Just In: Don’t Blame Me For Your Party’s Self-Inflicted Woes- Jonathan Tells Buhari

After General Muhammadu Buhari today in a
press statement asked President Goodluck
Jonathan to pull the brakes on his
administration’s runaway train of impunity in
the interest of Nigeria’s survival and the
sustenance of the nation’s democracy,
President Jonathan has deemed it fit to reply
him. Find the president’s statement after the
cut.
We have noted with much surprise and
regret, the statement issued by General
Muhammadu Buhari today in which he made
some wild and totally unsustainable
allegations against President Goodluck Ebele
Jonathan.

Although he tries very hard to deny it in the
statement titled “Pull Nigeria Back From the
Brink”, there can be no doubt that General
Buhari has sadly moved away from the
patriotic and statesmanlike position he
recently adopted on national security, which
President Jonathan publicly commended, and
has now reverted to unbridled political
partisanship.

There can be no other explanation or
justification for the completely unwarranted
and very uncharitable assault on the conduct
and integrity of President Jonathan which the
statement he issued today represents.

General Buhari’s main grouse which clearly
motivated his ill-considered statement
appears to be what he called “the gale of
impeachments or the utilisation of desperate
tactics to suffocate the opposition and turn
Nigeria into a one-party state”.

It is most unfortunate that instead of working
to put their house in order and resolve the
leadership crises and internal contradictions
that have plunged their party into a
downward spiral, General Buhari and his
opposition allies have resorted to blaming a
blameless President for their woes.
The processes for impeaching an elected
Governor are clearly stipulated in the
National Constitution which Nigeria has
operated since 1999. The President of Nigeria
is not assigned any role in that process and
President Jonathan has certainly not played
any role in the recent impeachment of
Governor Murtala Nyako of Adamawa or in
the impeachment drama currently being
played out in Nasarawa State.

For the record, President remains fully
committed to upholding the letters, principles
and spirit of the Nigerian Constitution as he
has sworn, and defending the rule of law and
integrity of the democratic process with all
his might.

General Buhari talks about anarchy. He needs
to be reminded that President Jonathan from
his humble beginnings as a Deputy Governor
in Bayelsa state to date, has never in his acts,
or utterances, recommended or promoted
violence as a tool of political negotiation.

Contrary to whatever General Buhari and his
new friends may imagine, President Jonathan
fully respects the rights, powers, authority
and independence of elected representatives
of the people, including the members of the
state assemblies who have concluded or
initiated impeachment proceedings against
their state governors on grounds which they
consider justifiable.

The constitution does not give the President
any power to intervene in such proceedings
and President Jonathan has never arrogated
such powers to himself or sought to exert
any nefarious and unconstitutional influence
on state assemblies in Adamawa, Nasarawa or
anywhere else in other to secure undue
political advantage for his party as General
Buhari unjustifiably alleges.

President Jonathan remains true to his
declaration that no political ambition of his is
worth the life of a single Nigerian. The
President has definitely not declared war on
his own country or deployed federal
institutions in the service of partisan interests
as General Buhari falsely claims. Neither has
he been using the common wealth to subvert
the system and punish the opposition, as the
former Head of State inexcusably asserts.

Also, President Jonathan has never at any time
ordered that any Nigerian should be
kidnapped or that anyone should be crated
and forcefully transported in violation of
decent norms of governance.
We therefore urge General Buhari to tarry a
while, ponder over his own antecedents and
do a reality check as to whether he has the
moral right to be so carelessly sanctimonious.

It may well be time to pull the brakes, as
General Buhari says in his statement, but it is
he and others who have resorted to idle
scapegoating and blaming President Jonathan
for their self-inflected political troubles who
need to stop their inexcusable partisanship
and show greater regard for the truth,
democracy, constitutionalism, the rule of law,
peace, security and the well-being of the
nation.