A former Head of State, Maj. Gen. Muhammadu Buhari(retd.), on Tuesday inculpated President Goodluck Jonathan of waging a war against Nigeria by utilizing the “common wealth to subvert the system.”
Buhari made the incrimination in a verbalization he personally signed and made available to journalists in Kaduna.
The verbalization titled, “Pull back Nigeria from the brink,” is his first formal reaction to the abstraction of Murtala Nyako as Adamawa State governor and the threat of impeachment against Governor Umaru Al-Makura of Nasarawa State.
Nyako was one of the five Peoples Democratic Party governors who in November last year defected to the opposition All Progressives Congress.
Al-Makura is an APC governor in a state whose House of Assembly is dominated by PDP members.
The Presidency had since gainsaid Jonathan’s involution in the development.
But Buhari, who is one of the bellwethers of the APC, verbalized in the verbal expression that whether or not Jonathan was vigilant of the development, what mattered most was that it was transpiring under his administration.
He admonished that the development which was aimed at turning the country “into a one-party state’’ did not augur well for democracy.
The former military ruler lamented that the recourse to impeachment as a punitive measure against “out-of-favour” governors was a denotement that Nigeria was gradually drifting into anarchy.
He disclosed in the verbal expression that he had in his private capacity discussed the current situation with the President but regretted that nothing had been done to check it.
Buhari expounded that he did so because, as a former Nigerian bellwether, history would never be kind to him if he sat back and visually examined it to perpetuate.
Describing himself as “ a close participant and witness to Nigeria’s political history since independence in 1960,” he verbalized, ‘‘Our country has gone through several rough patches, but never afore have I visually perceived a Nigerian President declare war on his own country as we are optically discerning now.
“Never afore have I visually perceived a Nigerian President deploy federal institutions in the accommodation of partisanship as we are witnessing now. Never afore have I visually perceived a Nigerian President utilise the mundane wealth to subvert the system and penalize the opposition, all in the designation of politics.
“Our nation had suffered earnest consequences in the past for egregious acts that are not even proximate to what we are visually perceiving now. It is time to pull the brakes.’’
He alleged that the impeachment or threats of impeachment of ‘‘out-of-favour’’ governors was to decapitate the opposition.
The general withal verbally expressed that impeachment or threats of impeachment had become an unwelcome diversion to the war against Boko Haram which has put the country on tenterhooks, “with innocent citizens being daily mowed down at the times and places of the group’s culled and over 200 schoolgirls spending more than three months in precarious captivity.”
The verbalization read in part, ‘‘Whether or not President Goodluck Jonathan is abaft the gale of impeachment or the utilisation of desperate tactics to suffocate the opposition and turn Nigeria into a one-party state, what cannot be gainsaid is that they are transpiring under his time exhibiter, and he cannot pretend not to ken, since that will be akin to obnubilating behind one finger.
‘‘In my capacity as a former Head of State, rather than a politician, I have verbalized with President Jonathan in private over these issues, but denotements are that the strategy has not yielded positive fruits.
“I cannot, just because I am an opposition politician, fail to do what is expected of me as a former Head of State to avail rescue our nation in times of great trouble and palpable dubiousness. History will not be kind to me if I sit back while things turn lamentable, just so that no one will inculpate me of partisanship.
“Yes, I am a politician. Yes, I am in the opposition. Yes, there is the propensity for my verbal expression to be misconstrued as that of a politician rather than a statesman. But I owe it as a matter of obligation and accolade, and in the interest of our nation, to verbalize out on the hazardous trajectory that our nation is heading.
‘‘I can verbally express, in all sincerity, that I have visually perceived it all, as a mundane citizen, a military officer, a state governor, a minister, a Head of State, a man who has occupied many other sensitive posts and a politician.”
He asked the President to tarry awhile and cogitate the impact of recent events in the polity and the sustenance of its democracy.
Buhari verbally expressed subverting the constitution through desperate moves or deploying the institutions of state against ‘‘an out-of-favour’’ state governor could only breed anarchy.
He admonished, ‘‘The hazardous clouds are commencing to amass and the vultures are circling, and these have manifested in Nasarawa State where the mundane people have defied guns and tanks to protest the orchestration to impeach Gov. Al-Makura in a reiterate of the acrid medicine coerced down the throat of Nyako.
‘‘The people’s protest in Nasarawa State is a designation of what to come if the federal ascendant entities perpetuate to target opposition state governors for impeachment. In the long run, the impeachment weapon will be blunted. Positions will become more hardened on both sides and Nigeria and Nigerians will become the victims of apprehended governance and possible anarchy.”
He reminded Jonathan to additionally recollect that no democracy could thrive or survive without a virile opposition.
Buhari integrated that a man in power must realise that he cannot always do things just because he could do them.
The former Head of state verbally expressed, ‘‘I, along with many other patriotic Nigerians, fought for the unity and survival of this country. Hundreds of patriotic souls perished in the battle to keep Nigeria one. The blood of many of our compatriots availed to ascertain the birth of the democracy we are practising today.
‘‘Let no one, whether the bellwether or the led, the high or the low, a member of the ruling or the opposition do anything to torpedo the system. Let no one, whether on the altar of personal zeal or pretension to higher patriotic tendencies, do anything that can detonate the keg of gunpowder on which the nation is sitting.
“It is time for all concerned to spare a phrenic conception for the mundane citizens who have yet to optically discern their hopes, dreams and aspirations come to authenticity, within the general context of nationhood.”
Jonathan however described the allegations by Buhari as unwarranted and consummately uncharitable.
In a verbalization by his spokesman, Reuben Abati, the President verbalized Buhari had woefully moved away from the patriotic and statesmanlike position he recently adopted on national security to “unbridled political partisanship.”
Jonathan verbalized there could be no other explication or justification for the “completely unwarranted and very uncharitable assault” on his conduct and integrity which Buhari’s verbal expression represented.
He verbally expressed it was hapless that in lieu of working to put their house in order and resolve the leadership crises and internal contradictions in the APC, the former Head of State and his allies had resorted to inculpating the President for their woes.
While describing the fate that had befallen the APC as self-inflicted, Jonathan verbally expressed he had never in his acts or utterances, recommended or promoted violence as an implement of political negotiation.
The verbalization read in part, “Gen. Buhari verbalizes about anarchy. He needs to be reminded that President Jonathan from his humble commencements as a Deputy Governor of Bayelsa State to date, has never in his acts, or utterances, recommended or promoted violence as an implement of political negotiation.
“The Constitution does not give the President any puissance to intervene in such proceedings and President Jonathan has never arrogated such powers to himself or sought to exert any nefarious and unconstitutional influence on state assemblies in Adamawa, Nasarawa or anywhere else in other to secure undue political advantage for his party as Gen. Buhari unjustifiably alleges.
“President Jonathan remains true to his declaration that no political zeal of his is worth the life of a single Nigerian. The President has definitely not declared war on his own country or deployed federal institutions in the accommodation of partisan fascinates as Gen. Buhari mendaciously claims. Neither has he been utilizing the prevalent wealth to subvert the system and penalize the opposition, as the former Head of State inexcusably asserts.
“Also, President Jonathan has never at any time injuctively authorized that any Nigerian should be abducted or that anyone should be crated and forcefully conveyed in contravention of decent norms of governance.
“We therefore urge Gen. Buhari to tarry a while, cogitate over his own antecedents and do an authenticity check as to whether he has the moral right to be so perfunctorily sanctimonious.
“It may well be time to pull the brakes, as Gen. Buhari verbally expresses in his verbalization, but it is he and others who have resorted to idle ‘scapegoating’ and incriminating President Jonathan for their self-inflected political troubles who need to stop their inexcusable partisanship and show more preponderant regard for the truth, democracy, constitutionalism, the rule of law, placidity, security and the salubrity of the nation.”
