Ex-govs plot to kill VP -Ijaw group alleges -Calls for Iwu’s arrest
Donald Ojogo, South-South Bureau Chief- 07.07.2009

AS the nation keeps guessing whether or not President Umaru Yar’Adua would seek re-election alongside his deputy, Goodluck Jonathan in 2011, Niger Delta advocacy organisation, the Ijaw Monitoring Group, (IMG) has raised the alarm over the safety of the nation’s number two man ahead of the polls.


IMG is alleging that some former governors from the region are after the life of the nation’s vice-president.


President Yar’Adua has kept the nation in suspense on the 2011 presidential election amidst unconfirmed reports that some political hawks within the PDP from the South-South geopolitical zone are working to ensure that Jonathan is dropped as the party’s vice-presidential candidate.


But IMG’s coordinator, Joseph Evah, who spoke with the Nigerian Tribune in a telephone interview, apart from raising the alarm, chided the chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Professor Maurice Iwu, for allegedly being economical with the truth concerning the 2007 bombing of the vice-president’s residence in Otuoke, Bayelsa State, on the eve of the elections. According to him, there was more to the bombing than the INEC boss was letting out, thereby urging the police and the State Security Service (SSS) to arrest Iwu.


Iwu had, according to a newspaper report last Friday, recalled that Jonathan would have been killed by the political class before the 2007 elections in order to scuttle the electoral process and destabilise the nation. He spoke in Enugu while delivering a lecture at the ninth quadrennial national delegate conference of the National Civil Service Union (NSCU).


But Evah not only took a swipe at the INEC chairman, he also challenged him to make public the names of those in the political class he knew as the masterminds of the bombing of the vice-president’s private residence. He alleged that from what Iwu said, it was evident that the life of the vice-president was still not safe, as the nation approached another round of elections in 2011.


“What Iwu said on Friday is a vindication of my earlier fears in 2007, that the nature of the security provided for the then governor of Bayelsa State, as the Yar’Adua’s running mate was laughable compared to others, who were just governorship candidates in some state. He had a very porous security, which was not up to half of what was provided for the likes of Andy Uba and Musiliu Obanikoro in Anambra and Lagos states. A few days later, the man’s private residence was bombed.


“I strongly believe that the INEC chairman is only being economical with the truth by saying that, that bombing was to scuttle democracy and this and that; let him come out to mention those people in the political class who wanted Jonathan dead, or is this another Tompolo list?


“Let the police and the SSS arrest Iwu, so that they can reopen the reason for bombing and he will tell them the persons he is referring to in the political class. If it is not done that way, it means that the life of the vice-president is still in danger because those former governors, who felt aggrieved that Yar’Adua did not accept them as his running mate, nominated by Obasanjo, are yet to forgive the vice-president for taking place. At least, el- Rufai said it last week that he was among those who influenced the rejection of some serving governors (then), who wanted to be Yar’Adua’s deputy after they had wasted their states’ money on a fruitless presidential journey,” Evah said.

he is off no use to anybody - Good ridance.