First Lady Patience Jonathan On Gold Buying Junket To Dubai

Ayo Adewuyi

Our attention has been drawn to a malicious on-line news report on Sahara Reporters about the recent trip of Her Excellency, the First Lady, Dame Patience Goodluck Jonathan to Dubai. The report smacks of an attempt by the authors to rubbish the goodwill of a modest woman who has chosen to waive her privileges as the First Lady and travel on a commercial flight for a private visit.

The said report ordinarily should not attract a reaction but for the malicious intentions of the authors who we understand are bent on carrying out the orchestrated plan of their sponsors.

The authors claimed in the said report that Mrs. Jonathan is “known to be interested in buying gold jewelry” and as such concluded that she is in Dubai on a spending spree shopping for gold. This cannot be farther from the truth. It is ungodly and an unnecessary distraction that is not needed now.

For the avoidance of doubt, Her Excellency, the First Lady is on a private visit which has been scheduled long before her husband was sworn-in as President, the assumption therefore that the First Lady took advantage of her present position is in the imagination of the writers.

Her Excellency, the First lady, Dame Patience Goodluck Jonathan did not, will not and does not intend to take undue advantage of her position.

The First Lady has come a long way as the wife of a Deputy Governor, wife of a Governor, wife of the Vice President and wife of the acting President, it therefore defy any logical reason that it is now that she will be scrambling to buy gold. This is uncharitable.

Mrs. Jonathan rather than being vilified should be commended for maintaining low profile, being modest and considerate for choosing to fly a commercial flight for the visit even though she has the privilege of requesting for the use of a Presidential aircraft.

To say that Mrs. Jonathan has “unveiled a high profile presence since her husband became the President” shows how ignorant the writers are and how deficient they are in investigative journalism. Otherwise, they should have known that the only official function performed by Mrs. Jonathan since she became the First Lady was the launching of “Master Care Foundation” the pet project of the wife of the Delta State Governor, Mrs. Roli Uduaghan.

This is in furtherance of her passion to assist the less privileged in the society.   We wonder if speeches are not supposed to be made on such occasions.

We are aware of the intentions of the authors and their sponsors but the President and his wife will not be distracted by these specialists of “Pull Him Down” syndrome in the arduous task of moving the Nation forward.

The report also made reference to the EFCC case of which Mrs. Jonathan has since been absolved.

This is a case on which investigation had been concluded and Mrs. Jonathan was not found culpable, but the detractors continue to make a mountain out of a mole hill.

If she had been found culpable, we are certain that Nuhu Ribadu would have charged her to court because she has no immunity.
We want to state categorically that Mrs. Jonathan has no link whatsoever with the seized N104million and has no knowledge of any $13.5 million dollars. In fact there was never an incident of $13.5million dollars.

We challenge Sahara Reporters to contact Mr. Nuhu Ribadu or Mrs. Farida Waziri to get the facts of the matter.

We state without any iota of equivocation that Mrs. Jonathan has no case against her.  She never had any case to answer. All the controversy was a storm in a tea cup stirred up by political mudslingers in her husband’s home state Bayelsa in the quest for the governorship seat.

Her Excellency the First Lady, Dame Patience Goodluck Jonathan will continue to uphold the dignity of the office of the First Lady and will not relent in promoting the well being of Nigerian Women.