National Chairman of the All Progressive Congress, APC, Chief John Oyegun,
\nhas accused President Goodluck Jonathan of dictatorial tendencies, saying
\nthe President and his party, the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP are
\ndesperate to crush opposition.<\/p>\n
Oyegun at a Press conference in Abuja also accused the President of
\ninducing State Assembly members to impeach Governors of APC controlled
\nStates.<\/p>\n
Read the Text of his statement:<\/p>\n
Being the text of a press conference addressed in Abuja on Wednesday, July
\n16th 2014 by the Chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Chief
\nJohn Odigie-Oyegun<\/p>\n
Protocols.<\/p>\n
Good morning, gentlemen of the press.<\/p>\n
Please permit me to start off this press conference with a quote by
\nChilean writer Isabel Allende, which goes thus: \u201dWhat I fear most is power
\nwith impunity. I fear abuse of power, and the power to abuse.\u201d<\/p>\n
Isabel, a victim of the Pinochet military dictatorship, is not alone. All
\nNigerians must be worried about power with impunity, which is what
\nPresident Goodluck Jonathan and his party, the PDP, have resorted to in
\ntheir desperation to crush the opposition and destroy Nigeria in the
\nprocess.<\/p>\n
I have called this Press Conference to address the grave dangers facing
\nNigerians as a people, our country as a nation and our democracy as our
\nhope, at this very critical time.<\/p>\n
Events in Nigeria in the past few weeks point to a return to the dark old
\ndays of state dictatorship, lawlessness, impunity and repression.<\/p>\n
Our freedoms are being emasculated, our economy being run to the ground,
\nand our only hope of bringing about change \u2013 our democratic expression is
\nbeing smothered before our very eyes all because President Goodluck
\nJonathan is so obsessed with reelection in 2015 at all cost that he is
\ndestroying not just all our key institutions but indeed the entire
\ncountry.<\/p>\n
At this critical juncture of our history and despite our desire for
\nrestraint and mature engagement with President Goodluck Jonathan and the
\nruling Peoples\u2019 Democratic Party (PDP) it is evident that inaction is no
\nlonger an option and we must resist.<\/p>\n
Indeed keeping quiet in the face of the ceaseless and unrelenting reckless
\nviolations of all known laws of the land and the Constitution will amount
\nto complicity in the lawlessness and impunity that has become the norm
\nunder President Goodluck Jonathan.<\/p>\n
We know it has been the dream of the ruling PDP to rule for 60 unbroken
\nyears, not minding if Nigeria becomes a desert land in the process.<\/p>\n
Their evil machination has manifested in Ekiti. It has manifested
\nyesterday in Adamawa, They have carried it to Nasarawa, and they have Edo,
\nOsun and Rivers in their sights.<\/p>\n
In the states mentioned, all of them opposition strongholds, President
\nJonathan and his party have abused national institutions, resorted to a
\ncrude use of force and engaged in unprecedented financial inducements to
\nachieve their objectives.<\/p>\n
All these anti-democratic tactics come under the umbrella of power with
\nimpunity!<\/p>\n
But there is a bigger problem. President Jonathan is obsessed with his
\nre-election in 2015, and he does not mind if Nigeria is destroyed in the
\nprocess. He does not care whether every institution of state, be it the
\nmilitary, the courts, INEC or any other one, is destroyed. All that
\nmatters now is his re-election.<\/p>\n
This explains why he has embarked on this war against the opposition, this
\nwar against all of Nigeria.<\/p>\n
Having bastardized the army, the police, the courts, aviation and the
\nelectoral commission, he has now moved to the next level: Impeachment.
\nEvery impeachment or threat of it in recent times has the imprint of
\nPresident Jonathan.<\/p>\n
As we speak, the Governor of Adamawa, Murtala Nyako, has been impeached at
\nthe instance of the President and his party, they have moved to Nasarawa,
\ntheir next stop, while Rivers, Edo and Borno, all APC states, are not
\nbeing spared the destabilization that precedes their new-found weapon.<\/p>\n
What was Nyako impeached for? Offences he allegedly committed five years
\nago. Those offences were not impeachable when he was in the PDP. But the
\nmoment he decamped to the APC, they became impeachable.<\/p>\n
The entire \u201cimpeachment\u201d of Governor Nyako is so fraught with
\nirregularities, bias, judicial contradictions and in violation of every
\nprocedural and constitutional provisions that it is the worst
\nmanifestation of impunity. We intend to mount an immediate and rigorous
\nchallenge to this gross injustice to the party and people of Adamawa
\nState.<\/p>\n
What is Gov. Al-Makura of Nasarawa being threatened with impeachment for?
\nAllegations of extra-budgetary expenditure, the same offence that
\nPresident Jonathan has committed many times. In fact, on only on the 10th
\nof July 2014, the Senate passed a resolution asking President Goodluck
\nJonathan to prepare and submit to the National Assembly supplementary
\nbudget to cover the over expenditure in the sum of N90.693 billion (US$585
\nbillion) for PMS subsidy 2012 and the sum of N685.910 billion (US$4.430
\nbillion) for Kerosene (DPK) subsidy expended without appropriation by the
\nNational Assembly in 2012 and 2013!<\/p>\n
In Adamawa, each member of the State House of Assembly was allegedly given
\nUS $300,000 as part payment to impeach Gov. Nyako; some 500 million Naira
\nhas allegedly been moved to Nasarawa to induce the state\u2019s lawmakers to
\nimpeach Gov. Al-Makura, and in Edo, each lawmaker has allegedly been
\noffered 75 million Naira to impeach Gov. Adams Oshiomhole.<\/p>\n
Now, who is more guilty of gross misconduct than a President who is
\nfrittering away our commonwealth to induce perfidious legislators to
\nimpeach their state Governors? Who is more guilty of gross misconduct than
\na President who deploys troops to harass, intimidate and arrest the
\nopposition during an election? Who deserves to be impeached for gross
\nmisconduct more than a President who uses national institutions against
\nthe opposition, and shuts airports arbitrarily?
\nPresident Jonathan\u2019s desperation knows no bounds, and he is willing to set
\na record of presiding over the greatest number of impeachments under his
\ntenure. Before Nyako\u2019s impeachment on Tuesday, a total of five
\nimpeachments have been carried out in all of the 15 years of the Fourth
\nRepublic. But between now and 2015, President Jonathan is championing five
\nimpeachments, in Adamawa, Nasarawa, Edo, Rivers and Borno.<\/p>\n
In doing so, he is subverting hitherto respected national institutions.
\nThe army has been so compromised that it can no longer be trusted by
\nanyone to be neutral. The army has been so abused that it now carries out
\npolice duties. Soldiers were deployed to guard the residence of the Chief
\nJudge of Adamawa while the impeachment proceedings were on. Soldiers were
\ndeployed to guard each member of the impeachment panel. Soldiers were also
\ndeployed to guard the venue where the panel sat.<\/p>\n
In Ekiti, soldiers were deployed to hunt down the opposition and prevent
\nthem from moving around freely, in contravention of the nation\u2019s
\nconstitution. In Osun, soldiers are again to be deployed to shut down the
\nstate and go after the opposition.<\/p>\n
By using the military for election duties, President Jonathan is clearly
\ndisobeying a court order as the Court of Appeal had ruled as far back as
\n2005 that the involvement of the military in the conduct of elections is
\nan aberration and therefore unconstitutional. Indeed in the words of
\nSalami, JCA on page 176 in the case of Yusuf v Obasanjo (2005) 18 NWLR
\n(Pt. 956 96@174-5)<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is up to the police to protect our nascent democracy and not the
\nmilitary, otherwise the democracy might be wittingly or unwittingly
\nmilitarised. This is not what the citizenry bargained for after 1999.
\nConscious step or steps should be taken to civilianise the polity and
\nthereby ensure survival and sustenance of democracy.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Akure airport was suddenly slammed shut just to punish opposition
\nleaders who had converged in Ekiti for Gov. Kayode Fayemi\u2019s campaign
\nrally. They had to travel all night by road to Lagos.
\nIn Borno, under the guise of ensuring security, the Maiduguri Airport has
\nbeen closed for several weeks, hence the Borno Governor and the people of
\nthe state, including the pilgrims heading to lesser Hajj, have been forced
\nto travel by road to Kano to board their flights. However, the reason for
\nshutting the airport has suddenly vanished as the private plane bearing
\nformer Governor Ali Modu Sheriff was allowed to land at the airport on
\nMonday, the same day the Governor had to travel by road to Kano to see his
\nbrother who was involved in an accident on the same road!
\nObviously, President Jonathan is fast turning Nigeria into George Orwell\u2019s
\nAnimal Farm, where some animals are more equal than the others.<\/p>\n
Welcome to Nigeria of President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, where the only
\npeople who are deemed to be true Nigerians are those under the umbrella of
\nthe PDP, where the only people worth protecting are PDP members!
\nConclusion<\/p>\n
We have raised the alarm several times that President Jonathan\u2019s obsession
\nwith his re-election is a clear and present danger to our democracy.
\nToday, we say this President\u2019s obsession with re-election is threatening
\nthe very existence of our nation.<\/p>\n
Never in the history of our dear nation has any President waged war on the
\ncountry the way this President is doing. Never in the history of our
\ncountry has any President desecrated national institutions like this
\nPresident is doing to the very institutions that sustain democracy. Never
\nin the history of our country has our people been so divided along ethnic,
\nreligious, political and social lines, with poverty rising astronomically
\nin the backdrop of a claimed rapid growth in the nation\u2019s GDP.<\/p>\n
We warn that excessive political greed will always have its consequences.
\nAny student of Nigeria\u2019s contemporary history will realize what acts of
\nimpunity and desperation to win elections at all cost did to the country
\nin 1965, 1983 and 1993, just to mention a few.<\/p>\n
We call on all friends of Nigeria to prevail on President Jonathan to
\napply the brakes in his obsessive quest for power, because every action
\nhas consequences.<\/p>\n
It is time for those who can still get the ears of this President to
\nremind him that his ambition is not worth the destruction of a whole
\ncountry. All those who can must act now before it is too late!<\/p>\n
I thank you all for listening<\/p>\n
Chief John Odigie-Oyegun
\nNational Chairman, All Progressives Congress<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
National Chairman of the All Progressive Congress, APC, Chief John Oyegun, has accused President Goodluck Jonathan of dictatorial tendencies, saying the President and his party, the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":27827,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29268","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-exclusive"],"yoast_head":"\n