Front-line predecessors of President Goodluck
Jonathan in office, ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo; and ex-dictators, retired
Generals Muhammadu Buhari, Ibrahim Babangida,
and Abdusalami Abubakar (retd.), as well as the Speaker of the House of
Representatives, Aminu Tambuwal, on Wednesday shunned the Democracy Day event
of the Federal Government.
While all former heads of government were reportedly
invited to the event where Jonathan rendered an account of his mid-term
performance, only Alhaji Shehu Shagari, Gen. Yakubu Gowon (retd.) and Chief
Ernest Shonekan attended.
Gowon ruled as military head of state between 1966
and 1976; Shagari from 1979 to 1983; while Shonekan spent barely 99 days in
office as head of the Interim National Government foisted on the country by
Babangida after the annulment of the June 12, 1993 election won by the late
businessman, MKO Abiola.
Rather than be in Abuja, Obasanjo chose to attend
the First Jigawa State Investment Forum in Dutse, where he showered praises on
Governor Sule Lamido for being a brilliant performer in whom he (Obasanjo) was
well pleased to have helped to office.
“You can help someone to find a job but you can’t
help the person to do the job. In this case, we found a job for Sule Lamido and
Sule Lamido was ready, willing, able and competent to do the job,” he
reportedly said at the event.
Obasanjo is believed to have facilitated the coming
of Jonathan to the Presidency in 2007 but the two have reportedly become
estranged.
Buhari, now one of the arrowheads of the coalition
to unseat the Peoples Democratic Party in 2015 and the Jonathan administration,
had in recent past exchanged hot words on the state of the nation. Babangida
contested the PDP Presidential ticket with Jonathan in 2011 and he is generally
seen not as a fan of the administration.
Tambuwal was represented at the event by his deputy,
Emeka Ihedioha, who gave no reason for the Speaker’s absence. Analysts on
Wednesday believed that attendance and non-attendance at the Democracy Day
celebration was “all part of the 2015 politics.”
Meanwhile, Jonathan, while presenting his scorecard
for his second year in office, asked Nigerians who are fond of criticising his
government to ensure they first develop their marking scheme before assessing
his administration.
Before the President formally presented the report
of his two years in office, Vice-
President Namadi Sambo; the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Pius
Anyim; Minister of National Planning, Dr. Shamsudeen Usman; and the Minister of
Finance, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, had taken turns to present the achievements
of the administration in all sectors for the past two years.
“I plead with those who want to write and assess us
to prepare marking scheme, compare us with previous governments and so on and
so forth. Develop your marking scheme and mark us,” Jonathan said.
Jonathan said while assessing his government, he had
discovered that a number of comments of his critics were “based on heartbeats
and not any visible criteria.”
“A number of comments about the performance of this
administration are based on the heartbeat of people,” he said.
He specifically referred to an assessment done by an
unnamed newspaper which scored the Minister of National Planning and the
Minister of Trade and Investment an average in terms of performance.
Jonathan said contrary to that assessment, the
performances of the two ministers remained the best among the three ministers
that had so far been in charge of those ministries under his leadership.
On the Ministry of Trade and Investment, the
President said because of the hard work of Dr. Olusegun Aganga, foreign
investors had been investing heavily in the country despite the security
challenges facing the nation and that until Usman came on board, the Ministry
of National Planning had remained relatively not in existence.
Sambo had earlier in his welcome remarks said all
members of the Jonathan administration were united in their aspiration to
transform Nigeria to a nation that would be respected worldwide.
He said the Democracy Day was not all about a public
holiday but a day to look inwards and give account of stewardship, adding that
was why the administration was using the opportunity to give account of its
actions to the nation that gave them the mandate to serve.
Sambo urged all Nigerians to join hands to build a
nation that would fulfil the promise of the past and work for the good of the
present and the future generation. He said constitutional and moral burdens
were on all of them in government to uphold democratic tenets.
He said, “To whom much is given, much is expected.
We are grateful to the nation for the mandate we received from the freest and
fairest election in recent time. The transformation agenda is decided on those
things that should be done to reposition the country. In the last two years, we
have pursued a resolute course to widen the political space.
“Our public institutions are being rebuilt. The
National Assembly is very vibrant, the judiciary is truly independent. There is
a general onsensus that democracy and government in Nigeria are getting better.
We have laid a foundation of change in the last two years.
“In the face of unprecedented security challenges,
the challenges call for caution from all of us. Nobody should make political
capital on the issue. We seek your support and honest counsel in the areas we
can improve upon. A bright future beckons on this land and its people. We
assure generations unborn of a nation that will meet their needs.”
Anyim said the mid-term report presented by the
President provided verifiable achievements of his administration. He said the
administration had protected the rights of citizens and the rule of law in its
two years of existence.
He scored the administration high in the expansion
of civic space, entrenchment of checks and balances, sanitisation of electoral
process, federal character in appointments and anti-corruption fight, among
others.
Okonjo-Iweala, on her part, said the
administration’s transformation agenda had been tailored towards addressing
some of the nation’s problems, including insufficient jobs, rising debt, high
recurrent expenditure and falling reserves, among others.
She said in its two years, the administration had
made the economy strong, exchange rate stable, and reduced inflation to 9.1 per
cent from 12.4 per cent in May 2011.
The minister said the Federal Government had started retiring its
past debts and changed waiver and tariff policies from focusing on individuals
alone to the entire sector.
She added that the government hired 50 forensic
auditors to probe the fraud in the fuel subsidy regime, adding that sanity had
so far been restored to the system.
She said following the audit, N14bn had been
recovered out of the N234bn diverted funds while oil marketers had been reduced
to 32, making it easier for government to monitor them.
“The contributory pension scheme is sound and it is
being reformed to prevent fraud. Nigeria’s credit rating has improved.
International investors are investing more in Nigeria. Our banks are strong and
the stock market is also strong with stock exchange index rising to 71 per
cent,” she said.
Okonjo-Iweala said the administration had done well
in the areas of rail rehabilitation, inland ports construction and the
overhauling of airports.
The Founder/President, Rainbow PUSH Coalition, Rev.
Jesse Jackson, observed that leadership was not just about winning elections
but about transforming the people.
He urged Nigeria to continue to deepen its democracy
because the nation mattered to the international community. He urged Nigerian
leaders and followers to dream big about the nation, saying their resources must
unite and not divide them. “Nigeria must deepen democracy. Nigeria matters. In
peacekeeping around the world, Nigeria matters. Dream, keep dreaming big. Dream
Nigeria. Dream of one Nigeria,” he said.
Others who attended included wife of the President,
Patience; wife of the Vice- President, Amina; former Chief of General Staff,
Gen. Oladipo Diya (retd.); President of the Senate, David Mark; Chief Justice
of Nigeria, Justice Mariam Mukhtar; and Deputy President of the Senate, Ike
Ekweremadu.
Others were the Chairman, Board of Trustees of the
Peoples Democratic Party, Chief Tony Anenih; the party’s national chairman, Dr.
Bamanga Tukur; former CJN, Justice Alfa Begore (retd.); elder statesman, Chief
J.P. Clark; members of the National Assembly, former state governors, including
Chief Adebayo Alao-Akala (Oyo); Sam Egwu (Ebonyi); Segun Oni (Ekiti); and
members of the Federal Executive Council, among others.
The PUNCH
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