The spokesperson of the All Progressives Congress, APC, Bolaji Abdullahi, has given more details to what led to the exit of former president Goodluck Jonathan.
According to him, Jonathan’s tolerance for corruption made the administration of ex-United States’ President, Barrack Obama support President Muhammadu Buhari.
The APC spokesperson, who was a Minister under the Jonathan administration, said the immediate past president gave the world to believe that there was no corrupt practice in his government despite claims by former Central Bank, CBN, Governor, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi.
In his upcoming book: “On a Platter of Gold: How Jonathan Won and Lost Nigeria,” Abdullahi claimed that there were allegations of “missing billions from government oil corporation, legislative inquiries into mind-boggling subsidy scams, a cabinet minister and close confidant of the president embroiled in hundreds of million naira armoured cars scandal.”
The APC spokesperson said, “another Minister’s recruitment ‘racket’ leading to the death of hapless job seekers, pension administrator disappearing with billions of naira, an ex-convict’s presidential pardon – the list seemed endless” all occurred under Jonathan’s administration.
Abdullahi also made mention of the case of the billions of dollars the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, was accused of failing to remit to the federation account by then-CBN governor, Sanusi.
According to Abdullahi, “In a Presidential Media Chat soon after Sanusi’s ouster, Jonathan denied that any money was missing and declared, quite memorably, that: ‘If anyone steals $50 billion or $20 billion anywhere, America will know.
“They will tell you where it is; it is their money.’ Quite possibly, the Americans had no evidence of $50 billion or $20 billion having gone missing, but Jonathan’s government gave no one the confidence that no money was being stolen,” Abdullahi wrote.
“Since the Transparency International started monitoring political corruption in countries across the world, perception has taken precedence over facts and figures in measuring where countries stood in corruption rating. The problem with perception, however, is that it does not need to be proved beyond reasonable doubts.
“On this basis alone, Nigerians, and whoever else was interested, had more than enough basis to conclude that even if Jonathan himself was not personally corrupt, he had demonstrated ample tolerance for corruption and corrupt officials – allegations of missing billions from government oil corporation, legislative inquiries into mind boggling subsidy scams, a cabinet minister and close confidant of the president embroiled in hundreds of million naira armoured cars scandal, another minister’s recruitment ‘racket’ leading to the death of hapless jobseekers, pension administrator disappearing with billions of naira, an ex-convict’s presidential pardon – the list seemed endless.
“Put together, these stories formed an ugly compendium that could make the Obama Administration to feel justified in supporting a ‘regime change’ in Nigeria, especially if the substitute was a Muhammadu Buhari, marketed as an ascetic, sandal-wearing old soldier, who had zero-tolerance for corruption.”