ACN challenges President Jonathan to confirm that he barred Amaechi at Presidential Dinner
(Nigeria) The Action Congress of Nigeria, ACN, has called on President
Goodluck Jonathan to immediately order a probe into the published report that
Rivers State Governor, Mr Chibuike Amaechi was barred from paying his respects
to the President at a dinner in the Presidential Villa in Abuja on Wednesday.
In a statement on Thursday by its National Publicity Secretary,
Alhaji Lai Mohammed, the party said the President should ensure that whoever is
behind such a condescending treatment of a State Governor is properly
sanctioned to serve as a deterrent.
''We are making this call because we do not believe that, in
spite of the reported frosty relations between the two, President Jonathan – as
the father of the nation - will lend the weight of his high office to such a
demeaning action as exhibited by the presidential security personnel.
''To believe that anyone occupying the esteemed office of
the President of one of Africa's most important nations will be a party to a
situation in which any security aide will wilfully fence a state chief
executive from paying his respects to the President at such an open gathering will
be to think the worst of the occupier of that office. That is why we have chosen
not to believe that this indeed occurred, and why we are calling on Mr.
President to tell Nigerians that 'it ain't so'
''We shudder to think of what efforts are being made -
including the use of national institutions - to undermine Governor Amaechi if
the treatment reportedly meted out to him at the dinner has the approval of the
powers that be. We are even more worried at what will happen to a governor from
the opposition who falls out of favour with the President, if a governor from
the same party as the President can be so publicly humiliated,'' it said.
ACN said it is particularly incumbent on the President to
clarify the report because Governor Amaechi, the authentic Chair of the
Nigerian Governors' Forum, NGF, extended an Olive Branch to President Jonathan
by attending the dinner along with the other governors who voted him into the NGF
chairmanship, despite the fact that the President is publicly supporting the
losing faction of the NGF, in what is being seen as a democratic Faux pas.
The party said the President must learn to separate politics
from governance by rising above petty partisanship as he steers the affairs of
state.
''At this point, we have no choice than to call attention to
the recent speech by the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Mr Aminu
Tambuwal, to welcome back the members from their short break.
ACN quoted the Speaker thus: “I am strongly persuaded to
state once again that from the little that we know, there is dichotomy between politics
and governance. Thus there is a difference between a candidate in electoral
contest on the platform of a political party and an elected official who has
assumed a non partisan responsibility and taken oath to protect and preserve the
constitution, to serve the people and the nation.
“Needless to say that generally, whenever partisan interests
conflict with national interest, it is partisan interests that must be sacrificed
in the preservation of the national interest. The oath we took is that of constitutionalism
and national service and not of suffocating partisanship.”
The party urged all political office holders, irrespective
of their party affiliation, to eschew the kind of pervasive and petty partisanship
that led to the reported disrespect shown to an elected State Governor by a
security agent being paid with taxpayers' money.
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