The First lady of Nigeria and wife of President Goodluck
Jonathan, Patience, was been accused of getting away with murder in the country
and of being used as a political tool, with the tacit support of her husband.
Nigeria’s Nobel laureate, Professor Wole Soyinka made this
allegation on Thursday during an international press conference on the state of
the nation. He alongside human rights lawyer, Mr. Femi Falana (SAN), pointedly
identified the first lady as being neck deep in the political crisis in Rivers
State, adding that her “seizure of Port Harcourt for 11 days with full security
apparatus in tow, indicated that there is something about that madam herself.”
Falana and Soyinka condemned the crisis that had engulfed
the Rivers State House of Assembly, when five out the 32 lawmakers attempted to
impeach the speaker, Hon. Otelemaba Amachree.
Soyinka described the entire scenario as reflective of meddlesomeness
and decried Mrs. Jonathan’s involvement in the crisis in the state, pointing
out that she has no constitutional role in the country.
“This is getting to a state where an unelected person, a
mere domestic appendage, can seize control of a place for 11 days and as a
result of her presence, the governor of that state was told by policemen that
you cannot pass here because the queen was there. What sort of jungle are we
living in?
“A person with no constitutional position is able to enjoy
the full security apparatus of the state which is being denied a governor,” he
said.
He said his advice for the first lady was to be a lady
before being a “first lady”.
In his words…….“My worry for her is that she should be a
lady first before being a first lady. You cannot be a first lady without first
being a lady. That is the only advice I have for her,”.
Mrs. Patience Jonathan in response to these statement on
Friday took on the Nobel Laureate, Prof. Wole Soyinka, for attributing the
crisis in the Rivers State House of Assembly to her.
In a statement by her spokesman, Ayo Osinlu, the President’s
wife said Soyinka betrayed the moral duty that expected him, as a respected
member of the society, to carefully consider all shades of issues that informed
his opinions on any matter.
Mrs. Jonathan said Soyinka had become an embarrassment to
his admirers with his diatribe against her.
The statement read in part, “Unfortunately, Soyinka betrayed
moral duty in his recent diatribe against Mrs. Patience Jonathan.
“Of course, this would not be the first time he would reach
out against the First Lady, usually from self-righteously indignant lecterns.
“In this particular instance, his verdict was that Mrs.
Jonathan was ‘stoking the crisis currently rocking her home state of Rivers…’,
and thereupon asked Mr. President to caution his wife.
“The good, old Prof. reminds one of the truth that indeed,
most of the giants on the street are men of like passions like everyone else.
Worse still, most of them are actually standing on clay feet and would fail the
test of a gentle push.
“Otherwise, who would have believed that the social, civil,
constitutional and sundry rights crusader Prof. would maintain a safe distance
from the heart of an activity that is a potential threat to the peace, security
and safety of the people of a state, then collect exaggerated stories and
jaundiced perspectives from familiar propagandists and character assassins, and
promptly summon the media to a “state of the nation” address.
“It’s an embarrassment to his throng of admirers and
followers, that a sage of Prof. Soyinka’s status, who used to be a gauge of
public morality in this nation, would lend himself to a propaganda of high
drive, to save a governor who elected to launch into a river without applicable
survival skills.”
Mrs. Jonathan argued that the calculation was to attack the
President and pull to pieces anyone associated with him, as a strategy for
attracting public sympathy to the “clear underdog.”
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