A bunch, the Residents Alliance for Clear Management has issued a blistering rebuttal of former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar, accusing him of distorting historical past and making an attempt to decrease the legacy of ex-President Goodluck Jonathan.
The group’s response follows an announcement by Atiku, the 2023 presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Celebration, on Wednesday, wherein he described Jonathan’s presidency as a “product of inexperience” and attributed his 2015 electoral loss to that alleged shortcoming.
In a strongly worded assertion collectively signed by its Convener, Musa Ibrahim, and Publicity Secretary, Oghenekaro Samuel, CATL dismissed the declare as “not simply unsuitable, however mischievous.”
“Dr. Jonathan rose by means of each constitutional rung of management—Deputy Governor, Governor, Vice-President, and Performing President throughout a important nationwide interval. To dismiss that trajectory as ‘inexperience’ is both a willful distortion of info or a troubling misunderstanding of governance itself,” the group said.
The organisation questioned the premise of Atiku’s criticism, noting that whereas Jonathan’s management was examined in workplace, Atiku’s expertise on the presidential stage stays untested.
“It’s outstanding that somebody whose ‘expertise’ is essentially outlined by repeated ambition now seeks to decrease the file of a frontrunner whose competence was examined in workplace, beneath stress, and in full public view,” the assertion added.
Highlighting Jonathan’s tenure, CATL pointed to key {economic} and structural reforms, insisting that Nigeria recorded measurable progress in the course of the interval.
“Below Dr. Jonathan, Nigeria didn’t drift—it superior. The financial system was rebased to turn out to be Africa’s largest, the facility sector was unbundled, agricultural corruption networks had been dismantled, and long-abandoned rail and street infrastructure had been revived. These are verifiable milestones, not opinions,” the group mentioned.
The organisation additionally underscored Jonathan’s 2015 concession as a defining second in Nigeria’s democratic historical past.
“When confronted with the selection between private energy and nationwide peace, Dr. Jonathan selected Nigeria. His peaceable concession stays probably the most consequential acts of democratic management on the continent,” it famous.
Describing Atiku’s remarks as an try to “rewrite a lived nationwide expertise,” CATL mentioned Nigerians are properly conscious of the realities of that interval.
“To now scale back that legacy to ‘inexperience’ isn’t just ironic—it’s an try to gaslight a nation that lived by means of and benefited from these years,” the assertion learn.
The group maintained that management ought to be judged by outcomes moderately than rhetoric.
“If expertise is the argument, then the excellence is obvious: one man has a file that may be scrutinised; the opposite has a résumé of repeated makes an attempt,” it mentioned.
CATL concluded that Jonathan’s legacy stays firmly rooted in coverage achievements, {economic} progress, and democratic stability.
“Dr. Jonathan’s file is written in outcomes and nationwide influence. No quantity of political revisionism can erase it,” the group said.