Nigeria’s ex-leader, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, on Monday (05/01/2015) explained that his disagreement with President Goodluck Jonathan was not personal but a consequence of the poor state of the economy allegedly caused by bad governance.
Obasanjo, who spoke when women leaders in the South West, led by the Iyalode of Yorubaland, Chief Alaba Lawson, paid him a courtesy call at his Abeokuta Hilltop residence insisted that he has no personal grudge against Jonathan whom he assisted to become president. The former president, who spoke on various issues, lamented the state of the economy, stressing that “If the head is rotten, it will affect the entire body because if there is no good governance, it would affect the economy. Our economy should not have been this bad. “When I was leaving office about eight years ago, I left a very huge reserve after we had paid all our debts. Almost $25 billion we kept in what they called excess crude account. The excess from the budget we were saving as reserve for the rainy days. “When we left in May 2007, the reserve was said to have been raised to $35 billion. But today, that reserve has been depleted! The reserve we left when we finished paying all our debts was about $40 billion, including debt forgiveness. The remaining debt was not more than $3 billion,” Obasanjo affirmed. “Our reserve”, he stated, “after we had paid off this debt was about $45 billion. As I said, they continued till the end of 2007. I heard that the reserve increased to almost $67 billion before the end of the year. I learnt if you want to buy a dollar now, it’s about N192 or N195. What it means is this, what you have been buying at N150 to a dollar, now you need N192 or N195 to buy it. That is the real situation. Is there any remedy? There is, but it does not come overnight because it means we have to give up all the bad things we have been doing.”
On the alleged sour relationship between him and Jonathan, he said: “Now you said this year is an election year, I have no apprehension over these coming elections. I have no fears over the forthcoming elections. I was reading in one of today’s newspapers that some people became jittery when they heard you (his guests) were coming to visit me and that Jonathan and I are not in good terms. There is nothing as such. I have no grudges against Jonathan and I think Jonathan equally has no grudges against me. I’m not quarrelling with Jonathan, but all I know is that whatever is good for Nigeria, that I’m ready to die for. I emphasize that whatever is good for Nigeria, is what I’m ready to defend with my life. Whoever, I emphasize, whoever says he would not do anything good to Nigeria, even if he says he’s ready to go Koko below (go down), I’m ready to square it up with such a person. I say again, whoever that person may be, I want you to get that correctly.”
In Obasanjo’s view: “If this country is going to change for the better, it would start from the top and if it’s going to be otherwise, it would start from the top, too.” The former President who spoke in his native Yoruba dialect, told his audience: “I know that God did not create Nigeria not to be rich or great. Is it that the people he created in Nigeria are not knowledgeable enough or not intelligent enough? Or is it that they don’t know their rights? On our problems in Nigeria, let’s look at the foundation of our leadership.
“In the profession I know very well, the military, what we normally say is that there are no bad soldiers but bad officers. If you see a situation where the soldiers are not doing well, we need to examine the officers in charge. So it is in the family, the community, the town and the country. “I have had some little experience about this country. I was a military head of state and I was also a civilian president, so what is left? If I talk, I know what I’m saying. Whoever wants should listen to me and whoever feels otherwise, may turn deaf ear. But when I’m talking, I’m talking with my understanding and intellect. I’m drawing from my experience and from what I’ve learn’t with others and from other countries and fellow eminent citizens of the world that I relate with.
