In an interview with DailyTrust Newspaper, Annkio Briggs, a Niger Delta rights activist, bares her mind on former President Goodluck Jonathan’s life after office, saying Jonathan was not noisy even when he was president.
How has the Ijaw received former president Jonathan?
As soon as Jonathan handed over power to the new president on May 29th he left Abuja and flew to Port Harcourt from where he proceeded to Bayelsa State. Ijaw people from all walks of life were on hand to welcome him. All well-meaning Ijaw people, including the traditional rulers, were fully there to receive and honour him. there was an overwhelming show of love by the entire Ijaw clan to a man that left the shores of his father’s land to Abuja and had to come back home after having a shot at the presidency. He was well received at home. The sentiment was in his favour. I don’t really know how he was viewed outside Ijaw land, but he is our son and he was well received.
What role is he being given in Ijaw nation?
If you remember, he worked in OMPADEC before he became deputy governor and subsequently the governor and eventually the acting president and then president of Nigeria, so in terms of politics he has played his role. Today in Victor Edozie, Port Harcourtthe political role he has played both at Ijaw level by being governor and at the national level by being president, he is also seen as a political leader.
Why has he been quiet, unlike Obasanjo and others who left power and have continued to attract visible crowd?
I am surprised that people are saying that Jonathan is quiet outside office. That has been his nature. Jonathan has been a very quiet person. Even as a president, apart from speaking on serious national issues that concerned his position as president, I don’t think that Jonathan is somebody that is so flippant that he should comment on every issue. So, I am not particularly surprised that he is not speaking. During his tenure as president even when he was insulted extremely by all kinds of people, he rarely responded. He is not Obasanjo. Obasanjo has been very critical of not just Jonathan but of most people he had anything to do with. But it doesn’t mean that Jonathan has nothing to say. He has a lot to say about everybody both locally and internationally. I have the privilege of knowing him. He is not somebody that expresses his views frivolously. He demonstrated that in the past years that he was president
What is your thought on the probe of some sectors of the economy, especially as it involves the period when he was the president?
There is no probe. Somebody said he is going to do something. You are going to probe the Ministry of Petroleum Resources. You are going to probe Jonathan’s administration. Jonathan’s administration was made up of thousands of people. There were ministers from the 36 states of the federation. There were ministers of state. There were permanent secretaries who were not political appointees. A lot of people were involved in Jonathan’s administration. So if you are going to probe any administration, it is going to involve a whole lot of people. When you selectively target somebody like the former national security adviser who was held hostage in his house for days, his vehicles impounded, then I don’t know what you are doing. The former governor of Jigawa State and his two sons were arrested and detained. He was later released on bail. The former chief security officer of Jonathan was also arrested and detained under very suspicious circumstances that made the public to ask questions and to express concerns about his health, security and other issues. If that is what you call probe it will not stand the test of time. I have always been in the forefront of the fight against corruption because I believe that Nigeria as a nation is put together on a tripod of corruption. The first coup in Nigeria had a lot to do with the claim that people at the helm that particular period were corrupt. Every military coup has used corruption as an excuse to take over government. So we are not pretending that corruption started in Jonathan’s time. Jonathan inherited corruption the same way Buhari for the second time as a leader in Nigeria has inherited corruption. Now, if you are fighting corruption we have to be very careful. You must be total. I personally do not see Buhari being sincere in fighting corruption. There are so many unresolved issues even in Obasanjo’s administration. When Jonathan assumed office I was one of those who said he should look into past administrations and even the administration he was part of to find out what really happened when Yar’adua was ill, to look into the irregularities when he was in Saudi Arabia. Diezani Alison-Madueke was not the first person to be minister of petroleum. She and Jonathan did not create subsidy. If we are fighting corruption, then we must go all the way back to find out who was responsible for what, instead of sectionalizing and putting a time frame to it and saying it’s only Jonathan we are going to probe. It sends wrong signals.
