The governor of Bauchi State, Bala Mohammed, saluted former president, Goodluck Jonathan’s statesmanship and courage at conceding defeat even while collation was ongoing.
Represented by the former Minister for Special Duties, Tanimu Turaki, Bala said: ’’Nigeria is not at war today because of your decision to concede defeat. We cannot thank you enough for the peace we are having in the country today, for the peaceful transition we had when you freely and voluntarily conceded defeat.
“By your decision, you have shown that you love your country more than you love power.
‘’That singular gracious call you put to your opponent was what brought our democracy to maturity and conferred legitimacy to our political process. Nobody ever is going to change that.
“We celebrate you today because by doing that, you have brought honour to yourself and you have brought honour to all those that will identify with you.
‘’Those who chose not to do what you did today are not being celebrated.
“As a matter of fact, if they were to organise an event like this, nobody will attend’’, he said.
He stated this during the public presentation of a book ‘Dear President Goodluck Jonathan’ written by Mr. Bonaventure Melah, a former Managing Editor of Daily Times, to honour the former President of Nigeria on Tuesday in Abuja.
Earlier, former Senator, Dino Melaye, who represented Kogi west senatorial district at the red chamber, in his goodwill message, tendered a public apology to Jonathan.
He said: “I Senator Dino Melaye, I want to say openly here that after many things that have happened and events that have unfolded in recent times, I want to say openly here that once I was blind, now I can see.
“In 2017, I was arrested eighteen times, there were more times in 2018 and between then and now, I have been taken to court for twelve different cases and out of those cases, we have won eleven of them.
“And that only one that borders on attempted suicide. I wonder how someone like me who likes cars and loves life so well would want to kill himself.
“President Goodluck Jonathan, I want to say that on behalf of all of us who shot blindly, we are sorry.
“The one that I later wondered why you did was that phone call.
“I sometimes wondered that if you had not made that call, we would not be where we are today But after I saw what is happening in America, where President Trump is saying I no go gree, I can now see the reason for that call.
“There are very few people like you. I pray for that anointing,” Melaiye said.
Moreso, in his presentation, the former President, Goodluck Jonathan said that the best way to assess a leader is to look at the philosophy behind his leadership.
This is even as he revealed that the focus of his administration was to change Nigeria through formal education. Jonathan said: “The best way to assess a leader is to look at the philosophy behind his leadership.
“For elected people, political parties are supposed to have ideologies but even within that persuasion, leaders must have their individual visions.
“I always don’t think about leadership at the level of a President or Governor based on infrastructure alone. Anybody who has money and is not a big thief would definitely provide that for the people.
“Apart from that, how else do you assess a leader, his thinking, his vision for leadership?
He stated that his interest while in office was to change society through education, adding that this was the reason his administration built new Almajirai schools as well as established new universities.
‘’My interest as the president was to change the society through education.
“Those who worked with me knew the efforts we put across in terms of elevating the education sector because without education, no matter what we do we will find it difficult to change.
‘’That is my own personal philosophy, it does not mean that it is the best. It was this belief that prompted the intervention in the almajirai case.
“We discovered from the analysis we did that there was a great need to elevate them above that level because if you keep them at that level, it will cause more problems for the government.
‘’Under my watch, we established about 12 conventional universities, one maritime university in Delta, one medical university in Benue State and the police university in Kano State’’, he said.
Jonathan noted that for Nigeria to overcome its numerous challenges, it must place more priority on science and technology.
According to him, technology played a vital role in many developed nations in the development of their economies, and Nigeria will be the better for it, if it adopts technology as a tool for economic development.
‘’We must move swiftly to build a strong foundation for science, technology and innovation.
Without this, the Nigerian economy may not step up to the next level,” he added.
Reviewer of the book, Dr. Reuben Abati said that the book, “Dear President Goodluck Jonathan, filled the gap in contemporary political history of Nigeria.
According to him, the book encapsulated the good and rough times of the Jonathan administration and the unmet expectations of the people.
He also said that the book, which was divided into three parts and 33 chapters, highlighted the betrayals of the former President by some of his close and trusted allies as well as the security agenda of his administration amongst others issues of governance and politics.
Notable persons at the event were governor of Akwa Ibom State, Udom Gabriel Emmanuel, his Kano State counterpart, Abdullahi Umar Ganduje, Sultan of Sokoto, Muhammad Sa’ad Abubakar III, former ministers as well as past and serving members of the National Assembly.
