Jonathan orders removal of offensive campaign banners …APC commends move, wants TAN to stop rallies President Goodluck Jonathan has directed that the # BringBackJonathan2015 signs and banners in Abuja be brought down immediately. The #BringBackJonathan2015 signs have been described as an offensive imitation of the # Bring- BackOurGirls# that has helped to call global attention to the fate of the over 200 girls abducted by Boko Haram about five months ago. According to the President, he and many Nigerians find the signs offensive and repugnant. A statement by the Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Dr. Reuben Abati, said Jonathan wholly shared the widely expressed view that the signs, put up without his knowledge and approval were a highly insensitive parody of the # Bring- BackOurGirls# hash tag. The statement added that while the president appreciated the enthusiastic show of support for his administration by a broad section of stakeholders, he condemned the # BringBackJonathan2015 signs, which appeared to make light of the very serious national and global concern for the abducted Chibok girls. The president assured Nigerians and the international community that his administration would rescue the abducted girls. Meanwhile, the All Progressives Congress, APC, yesterday reacted to the president’s directive, calling it a step in the right direction. In a statement issued in London yesterday by its National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, the party said the president made a mockery of his administration and his country by waiting for an international condemnation of the usurpation of the #BringBack- OurGirls# hash tag before issuing the directive for it to stop. “Had the US newspaper, the Washington Post, not written a stinging editorial skewing the Jonathan administration for appropriating the # BringBackOur- Girls# hash tag for his re-election, the administration would have continued its brazenness without regards to the feelings of the parents of the girls or indeed the Nigerian people. “Again, the administration has waited for a global opprobrium before doing what is right. Recall that it took an international media campaign before the Jonathan administration acknowledged, that the Chibok girls were missing in the first instance. “Recall also that it took a 17- year-old, Yousafzai Malala, to make the president realise that he should meet with the parents of the girls, even if he eventually insulted the grieving parents by inviting them to Abuja instead of going to visit them in their abode? “It is important that we don’t make a mockery of our own people, so that we don’t become an object of international mockery,” it said. APC said belated as the president’s directive on # BringBack- Jonathan2015 hash tag is, it is a good first step that must be quickly followed by another directive ordering the so-called Transformation Ambassadors of Nigeria, TAN, to immediately stop its rallies that have offended the sensibilities and intelligence of Nigerians. The party said the noisy and sycophantic rallies being held across the nation, ostensibly to collect signatures from Nigerians urging President Jonathan to seek re-election, contrast with the challenges currently facing the nation, which is being dismembered town by town by the Boko Haram terrorist group. “Nigeria is in a state of war, a state of anarchy, a state of loss never witnessed since the end of the unfortunate civil war in 1970. Terrorists are capturing towns after towns and hoisting their flags over the seized territories, our troops are engaged in an epic battle to ward off the terrorists. Our people are being daily slaughtered by the marauding terrorists. And Ebola is very much here with us. “Therefore, this cannot be the time for festivities and celebrations, the type being orchestrated by the government under the TAN banner. The rallies insult the troops who are battling Boko Haram. The rallies insult Nigerians who are fervently praying for the unity of the nation in the face of the madness by the marauders. The rallies offend the sensibilities of the families of our citizens who are being mowed down daily by Boko Haram. They must stop forthwith,’’ it said. APC wondered whether the organisers of the rallies and those who have been mocking the #BringBackOurGirls# campaigners know that Nigerians are not fools, hence can see the deceit, the callousness and the insensitivity of the Jonathan administration in secretly funding the rallies and the anti-BringBackOurGirls campaigns. “Really, what makes the president and his backers think he should be brought back? Is it because he is presiding over the dismemberment and humiliation of a once proud nation? Is it because he presides over an administration that is monumentally corrupt, that cannot account for $20bn in oil money, that cannot successfully prosecute anyone over the trillion naira oil subsidy fraud? Is it because of an unparalleled incompetence that has led to a massive decay in infrastructure and lack of jobs for our youth, or is it because he has exposed Nigeria to unprecedented global ridicule? “There must be a limit to the desperation of a president to win re-election at all cost. There must be a political price to pay for a president who would willfully subvert the constitution he swore to uphold,’’ the party said.
Posted on: Thu, 11 Sep 2014 08:00:03 +0000
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