PREMIUM TIMES. PDP said that Jonathan has excelled in spite of his detractors. The ruling Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, has alleged that the acts of terrorism and sectarian violence in Nigeria is being sponsored by unpatriotic elements whose aim is to discredit President Goodluck Jonathan. The PDP claimed the plan was to distract and detract Mr. Jonathan and constrain the successful delivery of his transformation programme so as to portray him as non-performing and finally ridicule his score card when time reckons. Northern Nigeria, particularly the North-East part of the country has been under various forms of attack by the insurgent Boko Haram group who have killed thousands of people since 2009. The federal government in May 2013 declared a state of emergency in Adamawa, Borno, and Yobe to be able to curtail the insurgents. A statement by the National Publicity Secretary of the PDP, Olisa Metuh, Tuesday, said it was beyond conjecture that the Nigerian version of terrorism is the product of a narrow political persuasion that defies logic and reason. “We accept the reality of terrorism as a global phenomenon, however, the peculiar trend of the Nigerian version which subsists on a welter of nebulous demands and masked identities, hacking down innocent Nigerians -women, children and the elderly in an awful scorch earth fashion, and in an obstinate ridicule of dialogue, defies all reason and logic and only summarizes a well considered agenda of national destabilization for a purely selfish political cause. We pointedly finger the opposition. “We recall statements by some politicians, vowing to make the country ungovernable for President Jonathan on the eve of the 2011 general elections, and therefore adjure Nigerians to rise against this brute ideology of violence from which a tiny clique of the political class intends to benefit ultimately. It is the climax of wickedness only heard of the Lucifer in the distant bosom of hell fire,” Mr. Metuh said. Mr. Metuh said President Jonathan was being ‘persecuted’ for no other reason than being a Nigerian from the minority, arguing that no leader in the history of the country had faced the height of persecution that the president has been subjected to since he assumed office The PDP said, this was in spite of the president’s humility and his fidelity to the orthodoxy of all democratic norms and values. “This is in spite of his proven commitment to the unity and progress of every party of Nigeria irrespective of tribe and religion. Ironically, this is in spite of his proven competence and record delivery of his electoral promises,” the PDP spokesperson said. Jonathan an achiever The PDP commended the president for ‘containing’ the insurgency and beating down distractions to post ‘landmark achievements’ in all sectors of the economy since he assumed office. The party listed some of the achievements to include the dualisation and rehabilitation of major trunk roads across the country in addition to the repair of Third Mainland bridge and the commencement of work on the Second Niger Bridge, the resuscitation of the inland waterways and the railway system which were abandoned for years, and the establishment of Almajiri education system and nine new federal universities across the country. The party also listed the completion and commissioning of power stations across the country, the new automobile policy, the revolution in the housing sector with establishment of the Nigeria Mortgage Refinance Company, NMRC, as well as the Agricultural Transformation Agenda through which, the party said, six million farmers have received inputs in a programme that targets an increase in domestic food production by an additional 20 million tonnes and creating 3.5 million jobs before the end of 2015. “This is in addition to the investments in job creation through the YouWin and SURE-P projects as well as the widening of the ambit of the PDP ideology of transferring wealth from public institutions to the private sector wherein hardworking private individuals are now thriving in manufacturing, trade, commerce and other critical sectors of the economy”, the party said. Mr. Metuh called on all well meaning Nigerians to resist anyone behind the sectarian violence and insurgency in the country and shore up support for the president in his efforts to deliver the dividends of democracy to the people.
Posted on: Tue, 18 Mar 2014 17:22:06 +0000