‘Jonathan deceiving Yoruba leaders with Confab report’

The All Progressives Congress Presidential Campaign Organisation (APCPCO) has again counselled Yoruba leaders against giving any endorsement to Dr. Goodluck Jonathan on the predication of his promise to implement the Confab report.
Mallam Garba Shehu, Director of Media and Publicity of APCPCO, in a statement, noted that the confab report was submitted more than six months ago, but Dr. Goodluck Jonathan, for want of cogent achievements, decided to use it as an electoral promise. “Jonathan sees this report as opium.”
Shehu said the best that Dr. Goodluck Jonathan can do with the report is to use part of the contents as an executive bill to the National Assembly for formal amendment to the Constitution.
He is stopped by the Constitution from doing otherwise.
The APC Campaign says, however, that it is particularly enthused with the recent report in The Punch newspaper in which General Alani Akinrinade; the former Chief of Defence Staff, expressed strong aversion to the endorsement of Dr. Goodluck Jonathan by the Afenifere leaders.
The respected Yoruba elder-statesman was quoted to have said in the interview that “the Yoruba agenda brought before the National Conference failed.”
Akinrinade also faulted the pro-Jonathan Yoruba leaders who said that the implementation of the report would benefit the people.
He had noted that the recommendations of the confab were below Yoruba’s target and wondered why the leaders would base their endorsement on that.
Shehu quotes Akinrinade verbatim to emphasise the position of the APC Campaign on the matter: “When the Yoruba sent their delegates, the cardinal points that can make a federation were practically not given to us (the delegates). I can assure you, we missed all the targets. It will be preposterous of us now to expect that by the time that report is executed, we will end up with true federalism.
“We want to set the record straight that there are major things that have to be done before we can have a true federalism. It cannot be done by one President alone. Unless you change the rule now, you will need all the national and state assemblies to agree with you.”
Akinrinade had reminded that Ondo State Governor, Olusegun Mimiko, who has been holding several post-confab conferences, was only pushing the agenda of the Peoples Democratic Party.
The APC Campaign agrees with Akinrinade on his incisive and highly cerebral opinion, which undoubtedly vindicates our position on that infamous endorsement of Dr. Jonathan by Afenifere.
“We state unequivocally, without any scintilla of doubt, as a revered civil war veteran and remarkable Yoruba man, General Alani Akinrinade’s opinion on the national discourse, nay the Yoruba agenda, cannot be discountenanced.
The APC Presidential Campaign calls on Nigerians, especially our people in the South-West, to imbibe the fresh perspectives of General Akinrinade as they delete the highly acidic impetus of the Afenifere group.