– Dame Patience Jonathan was a controversial figure while her husband was Nigeria’s number one citizen
– Her power and influence during her husband’s time at the Presidential Villa was not in doubt
– The power and influence she possesed eventually became her husband’s undoing in the 2015 elections
A new book titled “Against the Run of Play: How an incumbent President was defeated in Nigeria”, written by veteran journalist, Segun Adeniyi has chronicled the controversies courted by former first lady, Dame Patience Jonathan, that cost her husband his electoral victory in 2015.
The book focused on Mrs Jonathan’s many fights, gaffes, troubles that made her husband look weak and ill-suited for the office of president.
Although she criss-crossed the length and breadth of Nigeria mobilising women and men to vote for her husband, Mrs Jonathan’s utterances and actions further caused more trouble for an already sinking president.
Mrs Jonathan was involved in so many political battles and it affected her husband’s electoral fortunes
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ZENITHBLOG.com lists 7 actions of the former first lady, which eventually affected her husband’s chances of returning to Aso Rock.
1. Jonathan was hardly one year in office when the then first lady had an explosive encounter with the Speaker of the House of Representatives at the time, Aminu Waziri Tambuwal.
Adeniyi quotes Dame Jonathan as telling Tambuwal: “You this Hausa boy, you want to bring down the government of my husband; you want to disgrace him out of power? Una no fit! God no go allow you.”
2. Mrs Jonathan also had the seem suspicion towards the then Senate President, David Mark. Mark was quoted as saying in the book: “She once accosted Senator Joy Emordi to say, ‘Joy, I hear you are the manager of David Mark Presidential Campaign Organisation’, which was a baseless accusation.
“I had to meet the president to clarify issues with him, So, I would say it was President Jonathan and his wife, who radicalised Tambuwal and turned him into a political foe.”
3. The former first lady started attacking the then Rivers state governor, Rotimi Amaechi, over land matters in Okrika, where she hails from, embarrassing the governor before her natives. This was barely six months in August 2010 after Jonathan had been sworn in as president following the death of Yar Ádua in February of that year.
The author wrote: “In the course of a two-day visit to Rivers state, Dame Patience Jonathan engaged then Governor Amaechi in an open altercation in Okrika, her home town. The governor was explaining why there would be some demolitions in the town to make way for new schools proposed by the state government when Dame snatched the microphone from him and shouted, “Listen, you must listen to me! ”
A clearly embarrassed Amaechi stood still while Dame Patience Jonathan railed at him, “I want you to get me clear. I am from Okrika, I know the problems of my people. So, I know what I am talking about. I do not want us to go into crisis.
“We are preaching peace and we must maintain peace at any time. But what I am telling you is that you always say you must demolish. That word ‘must’ you use is not good. It is by pleading. You appeal to the owners of the compound because they will not go into exile. Land is a serious issue”.
From that day, the battle-line was drawn between the two as Mrs Jonathan made it clear she would not tolerate a governor from her state who would not bow to her. And it was not in Amaechi’s nature to be easily muzzled.
4. Mrs Jonathan stoked further fire of alienation against her husband in the North shortly after the 279 Chibok girls were seized by Boko Haram in April 2014. Contrary to the sympathy expressed by the world towards the kidnap of the school girls, Dame rather gave the impression that the event was stage-managed to embarrass Jonathan and his administration.
While the management of the crisis by the military had begun to put credibility in serious doubt, the bigger problem for Jonathan came from the home front.
In what she framed as a plot to discredit her husband, Dame Patience Jonathan told a group of visiting women led by the PDP National Women Leader, Mrs. Kema Chikwe, “We the Nigerian women are saying no child is missing in Borno state. If any child is missing, let the governor go and look for them. There is nothing we can do again”.
Jonathan could clearly not call his wife to order as she continued to embarrass his government
5. The book also alluded to the defeat of Jonathan at the 2015 poll to the utterances of his wife, Patience. It quotes the former Niger state governor, Babangida Aliyu, as accusing the former first lady of insulting the North with incendiary language, thereby alienating them from Jonathan during the election.
According to the former governor, Mrs Jonathan made sneering remarks against the North, by saying “Our people no dey born children wey dem no dey count. Our men no dey born throw way for street; we no dey like people from the other side”, an apparent reference to the concept of Almajiri common in the region.
6. In the course of a PDP rally in Calabar, Cross River state, on March 2, 2015, Mrs Jonathan urged PDP members to stone anyone that promised change, which was the APC slogan.
“Anyone that come and tell you change, stone that person. Anybody that tells you change, tell that person, carry your change and get away,” she was seen saying in a video that went viral.
7. At the PDP Women Presidential Campaign Rally in Kogi state, a northern town, a few days to the presidential election, Mrs Jonathan described the then APC Presidential candidate, Muhammadu Buhari, as being brain dead.
She said poignantly in pidgin english at the rally attended by thousands of people in Lokoja, the state capital, “Wetin him (Buhari) dey find again? Him dey drag with pikin mate. Old man wey no get brain, him brain don die pata pata” (What does Buhari want again? He is jostling for power with someone young enough to be his son. Old man whose brain is completely dead!).
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Meanwhile, a former governor of Niger state, Babangida Aliyu has revealed why the North opposed former president Goodluck Jonathan’s re-election bid in 2015.
Aliyu said the North backed out because Jonathan reneged on his promise to govern for only one term of four years.
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