Jonathan, you are a Drowning President –El-Rufai

 

On Wednesday, the former Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Mallam Nasir el-Rufai, has described President Goodluck Jonathan as a drowning President, who distorts facts.

He said, “It may interest the President to know that Nigerians are much wiser now and will not be deceived by the antics of a drowning president and his desperate aides.”

“The Jonathan administration is said to have favoured his home state of Bayelsa 200 per cent times more than the next states with the highest federal representation – Delta, Edo and Anambra.

“If Jonathan is not playing the ethnic card, can he possibly explain to Nigerians why Bayelsa, which has the smallest population in Nigeria and the fewest number of local government areas, has more than double the number of federal appointees measured by population and weight of responsibility than that of the next state?”

According to him, the most populous states of Lagos and Kano are at the bottom of the representation ladder.

He then asked, “Are those the words of a patriot or an ethnic bigot? This was after an election where he received nearly 100 per cent of all votes cast in the South-South and South-East states, in some cases getting more votes than there were registered voters or even residents.”

He also criticised Vice-President Namadi Sambo for the massive debts he incurred as the governor of Kaduna State.

However, the Presidency said el-Rufai and his ilk were “grossly irresponsible for targeting Jonathan in their politics of abuse and name-calling.”

Abati said nobody had the right to denigrate the office of the President under the guise of engaging in criticism.

Doing so, according to the presidential spokesman, is both “unreasonable and foolish.”

Abati said, “I have not seen the full text of El-Rufai’s statement. I will look out for it and study it and if need be, I will respond appropriately.”

Also, the media aide to the vice-president, Mallam Sani Umar, challenged el-Rufai to publish the facts on the Kaduna State debt profile and the water project.

Umar said, “I challenge El-Rufai to publish the debt profile of the state from 1996 to date for the public to decipher and judge whether huge debts were bequeathed to Kaduna State or not by the Sambo administration.”