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Jonathan and Amaechi
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The political feud between President
Goodluck Jonathan and the Rivers State Governor, Mr. Chibuike Amaechi,
appears to be far from ending, Chukwudi Akasike writes
Before the middle of 2010, the
relationship between President Goodluck Jonathan and the Rivers State
Governor, Mr. Rotimi Amaechi, was rosy. Apart from the fact that both
attended the same tertiary institution, University of Port Harcourt,
Amaechi was one of the governors that supported the election of Jonathan
as the President in 2011. Even the President’s wife, Mrs. Patience
Jonathan, was said to be a regular caller to the Government House in
Port Harcourt until things began to fall apart.
Initially, the fragile relationship
between the two men was not in public glare as they both managed their
growing disagreement between them. Issues based on ceded oil wells from
Rivers State to Bayelsa State were handled like brothers as both the
President and governor interacted privately and agreed on the way
forward. Nobody had inkling to the fact that the supposed brothers were
bearing hidden animosity against each other.
But
the row between Jonathan and Amaechi became glaring during the visit of
the First Lady to Okrika Local Government Area, her home town. The
governor had also seized the opportunity to take her round one of the
projects in the area; a school building constructed by his
administration. Amaechi had told Mrs. Jonathan that some buildings close
to the school must be demolished to create enough room for learning.
The governor’s position on demolition of
buildings appeared not to have gone down well with the First Lady, who
advised Amaechi not to be insistent on the issue of demolition of
buildings. She described land as a serious issue in Okrika Local
Government Area of Rivers State and told Amaechi to always avoid using
the word “must” when talking about the demolition of people’s property.
The First Lady said, “I want you to get
me clear. I am from here (Okrika). I know the problems of my people. So,
I know what I am talking about. I do not want us to go into crisis. We
are preaching peace and we must maintain peace at all time. But what I
am telling you is that you always say you must demolish.
“That word ‘must’, is not good. It is by
pleading. You appeal to the owners of the property because they will
not go into exile. Land is a serious issue,” the President’s wife had
said over four years ago.
The situation, however, forced Mrs.
Jonathan to cut short her two-day visit to the state and hurriedly left
for Abuja, the country’s capital.
The open disagreement between the First
Lady and the governor had indirectly created a platform for another
controversy that led to the resignation of the then Chairman of Okrika
Local Government Area, Mr. Tamunokoro Oba, who is the First Lady’s
cousin. Since then, it had been from one quarrel to the other until
the structure of the Peoples Democratic Party was taken from Amaechi
through the court on April 15, 2013 while a new executive of the party
led by Mr. Felix Obuah was inaugurated. The development appeared to have
been a set back to Amaechi, who vowed to fight on, even as the enmity
between him and President Jonathan grew.
Though the President was silent on
Amaechi’s frequent criticism of his administration, the President’s foot
soldiers like the former Minister of Niger Delta, Elder Godsday Orubebe
and the former Minister of State for Education, Chief Nyesom Wike, who
is now the governorship candidate of the PDP in Rivers State, took up
the gauntlet to defend their boss.
Amaechi had suggested that the governors
of South-South states should take over the East-West road since it
appeared that the Federal Government was delaying in its completion.
The criticism by Amaechi, which many saw
as being targeted at President, did not go down well with Orubebe, who
expressed his anger over the governor’s comment.
“I am particularly piqued by the
disrespectful behaviour of Amaechi to the person and office of President
Goodluck Jonathan, which will no longer be tolerated.
Amaechi should mind the business of
governing Rivers State whose capital city, Port Harcourt, has
degenerated since the governor’s administration was inaugurated,”
Orubebe had said shortly after the tour of the East-West Road.
But Amaechi’s Chief Press Secretary, Mr. David Iyofor, described Orubebe’s comment as reckless attack on the governor.
“It is a dubious but an obvious attempt
by Orubebe to divert attention from his ineptitude and abysmal failure
to deliver on the East-West Road. This callous attempt to drag the
President’s name into it is what is most disrespectful and
irresponsible. Contrary to his madcap vituperations, Amaechi has
tremendous respect for the office of the President of Nigeria and
President Goodluck Jonathan. The Office of the President is a big
institution that deserves utmost respect and it would be grossly
irresponsible for anyone to disrespect the President, which
unfortunately Orubebe is doing by dragging the President’s name into his
inability to deliver on the East –West Road.
Amaechi had once traced the genesis of
the quarrel. He alleged that the quarrel began following his refusal to
accede to the President’s wife’s insistence that the state funds should
be shared with her.
He specifically said that Mrs. Jonathan,
who is an indigene of the state, was unhappy with him when he turned
down her request. The governor spoke in Port Harcourt at the joint
graduation of students of the University of Ibadan and pioneer graduates
of Ignatius Ajuru University of Education.
“I refused to give them money in Abuja
because if I do that, I won’t be able to carry out any development
project or finish the road from Rumuolumeni to Rumuepirikom. The quarrel
between me and the wife of the President is because she said I should
bring the state money and share it with her,” Amaechi had said.
But the First Lady dismissed Amaechi’s
claim, describing it as a deliberate attempt to malign her and score
cheap political point.
The President’s wife further described
the governor’s statement as a lie designed to denigrate her person and
rubbish the Presidency. She said she could not have made such a request
from the governor either directly or indirectly.
A statement signed by her media
assistant, Mr. Ayo Adewuyi, read, “Having waited patiently for Governor
Amaechi to refute the statement credited to him about the First Lady,
(with the assumption that he was misquoted), it has become clear that it
was a deliberate attempt to malign Dame Patience Jonathan and score
cheap political
“The governor may have been beclouded by
the political uncertainty surrounding him to make such a jaundiced and
unsubstantiated allegation that the First Lady asked him to bring Rivers
State’s money to share. This is a blatant lie designed to denigrate the
person of Dame Patience Jonathan and rubbish the Presidency. This is to
say the least, most unfortunate. It is crystal clear that Governor
Amaechi is looking for a cheap excuse for his failure in the governance
of the state.
“We say without any iota of equivocation
that the First Lady never made such a request and could not have done
so in any way either directly and indirectly.
“The First Lady as an indigene of Rivers
State is more concerned with the socio-economic development of the
state and in a peaceful atmosphere. This guerrilla political warfare
must stop.”
Nothing, however, gave any indication
that the quarrel will soon end as the governor recently refused to
approve the Adokiye Amiesimaka Stadium for use by the Jonathan/Sambo
presidential campaign organisation.
But despite the refusal, the President’s
campaign train stormed the stadium for rally where Jonathan openly
admitted that Amaechi challenged him for not lifting the fortune of the
people of Rivers and Bayelsa states.
Even before the campaign train hit the
stadium, the state chapter of the PDP insisted that the rally would be
held at the facility because it belongs to the Rivers State people.
Speaking on the quarrel, a public
affairs analyst and the Chancellor of the International Society for
Social Justice and Human Rights, Chief Jackson Omenazu, explained that
the disagreement between the President and the governor was inevitable.
Omenazu reasoned that while Amaechi remains a social-liberal democrat,
Jonathan belonged to the party with a dry conservative ideology, adding
that the two cannot meet except at the poll.
The ISSJHR chancellor also attributed
the fuelling of the feud between the duo to unscrupulous politicians who
believed that they could enjoy pecuniary gains if the President and the
governor continued in the quarrel.
He said, “I have always said that apart
from some politicians with questionable character that are fuelling the
fight between Jonathan and Amaechi for their pecuniary gains and
political relevance, the quarrel also has its advantage. Nigerians can
now make a choice between the social-liberal ideology and the dry
conservative ideology.”
But a chieftain of the Peoples
Democratic Party in Rivers State, Chief Moses Deewo, blamed Amaechi for
failing to stop his utterances against the President, adding that the
governor never respected the Jonathan as the President of the country.
Deewo said, “Remember when the Federal
Government seized the monthly allocations of Lagos State, the then
governor of the state, Bola Tinubu, did not cast aspersions on the
person of the then President, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo. Amaechi should
have managed the situation rather than escalating it by using abusive
words on the President.
“With the 2015 elections around the
corner, it is obvious that both Jonathan and Amaechi would only be able
to settle their differences at the poll. For now, the enmity continues
and the latest is the refusal of the governor to approve the Adokiye
Amiesimaka Stadium for use by the Jonathan/Sambo presidential campaign
organisation. Of course, the Presidency and the PDP ensured that the
facility was used by force as soldiers took over the place six days to
the event.
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