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Obasanjo jets out to U
Obasanjo jets out to U.S.
•Makes peace with Plateau CAN
MOSES EZULIKE, Jos (and agency reports)
PRESIDENT
Olusegun Obasanjo left the country yesterday for the United States (U.S.) amid
criticism of insensitivity to the fuel strike by opposition political parties.
Obasanjo and four other African leaders
were invited to attend a scheduled meeting of the Group of 8 (G-8)
industrialised nations.
However, Information and National
Orientation Minister, Chief Chukwuemeka Chikelu defended the trip as being in
the national interest.
The President is also said to have earlier
apologised to Plateau State Chairman of the Christian Association of Nigeria
(CAN), Rev. Yakubu Pam, for insulting him during a recent working visit to the
state in the wake of the bloody crisis in the area.
Conference of Nigerian Political Parties (CNPP)
and Nigerian United for Democracy (NUD), the umbrella platforms of some
opposition parties, said that by travelling out at this time, President Obasanjo
is out of tune with the nation’s problems and should step aside for the
emergence of a people’s leadership.
Secretary-General of the two bodies, Mr.
Maxi Okwu, told Daily Champion that the fact that President Obasanjo has left
the country at this period of national crisis showed that he is insensitive to
the feelings of Nigerians.
Mr. Okwu, who said he was speaking for the
groups, stressed that the President’s action further justified the opposition’s
call on Obasanjo to resign "to make way for the emergence of a people’s
leadership that would spring from a Sovereign National Conference that would
produce a people’s constitution."
On the strike, he said the Federal High
Court, which ruled on the matter on Tuesday, showed how lawless the Federal
Government was, when it (court) pointed out that government was abusing court
process in a bid to undermine the right of the people to protest government
policies.
He said the CNPP/NUD was in full support
of the NLC’s directive that the strike should continue because the history of
the present government shows that it obeyed court orders selectively, stressing
that NLC would have no moral justification to obey the order on them to suspend
the strike if government went ahead to disobey the order for a reversal to the
old pump prices of fuel.
Chikelu told newsmen that the G-8 event is
"the biggest meeting where decisions on Africa will be taken."
"It is a meeting of world economic
powers," he said, adding that since Nigeria had been asking for debt
forgiveness, the event would serve as an opportunity to carry on the campaign.
He said that since Obasanjo had been
fighting for more funds to support reform programmes in Africa, non attendance
to the meeting would not only make a negative impact on the country, but on
Africa.
On the Federal High Court ruling which
asked petroleum marketers to revert to the old price of N38 per litre, Chikelu
said that there "may be a consequence on marketers" that do not comply.
He said that although the focus of
marketers which had made them delay compliance might be genuine "it is not for
us to debate."
Chikelu said that anybody who had not
reverted to the old price had breached the law and that it would be a "legal
matter."
"It is a court ruling and not a Federal
Government ruling and therefore all parties to the crisis must comply," he said.
Also speaking, Minister of Labour and
Productivity, Hassan Lawal said that at a meeting with stakeholders last
Tuesday, marketers said that they accepted the court verdict and would revert to
the old price.
Attorney-General and Minister of Justice,
Akinlolu Olujinmi (SAN) said: "I do not want to speculate that marketers will
not comply."
Olujinmi said that he expected that since
the Federal Government had complied, both the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) and
marketers would live up to the ruling.
The Labour crisis dominated the Federal
Executive Council (FEC) meeting which was chaired by Vice-President Atiku
Abubakar.
President Obasanjo’s alleged apology to
Pam was tendered during the reconcilatory dialogue between him (President) and
the leadership of Platerau State CAN in Aso Rock Villa, Abuja, last Friday.
President Obasanjo, had three weeks ago,
lambasted (Rev. Pam), calling him an idiot when he (the Chairman), had sought to
know what he (the President) said or had done over the murder of 48 Christian
worshippers in a Church of Christ (COCIN) in Yelwa-Shendam by some Muslim
hoodlums (fundamentalists).
The outburst which came before the
imposition of state of emergency in the state, four days thereafter, did not go
down well with the Christian community in Nigeria, particularly in Plateau
State, who ostensibly saw the President’s action as not only ill-motivated but a
bias against them.
Following this development, many prominent
Nigerians, leaders of thought as well as CAN leadership not only insisted that
the President’s outburst was ‘unpresidential" but that he should apologize to
the Christian body in the country.
Although the President was said to have
denied insulting the Christian body in that hot exchange, the CAN leadership, we
gathered, insisted on either extracting an apology from him or no peace.
It was against this background that the
President reportedly sent series of emissaries to CAN leadership in the State,
courtesy of the National CAN, which initiated the reconciliation between him and
the state leadership, whom we gathered anchored extensively Obasanjo’s political
campaigns in the state, for his second term.
The reconciliatory parley was earlier
billed for the Villa two weeks, ago
According to the Daily Champion’s
investigations, a deal was however struck when the CAN’s president, Archbishop
Peter Akinola in conjunction with Prof. Jerry Gana and the Aso Villa Chapel’s
Chaplain, Prof. Yusuf Obaje, convinced Rev. Pam to come to the Villa so that the
grey areas would be thrashed out. The Plateau team arrived Abuja last Wednesday
for the meeting which eventually took place last Friday.
Initially, the meeting was to be attended
by five persons the Chief Host (i.e. the President himself), Bishop Akinola,
Prof. Obaje as well as his Deputy, Rev. Williams (who has been the President’s
personal pastor) and Rev. Yakubu Pam.
But apprehensive of possible intimidations
from the Presidency, the state CAN leader insisted on going to the meeting with
his close lieutenants such as his Secretary, Rev. Bako Wuyep and the vocal
General Overseer of the Maranatha Bible Churches International (MBCI) Jos,
Bishop Jonas Katung to the parley.
At the afternoon dialogue which included
all those in company of Rev. Pam, not withstanding efforts and pressures from
Prof. Obaje and the security at Aso Villa to stop the Chairman’s lieutenants,
the President was said to have made it clear that he had nothing personal
against Rev. Pam.
President Obasanjo, who it was gathered,
never lost his sense of humour, all through the seven-man session, further
argued that he was surprised that in five previous meetings he had arranged with
suspended Governor Joshua Dariye on the way forward to the crises in the state,
the governor never bothered to bring in the CAN leadership to any of the
meetings.
This situation, our sources cited
President Obasanjo as regretting, was responsible for the break-down in
communication between the two parties, which consequently resulted to the
misunderstanding.
Besides, the President was said to have
again pleaded with Rev. Pam that his question on the murder of 48 Christian
worshippers when he visited Plateau State, only portrayed (Obasanjo) as
insensitive as well as bias to the plight of Christians in the State.
Sources at the close door dialogue, also
told Daily Champion that it was after the President’s submission as well as the
response of Rev. Pam - described as very humble and impressive by the President,
that he (Obasanjo) became sober and remorseful about the unfortunate incident.
At this point, President Obasanjo was said
to have now got up from his seat and headed straight to Rev. Pam, whom he
embraced and shook hands with a smile.
The President who was said to have hailed
CAN for all its efforts at resolving the perpetual killings in Plateau State,
reportedly urged them to intensify efforts to evolve a lasting solution to the
problem.
President Obasanjo, our sources stressed, pleaded
thereafter with the leadership of CAN to support Alli administration’s effort at
returning peace to the State, adding that it was only with the return of such
peace that the suspended governor (Chief Dariye) and others can return to
office.
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