The immediate past Governor of Plateau State and Senator representing
Plateau North Senatorial District, Jonah Jang, on Monday denied reports
making the rounds that he had a hand in the recent killings that
claimed the lives of over 200 persons in some villages of the State.
Jang denied the claims while speaking with journalists in Jos the Plateau State Capital.
He said, “doesn’t that sound funny that Jonah Jang, a Berom man from
Plateau State, is organising herdsmen to come and kill Beroms, or which
killings are they talking about?
“Over 200 people have been killed in some LGAs including Barkin Ladi,
Bassa, Riyom, Bokkos and Mangu and somebody is protesting in Abuja that
I’m organising the killings, so I’m the one who bought the arms and
gave the Fulani herdsmen to come and kill my people, so that I will be
the only Berom man and my family to leave, what does that mean or does
that make sense?
“I have been hearing somebody making noise on the television and
alluding to so many things, which I have directed my lawyers to write
him, and let him explain or else, he will go and explain in the court.
“But I just want to say that, it is a pity that our politics is turning to be what it is.”
According to the former Governor, “I believe that everything is being
done to find a reason to incarcerate me, so that I will not participate
in the ongoing politics.
“I’m the Senator representing Plateau North, I maybe recontesting the
Senate, I maybe contesting a higher position; that decision is in the
making.
“The PDP is working very hard to win the election on the Plateau and
as a key figure of the PDP here on the Plateau, so there seems to be a
very deliberate plan to get me out of the way, so that I don’t
participate in any of the electoral processes.
“I just want to make it very very clear, that if this is the way our politics is going to be, I’m sorry.
“I was part of G18, G34 that fought for this democracy to come, and
God has given us this democracy, and thank God the G34 formed PDP.
“PDP now nurtured democracy for sixteen years, and that’s why
democracy is stabilized, and now the APC as a party has come, they want
to destroy the democracy by trying to make sure that there is no
opposition, they want Nigeria to become a one party State, and I believe
that this is a subtle way to kill democracy in Nigeria again, but by
the grace of God, it will not happen.
“This democracy has come to stay, and we are going to participate
fully, and no amount of threat would stop us from participating fully,
we are poised to regain power as a party in Nigeria come 2019.
“We didn’t intimidate them, and when they won, we handed over the
government to them, and today president Goodluck Jonathan is being
acknowledged as one of the greatest democrats; he congratulated
President Buhari when it was announced that he won the election.
“They should also wait if we win in 2019, they should congratulate us and handover power to us, that’s the way democracy works.
“But when you think you want to start intimidating opposition so that
you remain in power, it will not work, not in a country like Nigeria,
we are not in a Banana republic. We are a nation of about 200 million
people, the biggest black nation in the world, and every black man in
the world is looking up to Nigeria to set the pace, and I don’t think
this is the way we should go about it.”
Speaking more on the security situation in Plateau and beyond, the
former Governor said, “The security agencies should do their work.
“Year in year out, when I took over Plateau in 2007, the crisis had
been on, for eight years I was struggling the security and everybody to
get this crisis resolved.”
“Again it is on, it has now gone into a wider dimension, we were
talking of Plateau, now we talking of Taraba, Benue, Zamfara, Adamawa,
it is going even down to the Southern part of the country.
“The security must standup and leave up to their expectation, because
if the security is saying the matter has gone above them, then the
President should ask the United Nations to come in, if the Nigerian
security cannot handle it”, he stressed.