Nigerians don’t need a disingenuous treatise from Onanuga on what life was like under Jonathan and what it’s like today under Tinubu. They have enough self-awareness and agency to know where and when their bread was beautifully, comfortably and lavishly buttered, and it is definitely not under Tinubu. And there are irrefutable facts and statistics to substantiate their sentiments.
Former President Goodluck Jonathan’s sudden appearance in certain circles and his presence in the company of some influential politicians have added a new dimension to the 2027 general elections discourse. Last week, he met with the former Senate president and protem chairman of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), David Mark, after the caucus meeting of the party. The meeting between the former president and the Benue politician sparked speculation of political realignment and forging a new alliance. It also further amplified the rumour that Jonathan plans to be on the ballot in 2027.
While political commentators are still dissecting Jonathan’s visit to Mark and its ramifications for the presidential election in 2027, elder statesman and chieftain of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Prof Jerry Gana announced that Jonathan would contest the 2027 Presidency on the platform of the PDP, confirming what many had thought to be a mere speculation. However, Gana’s announcement has caused a ripple in the still political water of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) and the presidency.
In his bid to delegitimise and cast aspersion on Jonathan’s presidential candidature in 2027, Bayo Onanuga, the spokesperson to President Bola Tinubu, penned a lengthy treatise filled with half-truths and outright falsehoods in other portray Jonathan’s 2027 presidential ambition as unrealistic. While he acknowledged the right of Jonathan to contest for the presidency, he wanted him to be wary of the PDP and people like Gana, whom he described as ‘sugarcoated cheerleaders’.
Onanuga’s rebuttal would have been treated with scant regard or given faint attention if he had stopped at his admonition to the former president to be mindful of those pushing him to contest the 2027 presidential election. He went on to reel out what he said were the failures of the Jonathan government when he was in power. He stated that the Nigerian economy was in ruins and corruption and insecurity were rife under Jonathan, adding that such abysmal and atrocious performance will not be rewarded again.
Of course, Jonathan, just like the governments before and after it, had his failings and weaknesses and his government was plagued by many problems and challenges, chief of which was rampant corruption and widespread mismanagement of the nation’s resource which culminated in the series of events that led to his defeat in in his defeat in 2015. When Nigerians voted out Jonathan in 2015 for the All Progressives Congress (APC), they felt they made the right choice and were getting the real deal by voting en masse for Muhammadu Buhari, who was widely regarded as spartan, disciplined, incorruptible, sincere and altruistic.
As the spokesperson of the Tinubu government, it will be somewhat a big or tough ask demanding a fair, objective and dispassionate juxtaposition of Jonathan’s government with that of his principal. Nigerians know where they were ten years ago and where they are today. They know what the general state of the nation was under Jonathan. They know what the economic situation of the country was under Jonathan and what it is today. They are the ones who are perfectly placed to juxtapose or make any comparison between the government of Jonathan and the Tinubu government, not a spin doctor. A random selection of twenty Nigerians anywhere in the country for an opinion sampling on the two governments will disabuse Onanuga’s mind.
While Onanuga wants us to believe that Nigeria’s economy was in freefall under Jonathan, available data and stats do not support his claim. Under Jonathan, inflation was in the single digits and Nigeria’s economy was one of the fastest growing in the world and the biggest in Africa following its rebasing in 2014. Nigeria’s gross domestic product (GDP) was $560 billion in 2014 and was projected to be a trillion-dollar economy by 2024. The naira was exchanging at 190 to a dollar. Unemployment was low. Today, under Tinubu’s government that Onanuga now defends, Nigerians are grappling with runaway inflation and a cost-of-living crisis. Nigeria’s GDP has fallen from over half a trillion dollars in 2014 to $187 billion in 2024, and the economy, which used to be the fourth largest on the African continent, now ranks fourth. Insecurity that used to be restricted to small parts of the northeastern part of the country under Jonathan is now widespread and destructive. If forlorn, long-suffering and much-tried Nigerians were to have the chance to choose between the government of Jonathan and that of Tinubu, there is no telling who they will cast their lot with.
Onanuga also harped on pervasive malfeasance and corruption in Jonathan’s government. While Jonathan’s inability to tackle corruption and allowing it to destructively fester as he looked the other way while high-ranking members of his government engaged in graft and sharp practices has been touted as one of the leading reasons he lost his re-election, Tinubu hasn’t exactly fared better in that regard. Corruption of all kinds is endemic under him. He condones and tolerates it. One can see his attitude towards corruption in his appointment of shady, unscrupulous and greedy characters with uninspiring and abhorrent antecedents into his government.
In his bid to please his paymaster and show that he is doing his job of defending President Tinubu, he exposes him to scrutiny and accentuates the troubling state of the nation under him. Nigerians don’t need a disingenuous treatise from Onanuga on what life was like under Jonathan and what it’s like under Tinubu. They have enough self-awareness and agency to know where and when their bread was beautifully, comfortably and lavishly buttered, and it is definitely not under Tinubu. And there are irrefutable facts and statistics to substantiate their sentiments.
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