2015: North shuns Jonathan’s peace moves

(VANGUARD) The moves launched by President Goodluck Jonathan to get northern leaders to support him ahead of the 2015 presidential election appear to have failed, Sunday Vanguard has learnt. One of the moves was the emissary sent to the Northern Elders Forum (NEF) at a meeting in Abuja.

The northern leaders were said to have told the emissary, a senior presidential aide, point-blank, they would rather prod one of their own to stand against the president in the next elections.

Jonathan, it was gathered, on Thursday, sent the senior aide to persuade the influential northern group to back down on attacking him and to, once again, support him to return in 2015.

The presidential aide, according to Sunday Vanguard sources, met with an NEF delegation of three at a guest house in Jabi, Abuja and tried for about two hours to extract assurance of support from the group.

Two former ministers from the North and a former adviser to erstwhile President Olusegun Obasanjo allegedly represented NEF at the meeting.

The emissary reportedly assured the NEF delegation that the Presidency would take urgent steps to correct perceived imbalances in the polity, which the northerners were complaining about, and the threat by ex-militant, Asari Dokubo, who recently vowed to attack anyone who stood in the way of Jonathan’s re-election.

The northern leaders were said to have pointedly rejected any appeasement from the Presidency, asking the aide to tell Jonathan that they were not interested in working with him anymore.

“We met with a man sent to us by the president and we told him our mind because we feel that there is no need to continue to deny the fact that we are opposed to Jonathan running again in 2015,”one of the sources, present at the meeting, said.

“We have seen enough of Jonathan in the last four years or so. We do not believe that there is any more magic he will bring to salvage Nigeria.

“We made it clear to the emissary that if we continued to support him beyond 2015, Nigeria would be thrown into more corruption, insecurity, poverty and misery in the midst of rising oil revenue.

“We also told the man sent by the president that his actions and utterances are pro-Ijaw and that he could seek new allies from other parts of the  country to actualise his political ambition in the next polls.”

In the meantime, NEF Secretary, Prof Ango Abdullahi, has faulted the recommendation by Chief Tony Anenih, the Chairman of the Board of Trustees (BoT) of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) which seeks to give automatic ticket to Jonathan and first term governors of the party.

Abdullahi said the move was not only undemocratic but was also in violation of the party’s constitution, which provides for primary election.

Describing the postulation as a desperate move to edge out other presidential aspirants of the PDP in the run-up to 2015, the former ABU Vice Chancellor asked the party faithful to reject such dictatorial proposal.