Bola Tinubu’s Presidency has rolled out negative indices that would make it impossible for former President Goodluck Jonathan to contest in the 2027 election.
A statement today, September 29, by Tinubu’s Special Adviser on information and strategy, Bayo Onanuga said that Jonathan would have to contend with court issue as to whether he can contest and if he wins, be sworn-in for the third time as President.
“…Jonathan will have his date in the court of the land. Indeed, the jury will determine whether Jonathan, who was sworn in twice as president, satisfies the constitutional requirements and is eligible to contest the presidency and be sworn in, if successful, for a third term in office.
“Jonathan will also have his encounter with the people as to whether he has anything new to offer after his disastrous six years, for which they voted him out in 2015.
“Let us remind ourselves about Jonathan’s record. We cannot forget in a hurry how his regime, devoid of any clear economic agenda, engaged in frivolous spending, ran the economy aground and put the country in dire straits.
“The nation’s economic downturn, which President Tinubu is working very hard to overcome, actually began under President Jonathan. “The Jonathan administration severely damaged the economy, and all key indicators declined under his watch. Under him, the so-called business moguls allocated foreign exchange to import fuel, simply pocketing the dollars without importing anything. Some of those big men still have court cases on the issue today.
“Jonathan and his National Security Adviser, Col. Sambo Dasuki (rtd), freely distributed security funds to friends and cronies.
“In 2010, President Jonathan inherited a total of $66 billion, of which $46 billion was in foreign reserves and $20 billion in the noble-but-abused Excess Crude Account. By 2015, when the people democratically removed him from office, the foreign reserves had fallen below $30 billion, and the Excess Crude Account had been depleted to $2 billion, despite generating record revenue from crude oil sales that the country had never achieved in more than 25 years combined.
“It is on record that between 2010 and 2013, crude oil sold for an average of $100 per barrel. By December 2014, however, the Jonathan-led Federal Government could no longer pay salaries to Federal Civil Servants. At least 28 states across the country owed workers huge salary arrears.”
Onanuga took a swipe at those who he described as “desperation of the opposition ganging up against President Bola Tinubu” trying to
prematurely foist Jonathan on the nation.
“We are once again regaled with a cacophony of voices, most of them full of sound and fury, signifying nothing, to paraphrase inimitable Williams Shakespeare in one of his classic works, Macbeth.”
He referred particularly to a statement by the former Minister of Information and National Orientation, Professor Jerry Gana who moved to draft former Jonathan into the 2007 presidential race.
He said that Professor Gana had concluded that ex President Jonathan would contest the coming election on the platform of the discredited People’s Democratic Party (PDP), “which bequeathed a legacy of economic ruins, after 16 years of bad governance.
“Gana even deluded himself, asserting that the former President would defeat President Tinubu to reclaim power after 12 years.
“Prof. Gana of the defunct MAMSER fame is free to delude himself and engage in his usual comedy; after all, Jonathan’s entering the race would provide another job for the Niger State-born former university don.
“However, we should caution former President Jonathan to be wary of the PDP sugar-coated cheerleaders. Politicians of Jerry Gana’s ilk merely want to lure him into the race to satisfy their personal, political, religious, and ethnic interests. They will abandon him midstream, as they did in 2015, and leave Gentleman Jonathan in the lurch.
“Don’t get us wrong: President Jonathan reserves the right to run if he wishes. It is his inalienable right to contest the presidency again. ‘President Tinubu will wholeheartedly welcome him if he decides to enter the race.”
