SAN FRANCISCO, June 09, (THEWILL) – The Congress for Progressive Change
(CPC) has condemned what it described as the orchestrated distortion of
recent commentaries of its leader, General Muhammadu Buhari (rtd), by
the President of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN),Pastor Ayo
Oritsejafor.
A statement issued on Sunday by CPC National
Publicity Secretary, Rotimi Fashakin, particularly faulted Oritsejafor’s
call for the arrest of Buhari because of his recent commentaries on
national issues.
Maintaining that there is definitely an
incongruity in Oritsejafor’s call and Buhari’s stand on Nigeria’s
insecurity, CPC said Oritsejafor has again “proven to be, a willing
implement for destabilisation in the hands of the Presidency, in the
orchestrated heckling of GMB ahead of the 2015 elections .”
Describing
the CAN President as an unrepentant supporter and friend of President
Goodluck Jonathan, CPC said the recent call by Oritsejafor is a rehash
of his stance on “a previous piece of mendacious writing by Dr. Reuben
Abati in his Guardian Newspaper column, wherein he alluded to GMB as
being responsible for post-election violence in some parts of the North
in April, 2011.”
CPC maintained that the kernel of Oritsejafor’s
latest orchestrated distortion of Buhari’s recent commentaries was done
to blacken him as supporting the Boko Haram insurgency and help in
bolstering the election fortunes of his friend.
According to
CPC, “Our attention has been drawn to the recent call by Pastor Ayodele
Oritsejafor, President of Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), for
the arrest of General Muhammadu Buhari (GMB) – the national leader of
the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) – on account of his recent
commentaries on national issues.
“We are aware that this is a
rehash of the stance of Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor to a previous piece of
mendacious writing by Dr. Reuben Abati in his Guardian Newspaper column,
wherein he alluded to GMB as being responsible for post-election
violence in some parts of the North in April, 2011.
“The subsequent libel suit instituted by GMB revealed that Abati had no shred of evidence for his reckless surmising. “
CPC
also alleged that Oritsejafor had used the platform of CAN to
impetuously seek the arrest of Buhari based on fiction and orchestrated
literary violence by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP)-led Federal
Government.
“The subsequent appointment of Dr. Reuben Abati as
the Special Adviser to President Goodluck Jonathan on Media and
Publicity revealed the fitting reward for that hatchet job,” CPC said,
adding “ We have also noted the physical presence of President Good-luck
Jonathan at the ceremony where Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor was presented a
gift of Bombardier Jet on 10th November, 2012.”
CPC said the
kernel of the latest orchestrated distortion of Buhari’s recent
commentaries was done to blacken him as supporting the Boko Haram
insurgency of Boko Haram in Nigeria.
“ In fact, Pastor Oritsejafor impudently asserted:
“He
is, therefore, the prime leader of this religious and blood thirsty
sect called Boko Haram, a movement that is based on a warped
interpretation of a strict adherence to force people of other religions
into Islam. This kind of fundamentalism is the driving force behind his
failure of each election in the country.”
“It is our view that
this statement is utterly tendentious and unsupportable by
incontrovertible facts. We are aware that, as it was before and after
the 2011 elections, Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor is keen on helping the
electoral fortunes of his friend, President Good-luck Jonathan. We are
therefore compelled to re-tell GMB’s uncompromising stand on Boko Haram.
“In a recent interview in June 2012, this is what GMB said on Boko Haram:
“When
we knew who was Maitatsine, wasn’t he arrested, killed and his corpse
shown to everybody? But this Boko Haram, if you could recall somebody
recommended me to represent Boko Haram. I told them the honest truth
that I didn’t know who their leadership was and I still don’t know who
their leaders are. I don’t know their philosophy because no religion
advocates hurting the innocent. So, all those people giving it a
religious meaning are wrong. You can’t kill a person and say Allahu
Akbar (God is great). It is either you don’t know what you are saying or
you don’t believe in it. It is one of the two.”
“On 25th
December, 2012 (Christmas day), bombings took place at the St. Theresa’s
Catholic Church, Madalla, Niger State; Jos, Plateau State; and
Damaturu, Yobe State. This is what GMB said:
"Bombing other human
beings to death at any time is callous. It becomes much more
reprehensible on a Christmas day and all lovers of peace must condemn
these gruesome acts and demand that the perpetrators be fished out and
brought to book.
"How on earth would the Vatican and the
British authorities speak before the Nigerian government on attacks
within Nigeria that have led to the deaths of our citizens? This is
clearly a failure of leadership at a time the government needs to assure
the people of the capacity to guarantee the safety of lives and
property. You can devote the entire budget to security and there won't
be any result if there is no competence in leadership to know what to do
at the right time."
“We leave discerning Nigerians to judge and
see the incongruity in Pastor Oritsejafor’s reckless call and GMB’s
unwavering patriotic stand on Nigeria’s insecurity. Again, Pastor
Oritsejafor has proven to be, a willing implement for destabilisation in
the hands of the Presidency, in the orchestrated heckling of GMB ahead
of the 2015 elections.
“As we shall prove shortly, the moral
rectitude, personal discipline and patriotic love for Nigeria by GMB is
head and shoulder above what the current leaders of the nation possess.
GMB is not in the mould of leaders that do not match their words with
deeds. In the run to the 2011 election, Dr. Good-luck Jonathan told an
unsuspecting Nation: “My ambition is not worth the blood of anybody.”
But truly, his electioneering campaign was trailed by blood, tears and
woes! As a ruling President, Dr. Good-luck Jonathan has caused more
destabilisation of the polity through his capricious politics than any
of his predecessors in office. Under his watch, the nation state is
tottering and statecraft in peril, but he prefers to use negative
propaganda against those he perceives as interested in contesting for
the Nation’s presidency, to actually evincing enviable leadership of the
country.”
According to the CPC, “There are certain incongruities
in the nation state under President Jonathan that GMB has continued to
sensitise Nigerians about, and for which the government has continued to
distort with its divisive weapon of preying on the ethno-religious
fault lines in the Country.
“In 2009, Mohammed Yussuff, the
leader of Boko Haram, was arrested by the military and handed over to
the Nigeria Police. He was paraded with hand-cuff before journalists.
Barely twenty four hours’ later, Yussuff’s lifeless body was shown to
journalists and still in hand-cuff! In a related development, persons
suspected to be Boko Haram members or sympathisers were shot by the
Police at point-blank range.
“The video footage of the incident
posted by al-Jazeera showed some of the people on crutches and made to
lay face-down before a police man bent over and summarily executed them
all. This act of cruel injustice, coupled with the official acquiescence
of the PDP-led Federal Government of President Good-luck Jonathan was
what GMB said to be the genesis of the bloody insurgency of Boko Haram.
“In
Baga, a fishing community in Borno State, a Nigerian soldier was
killed. The ensuing reprisal attack by the military left in excess of
185 persons dead – mostly children and women – and many houses
destroyed.
“The previous prosecution of the war on terror in
northern Nigeria had been done with such unprofessional ferocity that
left tales of human rights abuses and extra-judicial murders. The United
States of America (USA) had pilloried the Nigerian military for this.
It is on this background that GMB expressed his scepticism about the
current declaration of state of emergency in three northern states.
With the communication black-out over these states, are we not to expect
more abuses in the name of enforcing security?”
The statement
also recalled that: “In May, 2013, about 60 security men (consisting of
police and State security operatives) were allegedly gruesomely
murdered in Nasarawa by the Ombatse cult group.
“ In a bizarre
twist of the events, the Director-General of Directorate of State
Security (DSS), Mr. Ita Ekpeyong, said he had forgiven the killers of
the service men and left them to God’s judgment.
“ GMB, in his
characteristic candour, lambasted the head of Nigeria’s spy agency for
this perfidious statement. These are his exact words: “However, the
Nasarawa attack is a cult that infiltrated the police itself. The latest
I learnt from you the press is that the number of security personnel
killed is 56. The cult group slaughtered 56 security men. The SSS boss
or whoever that said he has left everything to God has no right to do
that.
“Constitutionally, Nigerians can practice any religion they
want or they can be atheists or anything they want to be, that is
constitutional. But nobody should hurt a citizen of Nigeria and then get
away with it, not to talk of slaughtering 56 law enforcement agents and
then somebody coming out from the system to say such a thing. It is
either that person doesn’t know what he was talking about or he
shouldn’t even be there.
“In many jurisdictions, notably the
advanced democracies, any murderous violence on the service men is
viewed with uncompromising severity. In the same vein, there is also a
concomitant punishment of the service men for any breach of service
codes or rules of engagement.
“ Last March, Staff Sergeant Robert Bales, a veteran of
four US combat tours in Afghanistan and Iraq, ran amok and killed
sixteen persons in Kandahar province of Afghanistan, while also burning
their houses and villages. The United States (US) authority did not go
the way of Nigeria. The offending service man was arraigned before the
Court by military prosecutors. From latest developments on the case,
Bales stands the risk of life imprisonment or death sentence.”’
CPC said it had stated this example “to show the utter irresponsibility
and ineptitude currently pervading the business of governance in the
Nigerian state,” adding “ The Federal Government, under President
Goodluck Jonathan, had shown complicity in the exacerbation of security
concerns in Nigeria.”
The statement however maintained : “As a
party, we know that the Federal Government of President Goodluck
Jonathan, like the previous PDP administration, seems too intimidated by
GMB’s sterling qualities and previous meritorious service to Nigeria
that no effort is spared to depreciate his status through deliberate
distortions and misrepresentation of his statements.
“We
sincerely sympathise with them! For the avoidance of doubt and within
the ambit of space/time constraints, we hereby avail discerning
Nigerians some aspects of the stellar public service performance of
General Muhammadu Buhari (GMB):
“ In August 1975, as a Lt.
Colonel, GMB was appointed military governor of North-Eastern State, an
area now comprising the six states of the North East geo-political zone.
He governed with such acuity and urbanity that was undoubtedly the
basis for the future development of the area.
“As Federal
Commissioner for Petroleum resources (March 1976-July 1978), two of the
Nation’s four refineries, that is, Warri and Kaduna, were built. Also,
thousands of kilometres of fuel pipelines and depots were constructed!
“In
1983, the patriotic fervour of GMB was rudely put to test when the
Chadians, in a mindless expansionist adventure, invaded and occupied 19
Islands in Lake Chad within Nigerian territory. As the General Officer
Commanding (GOC) the 3rd Armoured Corps, GMB successfully carried out a
blockade, forcing the return of the territories -and thereafter pursued
the Chadians as far as 50 kilometres into Chadian territory; a feat
loudly applauded as forward defence strategy at its best!
“ As
the incoming Head of State on December 31st, 1983, he aroused the
Nigerian people into a new wave of Patriotism with his often-quoted
statement: “This generation of Nigerians, and indeed future generations,
have no country other than Nigeria. We shall remain and salvage it
together.” This aptly captured what later defined the conduct of the
Buhari administration. The 20-month era of strong leadership espoused
what later became known as ‘Buharinomics’, which simply put, is an
admixture of frugality, probity, respect for contractual agreements,
expunction of all covert or overt attempts at subjugating the Nigerian
economy to world powers and above all, the economic policy with Nigeria
as the centre-piece. It is therefore without any whiff of equivocation
to state that the boldest attempt, in the last thirty years, at
alleviating the pains of the teeming masses was during the enactment of
Buharinomics.
“It was not surprising that inflation rate
inherited from the ruinous and immediate past civilian regime was
lowered by more than 18 points, from 23.2per cent in 1983 to 5.5 per
cent in 1985! The Buhari regime rebuffed all entreaties by IMF and World
Bank to devalue the naira, remove subsidies on services and increase
pump price on fuel; not even a special envoy from President Ronald
Reagan was sufficient to make him rescind his decision!
“As
Executive Chairman of the Petroleum Trust Fund (PTF), hundreds of
kilometres of roads were constructed to hitherto unreached rural
communities. He ensured the supply of drugs to the health centres of
educational institutions. The infrastructural development of the country
was massive with his inimitable management of the funds released for
PTF operations. It is no wonder that the subsequent scrutiny of the
financial dealings of the PTF showed an excellent work done by the
agency.
“It is against this back-drop that we understand the
frustrations of the current leaders and their sympathisers in the
heckling expeditions of GMB. As things stand, he poses the greatest
challenge to the continued existence of the indignity and incongruity
that the Jonathan administration represents.
“The tottering
edifice of the weather-beaten umbrella of the People’s Democratic Party
(PDP) is aptly captured by the well-reasoned words of Othman Dan Fodio:
“a kingdom can endure with unbelief but it cannot endure with
injustice”.
“As GMB once posited, “the battle for social justice
is not just for me, or the opposition, but a challenge to all Nigerians.
Each and everyone of us has a duty to stand up and speak for justice.
The first principle of justice in a democracy is the right of the
citizens to freely choose their leaders. This can only happen if
elections are free and fair, not according to INEC or a bare majority of
the Supreme Court. They must be free and fair by all counts and in all
senses.”
“In the run to the April 2011 elections, GMB saw through
the entire gamut of deception of the Jonathan regime and wept. Many
jeered, some excoriated him but the discerning ones were also
inconsolable. Unfortunately, his tears are drying up but the teeming
Nigerian people are now made to weep. Every act of the Jonathan regime
is a scripted venture in ruinous adventure. There is confusion in the
engine room and the statecraft is on auto-pilot. We are sure that though
the situation is sordid, help is on the way! The merger of the
opposition parties shall provide the fulcrum for springing the Nation
back to life.
“Indeed, to wrestle Nigeria from the vice-grip of
the current unpatriotic leaders is a task that must be done. Eternal
vigilance is still the price for our liberty.”
Welcome to Justin Kingland's Blog News
Lagos — No fewer than 150 shops and goods worth millions of Naira were
Sunday razed by fire at the Trinity spare parts market in Olodi Apapa
area of Lagos State. Vanguard gathered that the fire which started
around 3:24 p.m., might have been caused by an electrical power surge in
one of the shops on ‘B’ line of the
plaza. Eyewitnesses who spoke to Vanguard confirmed that at first a
thick smoke was spotted bellowing from one shop in ‘B’ line as Power
Holding Company of Nigeria, PHCN, restored power in the afternoon
before finally degenerating into an inferno that engulfed the entire
Speed Well Plaza. The plaza is said to house over 200 shops dealing on
motor spare parts. 
