Jonathan, Most Incompetent President, APC Alleges

The All Progressives Congress (APC) has told the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) that President Goodluck Jonathan is not the first minority to rule Nigeria and will not be the last, hence the frequent resort to his minority ethnicity is nothing but a poorly-veiled attempt to cover up his blatant incompetence, poor leadership and sheer cluelessness.
In a statement issued in Ibadan yesterday by its Interim National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, the party said the PDP’s claim that the Boko Haram insurgency and other internecine crises in the country were being sponsored by the opposition because the president hails from a minority group is totally irresponsible and not grounded in fact.
It said First Republic Prime Minister, Abubakar Tafawa Balewa (Sayewa) and military heads of state, Yakubu Gowon (Angas) and Sani Abacha (Kanuri) were also from minority ethnic groups, a fact that is lost on the trifling PDP.
“The PDP has recently been making outlandish statements and accusations that are capable of destabilizing Nigeria. In its new found proclivity for issuing frivolous press statements, the party has forgotten that facts are sacred and cannot be manipulated. But even by its low standard, the PDP has plumbed the depth of irresponsibility with its latest claim.
“President Jonathan’s woes have nothing to do with his minority ethnicity, but the manifestation of his incompetence, cluelessness and inferiority complex, and the fact that he is backed by a greedy, visionless and crooked cabal, both within his government and his party,” the APC said.
The party said, if indeed, the PDP believes the opposition is sponsoring Boko Haram to stop President Jonathan from realizing his so-called Transformation Agenda, what prevents the PDP-led Federal Government from instituting a probe into all the incidences so far, and to unravel the sources of the sect’s weapons, as demanded recently by Governor Murtala Nyako?
APC said just like ethno-religious crises in Nigeria predate President Jonathan’s assumption of office, the Boko Haram insurgency started in 2002 during the former president Olusegun Obasanjo’s regime, even though it became aggravated in 2009 when then President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua ordered a joint security operation, following the killing of over a dozen policemen, and the failure of police action to curb the crisis.
APC said the usual recourse to President Jonathan’s ethnic origin to cover his glaring non-performance does not impress Nigerians, who are aware that as a minority, Jonathan could not have become president without the votes of the country’s majority ethnic groups – Hausa/Fulani, Igbo and Yorubal
APC said a country that has no discernible counter-terrorism strategy that will clearly identify the multiple means for preventing, responding and defeating terrorist groups, including the alignment of political, military, social and economic instruments and objectives, cannot expect to successfully battle any insurgency.
“We have continued to offer suggestions to this government on how it can tackle the insurgency that is now ravaging a part of the country. We have called for improved intelligence gathering, the aligning of military and political solutions, the need to de-radicalize the affected areas as well as to invest in research that will give more insight into the different aspects of Boko Haram, including its ideology, leadership structure, profile of members, internal organization, sources of funding and weapons and links to Diaspora.
“We have stressed the need to widen the scope of our response to include the sub-regional bloc ECOWAS and the continental body African Union, especially since Boko Haram has assumed a regional dimension. We have called for a Marshall Plan of sorts for the North-east, not the paltry N2billion which the Federal Government provided as recovery fund to the six North-East states, at least, four of which are worse-hit by the insurgency.
“We have called for an end to inter-agency rivalries that have weakened the fight against the terrorists, and we have advocated the need to lift the morale of our gallant men and women in uniform who are battling the insurgency, instead of the huge funds allocated for the purpose of upgrading their equipment ending in the deep pockets of fat cats.
“If and when these and other recommendations are taken seriously by the government, instead of resorting to ethnic and religious excuses, then it will begin to seriously address the insurgency,” the party said.

Rivers State Commissioner for Social Rehabilitation, Joe Poroma (left) and Commissioner for Local Government Affairs, Samuel Eyiba, during the inter-school debate competition organised by Port Harcourt City Local Government Council, in Port Harcourt, Wednesday. Photo: Obinna Dele