Some people say Goodluck Jonathan is \u201cclueless.\u201d\u00a0 They would also have us believe he is a weak president.\u00a0 If so, how come his opponents are greatly afraid of him?\u00a0 People are not inclined to fear weaklings.\u00a0 Therefore it is telling that Goodluck Jonathan must be the most feared Head of State in the history of Nigeria.<\/p>\n
Since he was thrown up as president by divine providence, Jonathan has elicited the most vociferous opposition ever.\u00a0 Every trick in the book has been thrown at him to stop him from becoming president and from continuing to be president.\u00a0 At every turn, this has failed woefully.\u00a0 The evidence indicates that the opposition is convinced that Jonathan is unstoppable at the polls.\u00a0 Therefore, the emphasis has been directed more at preventing him from running for president and at frustrating his rule than at defeating him at the 2015 election.<\/p>\n
Serial losers<\/p>\n
Jonathan fought the 2011 election with a mystic that completely overwhelmed the opposition.\u00a0 A cabal from the North insisted another Northerner must complete Yar\u2019Adua\u2019s term of office.\u00a0 In the process, they turned the election into a regional contest.\u00a0 A clique in the PDP decided to shortlist and select a Northern opponent against Jonathan, convinced that his defeat would be a foregone conclusion.<\/p>\n
JONATHAN
\nJONATHAN<\/p>\n
They rejected a former president, Ibrahim Babangida, and chose Atiku Abubakar, a former vice-president no less, and heir of the much-vaunted PDM political machinery of the late Shehu Musa Yar\u2019Adua; to apply the knock-out punches to Jonathan in the PDP presidential primaries of 2011.\u00a0 But surprise surprise, the election was not even close.\u00a0 Jonathan not only defeated Atiku, he practically eviscerated the man.<\/p>\n
Thereafter, the hope of the Northern cabal fell to another regional champion, Mohammadu Buhari.\u00a0 On paper, Jonathan was no match for Buhari.\u00a0 Buhari was much better known and much better hyped.\u00a0 He had been Head of State some 30 years earlier, and had refused to leave the political scene thereafter.\u00a0 He fought the election for the presidency twice and lost twice.\u00a0 Then he had to face Jonathan, allegedly a \u201cgreenhorn.\u201d<\/p>\n
Again, the election was not close.\u00a0 Jonathan dismantled Buhari with a plurality of over 10 million votes.\u00a0 He even obtained 8 million votes in the North, to Buhari\u2019s 12 million.\u00a0 Then he practically cleaned up in the South.\u00a0 From then on, the fear of Jonathan became the political wisdom of the cabal.\u00a0 This has manifested in a number of shenanigans in the past four years.\u00a0 However, the outcome of these has only been to strengthen Jonathan\u2019s position as he proceeds to go to the electorate again in 2015 to seek a second-term in office.<\/p>\n
Sour grapes<\/p>\n
Having lost the PDP primaries ignominiously to Jonathan, Atiku became a prophet of doom.\u00a0 He said: \u201cthose who make peaceful change impossible make violent change inevitable.\u201d\u00a0 Of course, the only change that is peaceful is the one whereby Jonathan either foregoes re-election or is defeated at the polls.\u00a0 A Jonathan victory was, in the logic of Atiku, an invitation to violent change.<\/p>\n
But one needs to ask the former vice-president this question: \u201cWould the proposed violent change spare prophet Atiku, who was vice-president for eight years and who is alleged to have cornered juicy public companies from his vantage point as head of the privatization program under Obasanjo?\u201d\u00a0 Perceptions are sometimes more important than reality.\u00a0 Therefore, violent change would also have Atiku as one of its primary targets.<\/p>\n
For his part, the threats of Muhammadu Buhari during the 2011 election campaign led to widespread violence by his supporters in the North after he lost.\u00a0 They went on a rampage; looting and killing; in spite of the fact that, by all accounts, the elections were adjudged the most free and fair in the history of Nigeria\u2019s current democratic experiment.\u00a0 By the time the mayhem had subsided, over 1000 people had been slaughtered in cold blood, including innocent National Youth Service Corp members, and some 65,000 Nigerians became displaced.<\/p>\n
Undaunted, Buhari went on to declare in a statement made pointedly in Hausa in a BBC interview that: \u201cIf what happened in 2011 should again happen in 2015, by the grace of God, the dog and the baboon would all be soaked in blood.\u201d<\/p>\n
Phantom agreement<\/p>\n
Having realised that by some political alchemy, Goodluck Jonathan is impregnable at the polls, the strategy of his opponents has been to insist that he cannot seek re-election, instead of making concrete plans about how to defeat him at the polls.\u00a0 The Niger State governor, Babngida Aliyu, suddenly came up with the allegation that Jonathan had earlier signed an agreement with some governors in 2011 that he would not seek re-election but would only serve for one term; after which the PDP presidential candidacy would be zoned to the North.<\/p>\n
This was curious at best.\u00a0 Northerners had ruled the country for long stretches of 38 out of 54 years; at no time were any of them required to sign term-limit agreements.\u00a0 But now that it was the turn of a South-South president, we were meant to believe such an agreement was extracted from him by Northern governors.\u00a0 In any case, where exactly was this agreement?\u00a0 If it existed, then it should be published for all to see.<\/p>\n
However, Aliyu and his cohorts could not produce the alleged document, leading to the conclusion that it was nothing more than another ruse.\u00a0 The president\u2019s men were unequivocal in maintaining that Jonathan signed no such agreement.\u00a0 Even if he did, everyone knows that there is no honour among Nigerian politicians.\u00a0 Therefore, that gambit also turned out to be a waste of time.<\/p>\n
Legal option<\/p>\n
The next strategy was to contest Jonathan\u2019s eligibility to seek re-election in the courts; on the grounds that he has been president for two terms already.\u00a0 This strategy failed woefully.\u00a0 Justice Mudashiru Oniyangi ruled from the FCT that Jonathan\u2019s assumption of office after the untimely death of President Yar\u2019Adua fell under the National Assembly\u2019s doctrine of necessity.\u00a0 The Constitution stated that no man could be elected president more than twice for a total of eight years.\u00a0 But Jonathan has only been elected president once.<\/p>\n
Justice Oniyangi said: \u201cAfter the death of Umaru Yar\u2019adua, there was no election or by-election, President Jonathan was merely asked to assume the office of the President in line with the doctrine of necessity. He was not elected as the President but was made to assume office by virtue of Yar\u2019adua\u2019s death.\u00a0 Having exhausted the late President\u2019s tenure, he sought for his party\u2019s ticket and ran for the office of the President successfully in the 2011 general elections. He is therefore currently serving his first tenure of office, and if he so wishes he is eligible to further seek his party\u2019s ticket through the party\u2019s primary election and to run for office in 2015.\u201d<\/p>\n
Opposition threats<\/p>\n
This called for yet another strategy, therefore the opposition decided to employ fire and brimstone.\u00a0 Lawal Kaita, now of the opposition APC, said: \u201cWe will make Nigeria ungovernable for Jonathan.\u201d\u00a0 The objective remained the same.\u00a0 These people knew they could not defeat Jonathan at the polls; therefore their primary assignment was to prevent him from running for re-election.<\/p>\n
Junaid Mohammed fired one of the early salvos.\u00a0 He said: \u201cQuote me, if Jonathan insists on running, there will be bloodshed and those who feel short-changed may take the warpath.\u201d
\nSenator Joseph Waku of the Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF) followed suit: \u201cPresident Jonathan should not even contemplate making any move to contest the 2015 election because such will be catastrophic.\u201d\u00a0 Murtala Nyako, the former governor of Adamawa, echoed this, saying: \u201cwe must stop President Goodluck Jonathan\u2019s attempt to go for second term, as that will lead to civil war.\u201d<\/p>\n
What has happened to Waku\u2019s catastrophe and Nyako\u2019s civil war?\u00a0 These were all vain threats.\u00a0 Who did Nyako have in mind to fight his civil war for him?\u00a0 Since making these threats, Nyako has been ignominiously removed as governor of Adamawa State.\u00a0 Nobody shed any crocodile tears for him.\u00a0 On the other hand, his nemesis, Goodluck Jonathan has declared that he is running for second term and there has not been a riot, not to talk of civil war.\u00a0 As a matter of fact, he has been endorsed as the sole candidate of the PDP.<\/p>\n
Preparing for defeat<\/p>\n
This means back to the drawing-board for the APC.\u00a0 Since they now know they cannot stop Jonathan from contesting, they have started planning for their anticipated defeat at the polls.\u00a0 Their position is simple.\u00a0 If Jonathan wins, then they would claim the election was rigged.\u00a0 That would be grounds for bringing out the thugs and area boys to kill, steal and destroy.<\/p>\n
Thus, the APC started accusing the PDP of rigging an election that has yet to take place.\u00a0 In a speech made during Buhari\u2019s declaration of his fourth bid for the presidency, Rotimi Amaechi said: \u201cWe will punish these people\u2026 They are banking on using security against us. We shall teach them lesson. We will fight with our body, with our lives because there must be change this time.\u201d<\/p>\n
At the APC\u2019s so-called Salvation Rally, Amaechi declared that the APC will form a parallel government if the 2015 election is rigged.\u00a0 This is disingenuous because everyone knows that the only way the APC will not insist the election is rigged is if it wins.\u00a0 Every election that the APC has won has been free and fair; but every election it has lost has been rigged.\u00a0 In effect, the APC is already threatening treasonable felony if it loses the forthcoming presidential election.<\/p>\n
Queried about this stand, Lai Mohammed, the Publicity Secretary of the APC said that has been the stand of the APC since the Osun State gubernatorial election.\u00a0 In which case, had APC lost Osun it would have decided to create mayhem.\u00a0 Lai Mohammed declared: \u201cLet us remind the presidency, in case it has forgotten, that election fraud triggered a civil war in Algeria in the early 1990s, led to the killing of over 1,000 people in post-election riots in Kenya in 2007\/2008 and fired a near revolution in Iran in 2009\/2010.\u201d
\n(TO BE CONTINUED)<\/p>\n
(VANGUARD NEWSPAPERS)\n<\/p>\n
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Sent from my T-Mobile 4G LTE Device<\/p>\n
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Some people say Goodluck Jonathan is \u201cclueless.\u201d\u00a0 They would also have us believe he is a weak president.\u00a0 If so, how come his opponents are greatly afraid of him?\u00a0 People…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":23434,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-33879","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-articles-opinions"],"yoast_head":"\n