‘Jonathan lacks integrity to speak on inter-party democracy’

A columnist, Segun Ayobolu, has said former president Goodluck Jonathan “lacks the moral integrity” to speak on inter-party democracy.

Ayobolu stated this in an op-ed he penned, titled “APC’s Primaries And PMB’s Legacy”.

TheCornet had reported that Jonathan censured the recent party primaries, saying delegates were being bribed in exchange for their votes.

But Ayobolu believes Jonathan is being miserly with the truth.

The respected veteran journalist, in his article, recalled the corruption that characterised inter-party democracy in the Peoples Democratic Party under Jonathan as Nigeria’s president.

“He forgets that it was his utter disregard for the internal democratic processes of the PDP and his utilization of presidential power to clinch the Party’s ticket for the 2015 elections at all costs that led to the party’s implosion and his emphatic loss leading to the APC’s ascendancy to power.

“Dr Jonathan lacks the moral integrity to preach intra-party democracy to anybody,” Ayobolu stated.

Jonathan is attempting a comeback to the presidency after a humiliating defeat by incumbent President Muhammadu Buhari in 2015.

Surprisingly, he is doing so under the ruling party, the All Progressives Congress even though he has not officially left the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

Many watchers are left bewildered by the former Nigerian leader’s current political tryst with the APC, signposted by his initial ostensible rejection of the party’s presidential forms and subsequent volte-face.

Importantly, Jonathan’s dalliance with key figures in the APC and a recent pronouncement by a federal high court in Bayelsa affirming his eligibility to contest are telling signs of his recent political involvement.

In his statement a few weeks ago, Ebonyi State Governor David Umahi had said Jonathan running under the auspices of the APC is akin to becoming “one of the wonders in this century.” The APC-Jonathan collaboration has captured attention of many, so much because Buhari and some key appointees of his government have consistently for the past seven years pilloried the former president for overseeing a profoundly corrupt politico-economy system during his presidency.

At a 2018 Quarterly Business Forum, Vice President Yemi Osinbajo alleged mindless pillaging of public funds under Jonathan.

He said: “I’m sure many of us are familiar with the so called strategic alliance contracts with the NNPC and NDPC. The promoters of the companies made away with close to 3 billion US dollars, almost a tenth of our reserves at one point! Osinbajo, himself a presidential aspirant, added: “In one single transaction, a few weeks to the elections in 2015, the sum of N100 billion and $289 million in cash were embezzled by a few.”

Likewise, Buhari’s media adviser Femi Adesina said “it is obvious that corruption had an uninhibited course” under Jonathan. Chief among the accusations against Jonathan is that he ordered the opening of the Central Bank’s vault for the purpose of funding his failed re-election bid in 2015. This is why the Buhari presidency has had some of his predecessor’s key appointees either convicted or currently standing trial for charges of corruption.

Aside from his appointees, Jonathan’s wife, Patience, was also said to have acquired unexplainable wealth. In 2019, a five-man Supreme Court panel affirmed the forfeiture of $8.4million the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) seized from Patience.

Many are waiting to see how President Buhari and the APC will before the electorate deodorize the stench of corruption they have obsessively associated former president Jonathan with.