Obasanjo should let Jonathan be – Ayo Fayose

Press statement from Ekiti State Governor...

Mr Ayodele Fayose has urged former President, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo to stop attacking the immediate past President, Dr Goodluck Jonathan, saying; “Dr Goodluck Jonathan is no longer the president of Nigeria, he should be allowed to live a private life devoid of mudslinging from elder statesmen like Chief Obasanjo.”

 Governor Fayose said he was miffed that former President Obasanjo could choose the 11th Convocation Lecture of Benson Idahosa University (BIU) Benin, Edo State to say that “performance of Jonathan while in office will hunt the people of the South-South region for a long time to come.”

In a statement issued in Ado-Ekiti on Monday by his Special Assistant on Public Communications and New Media, Lere Olayinka, the governor said the people of the South South had already demonstrated their approval of Jonathan’s performance while in office by voting overwhelmingly for him on March 28 despite the gang-up orchestrated by Chief Obasanjo and his allies.

“Most importantly, Jonathan’s performance as a democrat has been widely acknowledged locally and internationally, particularly by President Mohammadu Buhari, who on many occasions acknowledged the role he (Jonathan) played in midwifing a peaceful and successful transition programme, thereby averting the feared crisis in the country.

“This is in contrast to Baba Obasanjo, who tried third term when he was about concluding his constitutional two terms. And who knows whether he would have tried fourth term if he had succeeded with his third term agenda? “The reality is, assuming but not conceding that Jonathan performed below expectation, democratic governance that he established in Nigeria is more important than any other performance that Obasanjo alluded to,” the governor said.

Speaking further, Governor Fayose urged Obasanjo to stop running other Nigerians down, saying; “We are all stakeholders in the country Nigeria. It is wrong for any Nigerian no matter how highly placed to go about carrying himself around as the only honest and lover of the country.”

The governor said; “since Baba Obasanjo has openly destroyed his Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) membership card, he is free to go about seeking relevance in the All Progressives Congress (APC) without running anyone down.”

He said people living in glass houses should avoid throwing stones, adding that Nigerians know those involved in the Halliburton scandal and people who are yet to be cleared of their alleged complicity in a scam like Halliburton lacked moral rights to brand other people as corrupt.