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| Jonathan and Buhari |
Former
President Goodluck Jonathan has spoken of the tensed moments he faced on March
28, 2015 ahead of his decision to concede victory to President Muhammadu Buhari
after that year’s presidential election.
“I was
actually in that valley on March 28, 2015”, he said.
Jonathan
also narrated why he relinquished power to Buhari, saying he did not want
Nigeria to slide into a theatre of war, with his fellow county men and
woman dying, and many more pouring into other nations in Africa and beyond, as
refugees.
“I never
knew that the human brain had the capacity for such enhanced rapid thinking.
One hundred and one things were going through my mind every second. My
country was at the verge of collapse. The tension in the land was abysmally
high and palpable, in the months leading to the election. The country became
more polarised more than ever before, such that the gap between the North and
the South and between Christians and Muslims became quite pronounced”, the
former President said.
“In fact,
it became so disturbing that some interest groups in the United States
began to predict indeed, many Nigerians did buy into this doomsday prophesy as
they began to brace themselves for the worst.
“As the
President, I reminded myself that the Government I led had invested so much
effort into building our country. I worked hard with my top officials to
encourage Nigerians and non-Nigerians to invest in our country to be able to
provide jobs and improve the lives of our people.
“We
worked hard to grow our economy and to improve and bring Nigeria up as the
biggest economy in Africa, with a GDP of about half a trillion dollars”.
Jonathan
told his story, last week, during a dinner in his honour by Cercle
Diplomatique, Geneva, Switzerland. The former President also spoke about his
foray into politics, the allure of power and future plans.
He began:
“ As you can see, I have not come here with a prepared speech, since what I
consider appropriate for this occasion is to just thank you all, members and
everyone else in attendance, in a few words, for the dinner and the award, in
order not to make the evening look boring. But having said that, I am still
tempted to note that if I were to present a written speech, the title, would
probably have been “Power Tussle in Africa: A Stumbling Block to Economic
Growth.” When Mr. Robert Blum, your President, made his very interesting
opening remarks, he introduced me as the former President of Nigeria. He was
absolutely correct.
My foray
into politics
“However,
I believe that not many of you here know that the story of my foray into
politics has a peculiar ring to it. I entered politics in 1998 and, barely one
year after, I got elected as the Deputy Governor of Bayelsa, my state. I later
became Governor, Vice President and eventually got elected as the President of
my country. I remain the only leader in my country to have travelled that
route.
As the
President, I served out my first term but, as Mr. Blum had pointed out earlier,
I lost the bid to be re-elected. I am encouraged by the fact that many of you
here appreciated my decision not to reject or contest my loss at the polls, not
even in the courts as many people had expected.
The
allure of power
“Again, I
have to agree with Blum that it was not an easy decision to take. This is
because the allure of power and the worries about what would become of you
after leaving office constitute an irresistible
force. It
has an attraction so controlling and powerful that it takes a man who has the
fear of God and who loves his people and nation to relinquish power so easily
in Africa.
Alone in
the valley
“I was
actually in that valley on March 28, 2015. I never knew that the human brain
had the capacity for such enhanced rapid thinking. One hundred and one things
were coursing through my mind every second. My country was at the verge of
collapse. The tension in the land was abysmally high and palpable, in the
months and days leading to the election. The country became more polarized more
than ever before, such that the gap between the North and the South and between
Christians and Muslims became quite pronounced. In fact, it became so
disturbing that some interest groups in the United States began to predict that
Nigeria would disintegrate in 2015. And, indeed, many Nigerians did buy into
this doomsday prophesy as they began to brace themselves for the worst. As the
President, I reminded myself that the Government I led had invested so much
effort into building our country. I worked hard with my top officials to
encourage Nigerians and non-Nigerians to invest in our country to be able to
provide jobs and improve the lives of our people. We worked hard to grow our
economy and to improve and bring Nigeria up as the biggest economy in Africa,
with a GDP of about half a trillion dollars.
Posers I
had to contend with
“Should I
then, for the love of power, watch Nigeria slide into a theatre of war, with my
fellow country men and women dying, and many more pouring into other nations in
Africa and beyond, as refugees?
Should I
hang on to power and tussle with my challengers, while the investments of hard
working citizens of the world go down the drain? I then said to myself, NO!
Resisting
the lure of power
“I
promised my God that I will not let that fate befall Nigeria under my watch, hence
the historic telephone call I put through to congratulate my challenger even
when the results were still being
tallied.
I believe that for a country to be great, both the leaders and the led must be
prepared to make sacrifices. This is why, everywhere I go, I always advise that
the new generation of African leaders must think differently. We can no longer
afford to wilfully sacrifice the blood of our citizens on the altar of
dangerous partisan politics. It is not worth it. This reminds me of one of my campaign
statements to the effect that my ambition was not worth the shedding of the
blood of any Nigerian. Some people took it then as mere political slogan but I
knew that I meant it when I said it.
We must
all fight for the enthronement of political stability in Africa, for in it lies
the panacea for sustainable growth and development. For Africa to record the
kind of advancement that will be competitive
and beneficial to our citizens, we must have stable states supported by strong
institutions. That appears to be the irreducible minimum that is common to all
developed societies. Africa’s political odyssey can distinctly be categorised
into three eras, and probably another that would later signpost its
classification as a developed continent”.
Challenges
“Some may
doubt this, but it is no fluke that Africa is growing and rising. However I
will admit before you here that we still have challenges. That is why people
like us did all we could to ensure that Nigeria,
the biggest black nation on earth, would not drift into anarchy because such a
situation would have spelt doom for the rest of the continent. It would have
affected not just Nigeria alone, but the GDP and
economy of the entire West Africa. And if the economy of West Africa crashes,
it would definitely affect the performance of the economy of the whole of
Africa. As you know, the GDP of Africa is less than three trillion dollars,
with only six African countries able to boast of nominal GDP above $100
billion. Even for those in this ‘elite’ category, you can’t really say that
they are rich countries. Apart from maybe South Africa that has an industrially
competitive economy, the rest are still mainly commodity exporting countries.
Even the case of that of South Africa is not very encouraging, because we have
a situation which we could refer to as a first world economic performance, yet
the ordinary people live the life of the people in the so called third world.
In the
case of Nigeria which is even the biggest economy on the continent, the reality
is that we have an unenviable per capita GDP of $3,203, which is the World Bank
average for a period covering 2011-2015.
Africa’s
future is bright
“Even
then, I still believe that Africa has a bright future; a promising prognosis
that is supported by the fact that the continent remains a very fertile and
attractive territory that yields irresistible returns on investments. I believe
that in the next few years many more big investors will be jostling to come to
Africa, if only we will do the right thing. The process of getting it right has
already started with a democratic and increasingly democratising Africa. But we
have to deepen and strengthen our democratic credentials through regular, free
and fair elections. This will in turn bring about the stability necessary to
improve the infrastructure that promotes rapid economic growth. These are the
guarantees that would lead us into the next period which I would like to call
the era of a developed Africa. I have no doubt in my mind that we will get
there some day.
My future
plans
“I will
be applying myself diligently to two key areas. First, is to work for good
governance by promoting credible and transparent elections. This will bring
about the strengthening of our institutions and the
enthronement of stability. I also believe that there is the urgent need to
create jobs for our teeming
young population.
This is another area that will be receiving my attention. I
recall that the Vice President of your association made reference in his speech
to my achievements in that regard through
what we
called Youth Enterprises with Innovation (YouWin) and the Nagropreneur
programme which encouraged young people to go into agriculture. I believe more
programmes like that should be established to promote youth entrepreneurship.
That way, we reduce their reliance on paid employment. We will not only teach
them to become entrepreneurs, they will also acquire the capacity to employ
other people. We will be paying special attention to this segment of our
society, especially young people and women. We will develop programmes that
will inculcate in them business skills to be able to set up micro, small and
medium enterprises. We shall assist them to access take-off grants when they
acquire the relevant skills and capacities. There are many areas that they can
go into; food processing, light manufacturing and the services sector are just
some of them.
I can tell you from experience that this works. As we speak, Our
Nagropreneur programme, to promote youth involvement in agriculture value
chain, is being scaled up by the African Development Bank presently. It is
already being replicated in 19 African countries because of the success of the
programme in Nigeria. I invite all of you here today, cabinet ministers,
diplomats and private sector people to remain committed to the cause of
improving lives, especially those lives in Africa, and making our world a
better place. For those of you that will be sharing in this vision for Africa,
I assure you that you will not be disappointed.
I am very optimistic that if we
encourage young men and women in this continent to develop businesses of their
own, the story of Africa will change within 10 years”.
Source:Vangaurd Newspaper
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