Jonathan, Nigeria’s Number One Enemy – APC

The All Progressives Congress (APC) has described President Goodluck Jonathan as Nigeria’s number one enemy because of his propensity to perpetrate impunity, abuse federal institutions and tolerate corruption, all in a dangerous clamour to win re-election at all costs.

The party said this in Osogbo on Wednesday, in a statement issued by its National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed.

According to the party, under President Jonathan’s watch, Nigeria has been thrown into unprecedented crisis that is manifesting in the opposition strongholds of Rivers, Edo, Adamawa and Nasarawa States and elsewhere across the country.

The President has also abused national institutions perhaps more than any other President in Nigeria’s history, deploying the police and the army to intimidate and harass ordinary citizens in general and opposition supporters in particular, as he did recently in Ekiti and is allegedly planning to do in Osun state; shutting airports at will just to punish the opposition and muscling the electoral commission, INEC, to prevent incorruptible RECs from conducting elections, it said.

“As we write, there are contrived crises in Rivers and Edo, where a handful of lawmakers with the backing of higher authorities have been terrorizing the Houses of Assembly in their States and defying court orders at will, with the ultimate prize for the renegades being the states’ chief executives; and there is crisis in Adamawa, where an impeachment plot has been undoubtedly instigated and hatched by higher authorities, despite tepid denials, and soldiers have been deployed to cage in very high state officials

“In Ekiti, several billions of Naira was allegedly scooped from a massive political war chest to subvert democracy, induce voters and upturn all known political theories to such an extent that all that anyone seeking to be elected now has to do is to dole out stolen public funds to a people already rendered comatose and impoverished by runaway corruption, glaring incompetence and sheer cluelessness that are the hall marks of the Jonathan Administration.

“Under President Jonathan, there is no longer the need to make any electoral promises or carry out people-oriented and quality of life projects. Just distribute bags of rice, expired or not, to a people already famished by a clueless federal government, and tuck in a few naira notes into the pockets of electorates who have been deliberately impoverished. This is a clear subversion of democracy.

“With such huge funds now being allegedly channeled to Osun to thwart the will of the people ahead of the 9 Aug. governorship election, in an attempt to repeat the Ekiti ‘experiment’ which the PDP-led federal government deemed to have been a ‘success’, it is now clear the Jonathan Administration will not pull any punches in subverting democracy ahead of the 2015 general elections.

“It is also clear now what happened to the 20-billion-dollar oil money that went missing, as well as the reason behind the massive oil subsidy fraud, the Malabo multi-billion dollar fraud, the pension scam, and finally why the President, whose body language does not abhor corruption, has redefined stealing as anything but corruption,” APC said.

The party said as far as President Jonathan is concerned, all that matters is his re-election. While he pursues that goal with vigour, the over 200 missing girls in Borno can stay where they are being kept by their abductors for over three months now; and the daily carnage in the North-east as well as Kaduna, Nasarawa and Benue can continue, even though over 12,000 people have been killed and 8,000 maimed. Once the President continues to play his dangerous politics of re-election, which involves using state resources and national institutions to muscle and muzzle the opposition; the press and ordinary citizens, allies well in the eyes of his purposeless party.

“Unfortunately, in the midst of all the shenanigans, Nigerians are more divided than ever along ethnic and religious lines, no thanks to a President who is so obsessed with power that he will not hesitate to cash in on the nation’s fault lines, abuse federal institutions, compromise once-credible public commentators to shamelessly mortgage their integrity on the altar of greed, and disregard even the Electoral Act by kick-starting electioneering campaign before the starting gun is fired.

“In view of this, we are now alerting the good people of Nigeria that President Jonathan’s re-election at all costs is a clear and present danger to Nigeria, her people and indeed her democracy.

“Unless Nigerians speak out and unless the instigated harassment of the media by security agencies is halted, so the Fourth Estate of the Realm can continue to perform its constitutional duties unhindered, Nigerians should gear up for more dangerous days ahead, which will include the stripping of the citizenry of their constitutionally-guaranteed basic rights, more egregious abuse of national institutions, perpetration of more acts of corruption as well as the muscling and muzzling of the opposition, even as the people will continue to be impoverished.

“On our part, as the country’s main opposition party, we pledge to be unrelenting in speaking the truth to power, irrespective of whether or not it makes the federal government uncomfortable, in the overall interest of ou r nation,” APC said.