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ACN ,Lagos Lawmakers fault Jonathan on Single Tenure,Jos Crisis
Ayokunle Oloye Newsdiaryonline Tue
Sep 13,2011
In the face of the mounting challenges facing the country such
as insecurity, unemployment, decaying infrastructure
shocking views espoused on Monday’s Presidential media
Media chat, some
Nigerians said President Goodluck Jonathan
is “confused” about the
state of the nation.
The Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) said the comments made by
President Goodluck Jonathan during his maiden Media
Chat on Monday have shown that he is largely out of tune
with the situation in Nigeria. Some members of the Lagos State
House of Assembly also expressed disappointment at the
performance of in the last 100 days in office.
The lawmakers while
assessing the state of the nation explained that President
Jonathan has failed the country due to his inability to address
some of these challenges within his first 100 days in office.
Moshood Oshun, a
member representing Lagos Mainland Constituency 2 said “as far
as I am concerned, President Jonathan with due respect is yet to
crawl, talk less of running.
“What has never occurred in the history of Nigeria is now
happening in his own time. There is insecurity everywhere; the
Jos crisis has refused to stop, bomb blasts have taken over the
whole of the Northern parts among other issues. So for me, he
has achieved nothing. Jonathan’s 100 days has been a failure”,
Oshun lamented.
Also Mudashiru Obasa
said that there is absolutely nothing to celebrate about
Jonathan’s 100 days in office.
He said “all
sectors are suffering, especially the banking sector which we
believe started well when grants were given to some of the
banks, but unfortunately, these banks are yet to survive.
“These banks have been unable to pay, not to mention returning
the amount of money given to them. We all know that when the
situation happened in America, bailout was given to some of the
banks and few months later, we started hearing good results that
the banks are making returns to the government, but in Nigeria
reverse is the case,” the lawmaker stated.
He also explained that “since the finance of a nation has
refused to work, that alone
is enough to assess the performance of any administration. The
president should go back home and call his cabinet, so that they
can look at how to salvage the country in a mess we are now,”
Obasa added
In a statement issued in Lagos on Tuesday by its National
Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, the party described as
patently superficial and devoid of deep understanding of
issues the President's comments on such issues as the
single-tenure
proposal, the Jos crisis
and the National Sovereign Conference, just to mention a few.
''When the President of a nation talks, citizens must take
something concrete away from it. Sadly, that cannot be said of
our President's
Maiden Chat on Monday,'' it said.
ACN said, for example, that since sovereignty derives from the
people, the President should not be oblivious, or even pretend
to be, to the
preponderance of the people's opinion against the single-tenure
kite which he is flying.
''Saying he has no regret and indicating he will push forward
with the ill-advised single-tenure proposal, even at the expense
of more pressing
national problems of insecurity and lack of economic
development, shows he is not in tune with the same people who
voted
him into office.
''Failing to tell Nigerians how his administration will
ameliorate the serious problems of infrastructural decay is a
blunder. Missing
the opportunity to comment on the fate of Nigerians who are
being arrested, detained and killed in Libya by the transitional
authorities which his administration has recognised is a
serious error of judgement,'' the party
said.
But it said the President's biggest faux pas during his Media
Chat is on the lingering Jos crisis - a problem which he failed
to exhibit an understanding of the issues at stake or proffer
any innovative solution
''The platitudes about one group not having the right to kill
the other or that enforcing the law doesn't bring the peace in
any place until the
peoplethemselves agree to have peace are not what Nigerians in
general, and the people of Jos in particular, want to hear. They
want to know that
theirPresident understands the issues at stake and has the
political will to end the
mindless killings. They want to know what the
government will do to bring the perpetrators of the
killings to justice, so as to end the ongoing culture of
impunity in Jos,'' ACN said.
The party said, for example, that the President's decision to
ask the Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) to take over the security
situation in Jos is largely
superfluous, and reinforces the same well-worn mindset of
resorting to a reckless use of force to solve all security
problems, including the Boko
Haram crisis.
''Right now, the military is in charge of security in Plateau,
under the Special Task Force deployed to the state. Even with
the task force's best efforts,
the killings and violence persist. One therefore wonders what
miracle the CDS is expected to perform with the same task force,
when even some
groups are accusing it (task force) of taking sides in the
crisis and calling for its withdrawal to pave the way for the
deployment of
'Operation Rainbow' a coalition of regular and mobile policemen.
''We agree with those who have said Nigeria's reliance on the
military for a solution to terrorism or other insecurity
problems is counter-productive. We agree with those who have
called for a holistic approach (that will take into
consideration the root causes of the problems) to the security
problems facing our nation. We say no to knee-jerk reactions to
these problems, as exemplified by President Jonathan's comments
during his ineffective Media Chat on Monday,'' ACN said.
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