Immigration Tragedy: Jonathan Keeping Faith And Promises

A year after pledging jobs to families who lost loved ones during a deadly recruitment by the Nigeria Immigration, President Goodluck Jonathan finally, handed out money and appointment letters to the beneficiaries.

Mr. Jonathan gave N75 million (N5million to each family) as well as employment letters to families of those who died in the botched exercise.

Fifteen applicants lost their lives in multiple stampedes across job recruitment venues across the country, as hundreds of thousands thronged the stadia used as examination venues, to vie for the jobs.

Each of the families of the deceased was handed a cheque of N5million naira each, while three family members were given employment letters.

Speaking shortly after, Mr. Jonathan said the incident will never repeat itself, “I promise this country that such will not happen again. This will be the last of such things,” he said.

Mr. Jonathan said the money given to the families of the deceased should not be seen as compensation because it cannot replace the lives lost.

As usual this noble feat by the president which has proven that his a promise keeper and a man who is worth his word has become an issue of unsavory propaganda by his detractors and never say gooders.

The declaration to compensate the families of the victims of this unfortunate incident was made about a year ago, a period long enough to be forgotten by the nation and even the one who made such declaration, as is the promise by subsequent governments to declare and not fulfill but only politicise issue to gain public acceptance.

President Goodluck Jonathan has not only shown the people that his government is one that fulfills promises but he has done more to the people's orientation, it has gone a long way to reassure the people about what governance and the ideals of governance should be.

The fulfillment of a year old government declaration is not just a hope booster for the beneficiaries of this gesture but also an assurance for the whole nation to see governance for what it ought to be.

The complexity of the Nigerian Political setup has however thrown up unwarranted propaganda by some political jobbers and opportunists who have without conscious tried to politicise this noble gesture as a medium to score cheap political points.

Detractors of this commendable effort fail to see the morality in the spirit of forgiveness and even the spirit following the compensation and its import in building nationalism and state consciousness, the effort which inadvertently reminds the citizenry of the covenant between the state and the people.

Why is the issue not the action and motive behind the general recruitment? The opposition has trivialise this epoch action to an opportunity to demonise a well-meaning Nigerian,  one whose effort to uplift the Nigerian unemployed from the abyss of penury and joblessness by creating job opportunities.

Why has the unfortunate disaster which was borne out of an honest attempt to better the lot of Nigerian youth become the yardstick to measure the performance of Comrade Abba Moro,  who has proven to be above board in his exceptional performance at the ministry of interior?

Why has the opposition not mentioned the upgrade in our prisons? The state of our borders? The successes recorded by the Nigerian Security and Civil Defense Corps (NSCDC), in curbing vandalism?

Politics should not be the bastion of all activity even in a political dispensation.  Let us all view government action on the basis of what such actions it set out to achieve.  Should the recruitment exercise have employed the number it intended, would these same harbingers of falsehood have accorded the same level of commendation as it has drawn their ire and condemnation?

It has become a tradition for the opposition to criticise all and every government decision not minding its import or value. The opposition have adopted a stance of infallibility when traducers are these accusers themselves, like the bible incident let those without sin cast the first stone.

Written by Jerry Emmanson, Abuja.