Former
President Goodluck Jonathan on Tuesday denied the allegations that he
received $200 million as proceeds from the Malabu Oil deal as first
published on a gossip news site, Buzzfeed.Ikechukwu Eze, Media Adviser to the former President said in a
statement on that the allegation is false as the Malabu oil deal far
predated the Jonathan regime and it would only make sense for him to be
bribed if he had a time machine to go back in time to when the deal was
struck.The statement reads, “The man quoted by the report said he ‘assumed’
that Dr Jonathan would be bribed. Since when has the assumption of a
crook been enough to smear the reputation of a patriot and international
statesman like Dr Goodluck Jonathan?“The report also wrongly claimed that “Jonathan and Etete had known
each other for years, according to Shell staff, when Jonathan served as a
tutor to Etete’s children while he was a minister.“This claim is clearly ridiculous and nothing can be further from the truth.“In the first place, the former President couldn’t have been a
‘tutor’ to Etete’s children without first establishing contact with the
family.“This is because Jonathan met Etete who served as the Petroleum
Minister in Gen. Abacha’s military regime for the first time under the
succeeding civilian administration when he was already the deputy
Governor of Bayelsa State. Even then, the fact remains that ex-President
Jonathan has never met any of Etete’s children.Advertisement“Besides, Jonathan couldn’t have been anybody’s private tutor during
that period, because he was already in the directorate cadre in Oil
Mineral Producing Areas Development Commission, OMPADEC (now NDDC),
having already left the academia, at the time Etete was a serving
minister.“This story, coming so soon after the fake news that Dr Goodluck
Jonathan refused British help in rescuing the Chibok Girls (a story that
the British Government debunked) and that he plans to contest the 2019
elections (another lie), proves that these fallacious stories are
deliberately contrived for reasons that are yet to be publicly
disclosed.“It is instructive that this same old fable apparently intended to
rubbish Jonathan’s name locally and internationally, is being recycled
with more lies added to garnish the narrative, at a time the
ex-President is making efforts to resolve the issues in the People’s
Democratic Party (PDP).“Again, let us point out for clarity and for the umpteenth time that
while he was in office and now that he is out of office, former
President Jonathan did not open and does not own any bank account,
aircraft or real estate outside Nigeria. Anyone with contrary
information is challenged to publicly publish same,” he saidIn conclusion, the former President appealed to the media to report facts rather than innuendo and gossip.The former President also reminded the media that he signed the
Freedom of Information Act into law and that it is only fair to use it
to investigate allegations in order to establish the truth.According to him, while he cannot stop criminals from ‘assuming’, but
that he can and he will stop them from getting away with blatant lies.
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