Ex-Niger Delta militant leaders yesterday challenged President Goodluck Jonathan to waste no further time in formally declaring his interest to seek re-election in 2015.
The Niger Delta Youth for Democracy led by Roland Abanara, Figbele Joseph and Austin Aboh, said the president had done credibly well in his first term in office that should ordinarily get him re-elected.
The ex-militants, who spoke at a press conference in Benin City, the Edo State capital, vowed to resist any plan aimed at frustrating Jonathan’s second term campaign, and declared that alleged politicization of the Boko Haram insurgency is designed to portray him as incapable of leading the country.
Abanara also made a case for an Ijaw as the next governor of Delta State, to this end, they threw their weight behind former Niger Delta Affairs Minister, Elder Peter Godsday Orubebe.
President Jonathan’s transformation agenda according to him, has affected the nooks and crannies of the country and was optimistic that he has the ability to take the country to a new height.
He added: “those who are capitalizing on the insecurity challenging confronting the nation to discredit the president should remember that terrorism as being witnessed today never started with the emergence of President Jonathan and the government is not relenting in bringing an end to it. We all know that terrorism is a global challenge, it is sad that it is only in Nigeria that opposition are playing politics with it”.
Decrying alleged marginalization of the Ijaw in Delta State, Abanara wondered why no Ijaw has been allowed to rule the state since its inception in 1991.