Former President Goodluck Jonathan pointed accusing fingers at former US President, Barrack Obama for frustrating his fight against the Boko haram insurgents when he was President.
Some PDP Governors Worked Against Me in 2015 – Goodluck Jonathan
Jonathan said, Obama had penciled his government to fail and frustrated the efforts of his administration from the political scene where he openly campaigned for Buhari to the counter-insurgency operations when he refused to sell weapons to Nigeria.
Giving an account of his administration’s fight against Boko Haram in the North-East and the events that followed the abduction of over 200 schoolgirls in Chibok, Borno State, Jonathan lamented the unwillingness of the Obama-led US government to help Nigeria to tackle the problem.
Jonathan accused Obama of not only refusing to give any real military backing to the Nigerian Military, he bluntly refused to sell any military hardware including jet fighters and attack helicopters to Nigeria.
Jonathan also lamented that, when the State of Israel stepped up to help with weapons, Obama frustrated the gesture and made sure the Israeli attack helicopters never got to the Nigerian Military who needed them to route Boko haram in the North-east.
Excerpts from this section of Jonathan’s boom read;
“As an aside, while thanking the men and women of the US security services who were deployed in Nigeria and toiled day and night in the Northeast in search of the Chibok girls, my surprise at the role played by the then US President Barack Obama, still calls to doubt his genuine intentions for Nigeria.
For some strange reasons, the Obama Administration had tactically pencilled Nigeria and my administration for failure. Amongst many manoeuvres, was the refusal to provide any real military backing to Nigeria’s Armed Forces.
President Obama and his security adviser, Susan Rice, bluntly refused to sell any military hardware including jet fighters and attack helicopters to Nigeria.
Obama cited the Leahy Law as the reason his regime prevented the American Government from supporting Nigeria in providing weapons to fight Boko Haram.
Even when the state of Israel expressed the willingness to sell attack helicopters to Nigeria, the gesture was frustrated by the Obama administration that kept waving the same Leahy law like a banner.”