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Jonathan's National Conference Is Poison - Ojudu

October 9, 2013

The lawmaker representing Ekiti Central, Babafemi Ojudu, says the National Conference being put together by the PDP-led government of Goodluck Jonathan is dishonest and deceitful.

The lawmaker representing Ekiti Central, Babafemi Ojudu, says the National Conference being put together by the PDP-led government of Goodluck Jonathan is dishonest and deceitful.

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According to Ojudu, the Jonathan administration is just borrowing from "our recent history when government after government gathered people in the name of National Conference or political summit so as to divert the attention of the people from the political challenges faced by government", adding that this has been the practice since 1985.

In a statement in Ado-Ekiti, Ojudu said he had always been a strong advocate of Sovereign National Conference, as opposed to National Conference, as far as 1990 when Alao Aka-Bashorun attempted to organise a Sovereign National Conference in Lagos, but same was aborted by General Ibrahim Babangida.

He maintained that as the Organising Secretary of Campaign for Democracy, he left his job as an editor for three months to join in the efforts to convoke a Sovereign National Conference because of his belief in the need for Nigerians to talk and negotiate their togetherness.

He, however, argued that President Jonathan is using the proposed national conference to divert attention of Nigerians from the economic problems besetting his administration and the noise arising from the implosion of PDP.

"His consultants or advisers must have informed him of the workability of making Nigerians talk while trying to put his house in order. The man is just looking for time and space to buy, persuade, blackmail or pummel to submission those in his party who are opposed to his continuous rulership of Nigeria.

"It is also a strategy to put a stop to the APC progress of mobilizing Nigerians for the 2015 elections. I will not be surprised if the outcome of the conference says 2015 is no longer feasible for elections and that Jonathan should be allowed to continue in office," he said.

Ojudu argued that there were a number of processes President Jonathan could have followed if he was genuine or sincere about the national conference.

He said the National Assembly, and not just the PDP leadership of the legislature, should have been consulted so that the issue would be thoroughly debated and modalities for convoking the conference agreed upon.

He added: "Secondly, critical leaders of political parties, labour unions, professional bodies, organized private sector and religious leaders would have been consulted and a credible committee of patriotic Nigerians representing shades of opinions would have been put together to organize the conference."

He urged Nigerians to reject the national conference in its entirety and continue in their demands for a credible Sovereign National Conference (SNC) to be convoked by the generality of Nigerians and not by leaders of a party that is imploding.

"For the critics of our position, we have this to say to them; you do not say you are hungry and famished and somebody then offers you poison and you swallow it. For those who mean well for Nigeria, Jonathan's national conference is poison. We shall refuse to swallow it, " Ojudu said.

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