More knocks came for former President Goodluck Jonathan over his defence that his erstwhile National Security Adviser (NSA) Col Sambo Dasuki couldn’t have stolen $2.1 billion funds.
The latest knock was from the local chapter of the All Progressive Congress (APC) which carpeted the former President of trying to cover what has been exposed for all to see.
The party wondered why such defence came from Dr. Jonathan at a time some of those partook in the funds have not owned up but refunding their shares to the federal purse.
It said the former President’s claim only confirmed that he knew how the funds approved to buy arms for troops fighting insurgents in the Northeast was diverted under his watch as the Commander-in-Chief.
In a statement by its spokesman Joe Igbokwe, the APC said there should be a limit to which a leader should rise in defence of his lieutenant with the mind-boggling revelations and overwhelming evidences that the arms purchase cash was diverted.
The party described as regrettable that the diversion of the security vote led to the loss of thousands of lives of both civilians and soldiers who were ill-equipped to face well-kitted Boko Haram insurgents.
It urged Jonathan to refrain from playing on the intelligence of Nigerians, whose future have been compromised by maladministration, betrayal of public thrust and corruption that characterised governance under him.
The statement reads: “Even as we concede that Jonathan is on a desperate bid to rehabilitate himself, we wouldn’t believe that a former president should be so contemptuous of the intelligence of Nigerians as to give the kind of defence he gave to Sambo Dasuki. We wonder what Jonathan makes of the horrid details that are emanating from the Dasukigate issue with shocking evidences, confessions and even refunds made by those that participated in that monumental corruption.”
“To claim that Dasuki and his partners did not steal the arms purchase fund reveals the inner beliefs of Jonathan. One would have expected Jonathan to be cautious in seeking to advance very childish and inadmissible exculpation of his subordinates for glaring acts of corruption. We had expected that Jonathan would have striven to water down the lowly impression held of him by Nigerians and the international community by not deciding to be so patronising to clear cases of corruption by his subordinates.
“By Jonathan’s defence of Sambo Dasuki, we believe time has come for the security agencies to pick up Jonathan to tell the nation all that he knows of the many cases of corruption that happened under him. We think that Jonathan knows more than he admits about the unseemly corruption that he presided over and should be brought in for questioning. It’s becoming indefensible for Jonathan to pretend he was innocent of the corrupt acts of his subordinates.
“While we condemn Jonathan’s cheeky defence of Dasuki, even in the face of monumental damning evidences, we want to state that the anti-corruption war is incomplete until Jonathan justifies his defence of corrupt subordinates.”
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