Former President Olusegun Obasanjo, on Tuesday in an open letter replied the leader of Pan Niger Delta Forum (PANDEF), Chief Edwin Clark, over allegations of his hatred for the Niger Delta.
Specifically, Obasanjo said Nigeria and Niger Delta demand in Clark, a statesman and not a tribesman, just as he warned the PANDEF chieftain and Chairman, Board of Trustees of the Ijaw National Congress (INC), against deploying “offensive and uncouth languages” to describe his personality.
It would be recalled that Clark had, last Wednesday, hit Obasanjo over what he termed “a disappointing display of hatred against the people of the oil-producing states in Nigeria.”
Indeed, Clark was reacting to a recent outburst by the former President in Abuja, where he reportedly castigated the INC’s National Secretary, Ebipamowei Wodu, at a peace and security parley convened by Global Peace Foundation and Vision Africa.
In an open letter to Obasanjo, titled: ‘My disappointment over your unprovoked outburst against the people of the Niger Delta region,” Clark accused Obasanjo of double standards on resource control.
Obasanjo’s response was contained in a letter dated December 28 and titled, “My response to the open letter by Clark.”
The ex-President noted that some of the words deployed by Clark to describe him “are offensive and uncouth.”
He said: “I have never shown any anger, distraught with Niger Delta region nor any part of Nigeria. Some of the languages you have deployed to describe me in your letter are offensive, uncouth and I totally and completely rejected them. I am not inconsistent, hypocritical, unstatesmanly, and nor am I anybody’s lackey.
“You use your own yardstick to judge others. I fear God and I respect those who respect themselves and I hope it is about time you changed from a tribesman to a statesman of character.
“That’s what Nigeria, and indeed the region you profess to love, demand of you at this stage. I believe one lesson that we all must appreciate that we have all learned in the last 61 years of our independence is that we all need to be civil to ourselves and occasionally put ourselves in the position of others. Bad language does not show prudence, wisdom and maturity. I hope you will think and adjust.”
The former president also clarified that the oil in the Niger Delta belongs to Nigeria constitutionally.
Obasanjo observed that the Constitution did not confer ownership of oil and other mineral resources on any of the regions.
