South-South group urges Sanusi, Bakare, others to apologise to Jonathan

The founder of Latter Rain Assembly, Pastor Tunde Bakare, has been advised to redeem his image by apologising to former President Goodluck Jonathan.

The call was made by a group of young professionals under the aegis of South-South Emerging Leaders’ Forum (SELF) in Abuja on Tuesday, August 13, 2019.

The forum was responding to a recent call by a former deputy national publicity secretary of the governing All Progressives Congress (APC), Timi Frank, that opposition leaders and members of the civil society who "sabotaged" the administration of Jonathan should apologise to the former Nigerian leader.

Former President Goodluck Jonathan ece-auto-gen

The group noted that other Nigerians like the former Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) governor and current Emir of Kano, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, and many others who participated in the Save Nigeria Group, should heed the call by Frank and openly apologise to Jonathan.

Chairman of the group, Preye Ebi, called on them to speak out against “hardship, killings, insecurity, poverty, unemployment, lack of rule of law” supposedly ravaging Nigeria for the past four years.

Ebi wondered how these Nigerians have "suddenly lost their voices even in the face of more hardship, killings, insecurity, poverty, unemployment, lack of rule of law and all kinds of backwardness in the country.”

President Buhari and Pastor Bakare were once flagbearer and running mate respectively. These days, their love has gone cold ece-auto-gen

The group said Bakare “who turned his auditorium to political gathering to criticise Jonathan’s administration to compare and contrast whether Nigeria is now better under his friend General Muhammadu Bubari or publicly tender an apology to redeem his image”.

On Emir Sanusi, it said it was unfortunate the former CBN governor could make an "unsubstantiated allegation" that a certain huge amount of money got missing under Jonathan, alleging that he only did that “to sabotage Jonathan’s administration".

The group also berated the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC), accusing the body of “mischievously” allowing itself to be used against the former President.

The group wondered why the union has suddenly become docile against the “mal-administration of the APC” which it said had brought more hardship on NLC members.