Ahead of the 2015 Presidential election, Northern Elders' Forum warned on Saturday that Nigerians should not trust President Goodluck Jonathan in his attempt to woo the country for another term.
Secretary of the NEF and former Presidential Adviser on Food Security, Prof. Ango Abdullahi, who spoke as a guest of the week on Liberty FM, monitored in Kaduna on Saturday, noted that the President betrayed the process that brought him to power.
Prof. Abdullahi claimed that the President's handlers had approached him on the need to drum up support for him (Jonathan) ahead of the 2015 presidency.
He added that the denial of the zoning fomula of the Peoples Demoractic Party by President Jonathan was orchestrated by ex-president Olusegun Obasanjo.
He said, "When Obasanjo wanted an extension of tenure for a second term under the zoning arrangement, he came to an extended caucus of the PDP. I remember people opposed the idea. Late Abubakar Rimi was one of them and he was supported by about three others that Obasanjo should not be given an extension and that the Presidency should come to the North for four years before going back to the south.
"Eventually, about 37 people out of the about 41 present voted for the extension for Obasanjo to have a second term. Now, coming to why we should not trust people who renege on promises, Obasanjo was the first to deny that there was a zoning that brought him to power.
"So, Jonathan must be Obasanjo's student on matters of zoning because he himself kept saying that Jonathan rightly became the President of the country when Yar'adua died.
"If he had acknowledged this understanding, it would have been purely a different matter. But people kept arguing purely on semantics and politics, and Jonathan just one of them who don't believe, both in the North and South that people should honour a simple agreement."
The professor of agricuture added that he was never an advocate of zoning but insisted that come 2015, the North would vote in unison.
Punch
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