Former President Goodluck Jonathan has spoken of the tensed moments he
faced on March 28, 2015 ahead of his decision to concede victory to
President Muhammadu Buhari after that year’s presidential election.
“I was actually in that valley on March 28, 2015”, he said.
Jonathan also narrated why he relinquished power to Buhari, saying he did
not want Nigeria to slide into a theatre of war, with his fellow county
men and woman dying, and many more pouring into other nations in Africa
and beyond, as refugees.
“I never knew that the human brain had the capacity for such enhanced
rapid thinking. One hundred and one things were going through my mind
every second. My country was at the verge of collapse. The tension in the
land was abysmally high and palpable, in the months leading to the
election. The country became more polarised more than ever before, such
that the gap between the North and the South and between Christians and
Muslims became quite pronounced”, the former President said.
“In fact, it became so disturbing that some interest groups in the United
States began to predict indeed, many Nigerians did buy into this doomsday
prophesy as they began to brace themselves for the worst.
“As the President, I reminded myself that the Government I led had
invested so much effort into building our country. I worked hard with my
top officials to encourage Nigerians and non-Nigerians to invest in our
country to be able to provide jobs and improve the lives of our people.
“We worked hard to grow our economy and to improve and bring Nigeria up as
the biggest economy in Africa, with a GDP of about half a trillion
dollars”.
Jonathan told his story, last week, during a dinner in his honour by
Cercle Diplomatique, Geneva, Switzerland. The former President also spoke
about his foray into politics, the allure of power and future plans.
He began: “ As you can see, I have not come here with a prepared speech,
since what I consider appropriate for this occasion is to just thank you
all, members and everyone else in attendance, in a few words, for the
dinner and the award, in order not to make the evening look boring. But
having said that, I am still tempted to note that if I were to present a
written speech, the title, would probably have been “Power Tussle in
Africa: A Stumbling Block to Economic Growth.” When Mr. Robert Blum, your
President, made his very interesting opening remarks, he introduced me as
the former President of Nigeria. He was absolutely correct.
My foray into politics
“However, I believe that not many of you here know that the story of my
foray into politics has a peculiar ring to it. I entered politics in 1998
and, barely one year after, I got elected as the Deputy Governor of
Bayelsa, my state. I later became Governor, Vice President and eventually
got elected as the President of my country. I remain the only leader in my
country to have travelled that route.
As the President, I served out my first term but, as Mr. Blum had pointed
out earlier, I lost the bid to be re-elected. I am encouraged by the fact
that many of you here appreciated my decision not to reject or contest my
loss at the polls, not even in the courts as many people had expected.
The allure of power
“Again, I have to agree with Blum that it was not an easy decision to
take. This is because the allure of power and the worries about what would
become of you after leaving office constitute an irresistible
force. It has an attraction so controlling and powerful that it takes a
man who has the fear of God and who loves his people and nation to
relinquish power so easily in Africa.
Alone in the valley
“I was actually in that valley on March 28, 2015. I never knew that the
human brain had the capacity for such enhanced rapid thinking. One hundred
and one things were coursing through my mind every second. My country was
at the verge of collapse. The tension in the land was abysmally high and
palpable, in the months and days leading to the election. The country
became more polarized more than ever before, such that the gap between the
North and the South and between Christians and Muslims became quite
pronounced. In fact, it became so disturbing that some interest groups in
the United States began to predict that Nigeria would disintegrate in
2015. And, indeed, many Nigerians did buy into this doomsday prophesy as
they began to brace themselves for the worst. As the President, I reminded
myself that the Government I led had invested so much effort into building
our country. I worked hard with my top officials to encourage Nigerians
and non-Nigerians to invest in our country to be able to provide jobs and
improve the lives of our people. We worked hard to grow our economy and to
improve and bring Nigeria up as the biggest economy in Africa, with a GDP
of about half a trillion dollars.
Posers I had to contend with
“Should I then, for the love of power, watch Nigeria slide into a theatre
of war, with my fellow country men and women dying, and many more pouring
into other nations in Africa and beyond, as refugees?
Should I hang on to power and tussle with my challengers, while the
investments of hard working citizens of the world go down the drain? I
then said to myself, NO!
Resisting the lure of power
“I promised my God that I will not let that fate befall Nigeria under my
watch, hence the historic telephone call I put through to congratulate my
challenger even when the results were still being
tallied. I believe that for a country to be great, both the leaders and
the led must be prepared to make sacrifices. This is why, everywhere I go,
I always advise that the new generation of African leaders must think
differently. We can no longer afford to wilfully sacrifice the blood of
our citizens on the altar of dangerous partisan politics. It is not worth
it. This reminds me of one of my campaign statements to the effect that my
ambition was not worth the shedding of the blood of any Nigerian. Some
people took it then as mere political slogan but I knew that I meant it
when I said it.
We must all fight for the enthronement of political stability in Africa,
for in it lies the panacea for sustainable growth and development. For
Africa to record the kind of advancement that will be
competitive and beneficial to our citizens, we must have stable states
supported by strong institutions. That appears to be the irreducible
minimum that is common to all developed societies. Africa’s political
odyssey can distinctly be categorised into three eras, and probably
another that would later signpost its classification as a developed
continent”.
Challenges
“Some may doubt this, but it is no fluke that Africa is growing and
rising. However I will admit before you here that we still have
challenges. That is why people like us did all we could to ensure that
Nigeria, the biggest black nation on earth, would not drift into anarchy
because such a situation would have spelt doom for the rest of the
continent. It would have affected not just Nigeria alone, but the
GDP and economy of the entire West Africa. And if the economy of West
Africa crashes, it would definitely affect the performance of the economy
of the whole of Africa. As you know, the GDP of Africa is less than three
trillion dollars, with only six African countries able to boast of nominal
GDP above $100 billion. Even for those in this ‘elite’ category, you can’t
really say that they are rich countries. Apart from maybe South Africa
that has an industrially competitive economy, the rest are still mainly
commodity exporting countries. Even the case of that of South Africa is
not very encouraging, because we have a situation which we could refer to
as a first world economic performance, yet the ordinary people live the
life of the people in the so called third world.
In the case of Nigeria which is even the biggest economy on the continent,
the reality is that we have an unenviable per capita GDP of $3,203, which
is the World Bank average for a period covering 2011-2015.
Africa’s future is bright
“Even then, I still believe that Africa has a bright future; a promising
prognosis that is supported by the fact that the continent remains a very
fertile and attractive territory that yields irresistible returns on
investments. I believe that in the next few years many more big investors
will be jostling to come to Africa, if only we will do the right thing.
The process of getting it right has already started with a democratic and
increasingly democratising Africa. But we have to deepen and strengthen
our democratic credentials through regular, free and fair elections. This
will in turn bring about the stability necessary to improve the
infrastructure that promotes rapid economic growth. These are the
guarantees that would lead us into the next period which I would like to
call the era of a developed Africa. I have no doubt in my mind that we
will get there some day.
My future plans
“I will be applying myself diligently to two key areas. First, is to work
for good governance by promoting credible and transparent elections. This
will bring about the strengthening of our institutions
and the enthronement of stability. I also believe that there is the urgent
need to create jobs for our
teeming young population. This is another area that will be receiving my
attention. I recall that the Vice President of your association made
reference in his speech to my achievements in that regard through
what we called Youth Enterprises with Innovation (YouWin) and the
Nagropreneur programme which encouraged young people to go into
agriculture. I believe more programmes like that should be established to
promote youth entrepreneurship. That way, we reduce their reliance on paid
employment. We will not only teach them to become entrepreneurs, they will
also acquire the capacity to employ other people. We will be paying
special attention to this segment of our society, especially young people
and women. We will develop programmes that will inculcate in them business
skills to be able to set up micro, small and medium enterprises. We shall
assist them to access take-off grants when they acquire the relevant
skills and capacities. There are many areas that they can go into; food
processing, light manufacturing and the services sector are just some of
them. I can tell you from experience that this works. As we speak, Our
Nagropreneur programme, to promote youth involvement in agriculture
value chain, is being scaled up by the African Development Bank presently.
It is already being replicated in 19 African countries because of the
success of the programme in Nigeria. I invite all of you here today,
cabinet ministers, diplomats and private sector people to remain committed
to the cause of improving lives, especially those lives in Africa, and
making our world a better place. For those of you that will be sharing in
this vision for Africa, I assure you that you will not be disappointed. I
am very optimistic that if we encourage young men and women in this
continent to develop businesses of their own, the story of Africa will
change within 10 years”.