Governor of Rivers State, Rotimi Amaechi, Says Patience Jonathan is Defacto President Of Nigeria
Read the abridged interview.
The Governor of Rivers State, Rotimi Amaechi, has disclosed that he incurred the wrath of President Goodluck Jonathan because he was seen to be exposing a lot of corrupt activities going on in government.
Amaechi also gave the impression that the President and his wife can never keep to their promises, recalling how they held several meetings with him begging him to deliver the state to Jonathan during the 2011 presidential election with the promise that they would never trouble him again, a promise they did not keep.
Governor Amaechi, who spoke with TheNEWS magazine, listed many instances where his actions infuriated President Jonathan and his wife, Patience, who he described as a de facto President.
First among the reasons for the battle to bring him down, according to Amaechi, is the desperate ambition of Dame Patience Jonathan to see herself and be addressed as the political ‘lord’ of Rivers State, her home state despite the fact that she is even not recognized by the constitution and is not occupying any elective office.
This seeming bottled-up anger culminated in the incident that occurred in Okrika, Patience’ hometown, in which she snatched the microphone from the governor and reprimanded him for saying he would buy off some buildings around a school and demolish it so as to create enough space for extracurricular activities for the school.
Governor Amaechi attributed the crisis to three things: “the first was the attempt by the wife of the President to control the Rivers State government. I remember when female senators came to me after she met with them.
“She said to them: ‘I am the highest ranking officer from Rivers State and I wonder why the Governor of Rivers State does not accord me that respect’.
“I said in law, I don’t see the office of the wife of the President being superior to that of the governor…The resistance is what you are seeing.”
During Jonathan’s campaigns for 2011, he said the President and his wife pleaded with him since he (Amaechi) wanted to be assured that if Jonathan emerged, there would not be a multiplicity of presidents where “you have the wife manipulating power, everybody doing one thing or the other.
“I wanted to make sure that I and the Rivers people are fully protected. I wasn’t convinced.
“Now, within the period, the President had called me and the wife and we sat together and made peace. There again, they promised that nobody would hurt me, nobody would do this or that. That’s why this is a bit difficult because there is nothing new that they can tell me that they did not tell me in 2011 and they did not keep to their promise”.
He said the meeting was just between him, the President and Mrs. Jonathan and he secured their promise to protect him, but “we had hardly won the 2011 elections when the wife descended on me and the Rivers State Government.
