (Obasanjo) also had at least three fingers pointing backwards, he quickly exonerated himself from the perceived shortcomings of the Jonathan administration like a father disowning his own son. He said that rather than take blame for bringing Jonathan to power, Nigerians should be given credit for helping Jonathan, a man from one of the minority ethnic groups, to ascend the highest office in the land.
Obasanjo also seized the opportunity to debunk the speculations that he deliberately imposed the late President Umar Musa Yar’Adua on the nation as successor because he knew the man was sick and will be unable to rule the country. According to him, Yar’Adua provided concrete evidence that he was healthy and he (Obasanjo) also confirmed his state of fitness with medical experts.
These tales are as old as the power vacuum saga when Yar’Adua was incapacitated and Nigerians including Obasanjo demanded that Jonathan, then a vice president, should step into the shoes of the ailing ruler. On the strength of that clamour, the National Assembly invoked the Doctrine of Necessity and Jonathan became Acting President and subsequently President when Yar’Adua eventually passed on to eternity.
The motivation Obviously, Obasanjo’s current assessment of the Jonathan administration has its roots in politics. It cannot be divorced from President Jonathan’s aspiration to seek a second term in office and the orchestrated plans by his political opponents within and outside the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to stop him from contesting and winning the 2015 presidential elections.
It is a renewal of the ferocious hostility which Obasanjo launched a year ago when he wrote the president a lengthy open letter criticizing the policies of the present administration particularly in relation to the fight against terrorism and insurgency in the North East region. In the letter dated December 2, 2013, Obasanjo raised several issues about the Jonathan administration that portrayed it as ineffective and lacking in purposeful leadership.
Obasanjo was vehemently opposed to the idea of President Jonathan seeking re-election because according to the former President, Jonathan had in 2011 committed himself to serve only one term given the circumstances of his ascension to the office. Obasanjo and other critics of the current administration are not impressed with Jonathan’s handling of the fight against the Boko Haram insurgency. In the past three and half years, this terrorist group which is hinged on radical Islamic creed, has terrorized and overran several towns in Borno, Yobe and Adamawa states.
President Jonathan’s declaration of a state of emergency in these states has not resolved the crisis of insecurity in the region. Between December last year when Obasanjo wrote his famous letter and now, the challenge of insecurity has taken a worse shape. The Boko Haram fighters have become more emboldened with the kidnap of about 200 Chibok schoolgirls, the seizure of Nigerian territories and the declaration of these occupied territories as Caliphates and the imposition of Shariah laws on the inhabitants of these communities.
Therefore, it would appear that Obasanjo’s latest rating must have been based on this seeming overwhelming national security challenge. Talk back In a swift response to Obasanjo’s latest attack on Jonathan administration, the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Public Affairs, Dr. Doyin Okupe, disagreed with the “below average” rating and instead scored Jonathan high on almost every sphere of governance. Okupe described the comments credited to the former president as “untrue, misleading and clearly do not tally with the facts on the ground.” According to him, Jonathan has performed better than all other previous leaders of the country since 1960.
“In terms of performance and achievements, no administration since 1960 when Nigeria gained independence from Britain has done as much as that of President Jonathan. Every discerning and unbiased Nigerian will definitely attest to this fact as the evidence stare all of us in the face. “We will show here that contrary to Chief Obasanjo’s position, the Federal Government under President Jonathan has performed excellently given the prevailing circumstances and resources available,” Okupe said.
In a bid to further prove Obasanjo wrong, Okupe delved into the rigours of showcasing the achievements of the current regime on key aspects of national life. He reeled out in details what the administration had done in agriculture, aviation, power, roads, education, health and other sectors of the economy. The Presidency stated that before the Jonathan administration came on board, Nigeria imported N500 billion worth of rice in 2011, but that a radical approach adopted by the administration changed the story.
“Today, Nigeria has reached an unprecedented 60 per cent sufficiency in rice production, a feat, which the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO) recently described as capable of raising world rice output to a record high in the next 12 next months. Nigeria is already on its way to self-sufficiency in rice production as sizeable chunk of its 167 million populations are currently feeding on rice grown and processed locally. “For the third year running, Nigeria has remained the number one destination of investors in Africa and one of the first 10 in the World.
The Jonathan administration has reversed almost all of the negative economic ratings of Nigeria before he came on board and there are verifiable facts from the World Bank, Standard and Poors, Moody’s and Fitch about the Nigerian economy which has become the largest economy in Africa and the 26th largest in the World. “Our economy now has great potential to grow better and be more impactful in the lives of ordinary Nigerians with the current efforts being made by the government to ensure inclusiveness through various interventionist policy programmes,” Okupe said.
On the vexed issue of insurgency in the North East, the Presidency noted that while it is true that Nigeria has been faced with incidents of insurgency and terrorism especially in the last few years, it is also true the Jonathan administration has successfully contained the initial widespread and limitless activities of the insurgents which were prevalent in 12 states of the North including the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja. “While it is true that the present activities of the terrorists in the three North Eastern states have become more deadly in mindless killings, kidnappings and supposed territorial seizures.
Government has made giant diplomatic strides with our neighbouring countries in order to checkmate the crisscrossing of the insurgents. “In spite of this war however and in view of the other giant strides and achievements recorded in other sectors, it beats the imagination that anyone would say that President Jonathan has performed below average in office.
On the contrary, he has provided quality leadership and exemplary vision in transforming the Nigerian nation and giving hope to Africa’s most populous nation,” the presidential aide said. Second explosion Barely three days after this lengthy response, Obasanjo exploded again and this time, took a swipe at President Jonathan and his administration over what he described as the promotion of unbridled corruption and poor handling of the insurgency in the North East. As in the previous attack, the former president chose the occasion of a book launch to launch his verbal missiles.
Obasanjo dismissed the explanations of the Jonathan administration on the insurgency and blamed the government squarely for the escalation of the crisis. “It is a gargantuan danger to the nation and to all Nigerians. President Jonathan’s understanding of Boko Haram phenomenon suffered from wrong reading and wrong imputation. That is what led us to where we are today.
It took even the President more than three years to appreciate and understand that it is a terrible mix of poor education or lack of education, misinterpretation of what Quran teaches and stands for, poverty, unemployment, injustice, drug, gun trafficking, human trafficking, fallout from Libya, revenge, frustration, struggle against inequality, imitation of international terrorism leading to training and part of the absorption by international terrorists groups and general poor governance including corruption,” Obasanjo said.
He alleged that the Jonathan administration had elevated corruption to an unenviable height, promoted incompetence and ethnic bigotry to an unprecedented level while neglecting the economy. According to him, these developments, coupled with the non- investment in the oil and gas sector over a period of time and the crashing price of crude oil would have a lot of negative impacts on the economy.
He said: “Nigeria cannot continue to indulge in disdain of truth, elevation of corruption and incompetence, reinforcement of failure, condonation of heinous crimes and celebration of mediocrity, tribal bigotry, fomenting violence and anti-democratic practices in states and National Assembly. “Corruption in the National Assembly also includes what they call constituency projects, which they give to their agents to execute, but invariably, full payment is made with little or no job done.
“In all these, if the executive is absolutely above board, the offending members of the National Assembly resort to subtle or open threat, intimidation and blackmail of the executive. “For quite some time, the covered and hushed-up corruption has had its toll on the economy. We may have to borrow to pay salaries and allowances. Revenue allocation to states and local governments has already drastically reduced. Capital projects at all levels may have to be drastically cut or stopped.”
source: newtelegraphonline
