Analyzing Obasanjo's Full Letter to President Jonathan

Osas eye analysis on the 18-page letter written by former President Olusegun Obasanjo to President Goodluck Jonathan.

Did Obasanjo addressed the core issues in [resident Jonathan's administration. The former President Obasanjo is not expecting President Jonathan to reply him. Nigerians are though. I am. Is Obasanjo's letter good for Jonathan and Nigeria.

“Obasanjo will be a happy Nigerian if appropriate steps are taken by President Jonathan to address the burning issues of corruption and other challenges that threaten to bring this country down.

“There is absolutely no reason to expect a reply from the Presidency when previous letters written to him were not even acknowledged.”

Obasanjo's attack on Jonathan: Obasanjo told Jonathan in an 18-page letter, dated 2 December:

1.  “Nigeria is bleeding and the haemorrhage must be stopped before it is too late.”
2.  The former President said Jonathan had betrayed God and the Nigerian people that brought him to power, adding that he has been pursuing selfish, personal and political interests based on advice he receives from “self-centred aides”.
3.  Obasanjo accuses President Jonathan of using the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Chairman, Bamanga Tukur, to cause multiple crises and divide the ranks of the party, the President’s failure to keep a promise he made not to seek a second term is also generating tension within the ruling party.

“It would be unfair to continue to level full blames on the Chairman (Tukur) for all that goes wrong with the party. The chairman is playing the tune dictated by the paymaster (Jonathan),' Obasanjo said in the letter.

“But the paymaster is acting for a definitive purpose for which deceit and deception seem to be the major ingredients.

“Up till two months ago, Mr. President, you told me that you have not told anybody that you would contest in 2015. I quickly pointed out to you that the signs and the measures on the ground do not tally with your statement.

“You said the same to one other person who shared his observation with me. And only a fool would believe that statement you made to me judging by what is going on.

    4.  President Jonathan to change career, says he's unfit to run Nigeria

 “I must say it is not ingenious. You may wish to pursue a more credible and more honourable path,” Obsanjo said in the letter.

He added that it would be morally wrong for Jonathan to contest in 2015. “As a leader, two things you must cherish and hold dear among others are trust and honour both of which are important ingredients of character.

      5. President Jonathan cannot be trusted.

 “I will want to see anyone in the Office of the Presidency of Nigeria as a man or woman who can be trusted, a person of honour in his words and character.”

     6. Obasanjo also accused the President of being a sectional leader.

“For you to allow yourself to be possessed, so to say, to the exclusion of most of the rest of Nigerians as an Ijaw man, is a mistake that should never have been allowed to happen.

“Yes, you have to be born in one part of Nigeria to be a Nigerian if not naturalised but the Nigerian President must be above ethnic factionalism. And those who prop you up as of, and for ‘Ijaw nation’ are not your friends genuinely, not friends of Nigeria nor friends of ‘Ijaw nation’ they tout about.

“To allow or tacitly encourage people of ‘Ijaw nation’ to throw insults on other Nigerians from other parts of the country and threaten fire and brimstone to protect your interest as an Ijaw man is myopic and your not openly quieting them is even more unfortunate,” Obasanjo said.

        7.  Obasanjo also accused Jonathan of a Blacklist with over 1,000 Nigerian politicians and opponents. He also presented news details of the president training snipers and other armed personnel secretly in a location where Abacha also trained his killers and that the President is clandestinely acquiring weapons for political purposes.

         8. In a tacit reference to Major Hamza Al-Mustapha who was acquitted by an Appeal Court for the murder of Kudirat Abiola, wife of winner of 1993 presidential election, MKO Abiola, Obasanjo said: “Presidential assistance for a murderer to evade justice and Presidential delegation to welcome him home can only be in bad taste generally but particularly to the family of his victim.

“Assisting criminals to evade justice cannot be part of the job of the Presidency. Or, as it is viewed in some quarters, is he being recruited to do for you what he had done for Abacha in the past?

“Hopefully, he should have learned his lesson. Let us continue to watch.”

9. Quoting a proverb, Obasanjo said Jonathan must have been wrongly advised.

Obasanjo wrote: “The Yoruba adage says: ‘The man with whose head coconut is broken may not live to savour the taste of the succulent fruit.’

“Those who advise you to go hard on those who oppose you are your worst enemies. Democratic politics admits and is permissive of supporters and opponents.

10. Warns that the President may be Oust from his office, cites Egypt's Morsi as an example. 

“When the consequences come, those who have wrongly advised you will not be there to help carry the can. Egypt must teach some lesson.”