They had everything cut out long before they left office last May 29. At a secret meeting in Abuja, former President Goodluck Jonathan and his ministers mapped out strategies on how to react to criticisms after their exit. They knew that they were leaving the country in a mess, which will become so glaring after their exit that the people will call for their heads. How to avoid the people’s wrath became their headache. The meeting decided that the only way out is for them to continue to bond together after their exit.
Truly, since May 29, these men of yesterday have remained together. They and their principal have held series of meetings in the last three months amid the clamour for a probe of their tenure. In one of its sessions, the meeting advised Jonathan to seek the help of the Gen Abdulsalami Abubakar-led peace committee to reach out to his successor, President Muhammadu Buhari. The meeting felt that the president is breaching the understanding he reached with Jonathan and that only the peace panel could intervene to remedy the situation.
What is this understanding they are talking about? It all has to do with the agreement signed by Buhari and Jonathan to accept the outcome of the March 28 presidential election. The essence of the pact is to ensure that there was no breakdown of law and order over the election result.The parties complied with the terms of the agreement because the election came and went without violence. But does this imply that Buhari would not call Jonathan to question for his deeds in office? Of course, it does not. But those who want the immediate past administration to get away with all its atrocities want to tie Buhari’s hands with that pact, which centred mainly on a peaceful, free and fair election. With the elections over, the peace panel should automatically close shop and allow Buhari to do his job. But, Jonathan, his ministers and others who want to use it to achieve their aims will have none of that.
The former ministers’ thinking is that if things continued like this, Jonathan may end up being a villain in the people’s eyes. So, to avoid that, they felt it was expedient for the peace panel to do something before it is too late. That informed the meeting the panel had with the president last month. But the panel met its match in Buhari, who insisted on probing the Jonathan administration for leaving the country in a mess. The panel’s argument that a probe may rubbish Jonathan’s good deed of of conceding defeat to Buhari in the last election did not cut ice with the president. He was said to have told the panel that all those who abused their office must pay the price for their actions.
Jonathan also met with Buhari, who stood his ground on probe. As if he knew things would turn out this way, Jonathan had at the valedictory Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting held on May 27 said he was not afraid of probe but that it should be extended to the administrations before his. ”Anyone calling for probes must ensure that probes are extended beyond the Jonathan administration otherwise it will amount to a witch hunt”. This has been the line of the former ministers, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and its senators that have been accusing Buhari of being selective in his anti-corruption war.
But is that the case? No, says the All Progressives Congress (APC), which points out that some of its members have also been caught in the anti-graft war web. But Jonathan and his ministers believe that they are the target. This is why they have resolved to fight back with all they have. After their last meeting in Abuja, one of them, the former National Planning Minister, Dr Abubakar Suleiman, was appointed the group’s spokesman. It is part of their larger plan to ensure that none of them goes down alone. They want to fight as a group. But there is danger in that because each person must answer for his own deed. Was the treasury looted as a group? No. The ministers might have worked together in Council, but every individual must give an account of his stewardship, given as we all know that they did not all hold the same portfolio.
Could it be that they are afraid and so, are seeking solace in a group? The failure of the peace panel to secure a soft landing for them may have heightened their fear that eh, this is prison! If they have no skeletons in their cupboards, they need not fear, but if they do, they should be prepared to face the consequences of their actions. Performing his first duty as the group’s spokesman, Suleiman, in a statement, claimed that lies were being peddled about the Jonathan administration, submitting : ”But such sensationalism may achieve the unintended effect of de-marketing our country within the international community”. How can?
Suleiman is wide of the mark. Rather, Nigeria is enjoying its best time ever in the comity of nations. The president has been to the United States, where he stayed in President Barack Obama’s guest house; he has attended the G7 summit as an observer and last week, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon was in Nigeria. I don’t know what Suleiman is driving at with such a claim. Is he saying that Nigeria will be de-marketed because we want to ask our past leaders questions? Has he ever heard of any country being de-marketed for looking at its past in order to shape its future? Were countries that jailed their leaders for corruption and other misdemeanours de-marketed?
Jonathan and his men need not fear since they say they served the nation with all their hearts. ”We are proud to have served Nigeria and we boldly affirm that we did so diligently and to the best of our abilities. The improvements that have been noticed today in the power sector, in national security and in social services and other sectors did not occur overnight. They are products of solid foundations laid by the Jonathan administration…the Jonathan administration did not encourage corruption, rather it fought corruption vigorously…for the benefit of those who may have forgotten so soon, it was the Jonathan administration that got rid of the fraud in fertiliser subsidies, which had plagued the country for decades…”
Huh! This will be sweet music in the ears of the probe panels. Suleiman and his colleagues should go and sing it there. But will they have the courage of their conviction to appear before such panels when the time comes?
NATION
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The evil that men do live after them.Jail. You all must remain.CHIKENA.