Chief Edwin Clark
A former Minister of Information, Chief Edwin Clark, has pledged to work with the President-Elect, Maj. Gen. Muhammadu Buhari(retd.).
He said he will support him the way he supported the late President, Alhaji Umaru Yar’Adua.
Clark stated this in a congratulatory message sent to the President-elect, who contested the presidential election on the platform of the All Progressives Congress against President Goodluck Jonathan of the peoples Democratic Party in the March 28 presidential election.
He said, “I congratulate you and reassure you that as you get to commence the process of peaceful transition and government, you will have my full support, as a man who strongly believes in the unity of Nigeria, just as I supported our most respected late President, Umaru Yar’Adua, and his successor, President Jonathan, as along as you will, at all times, uphold the dignity of Nigeria and those things that bind us together as one united country.
“Remember that part of our old National Anthem, which says, ‘Though tribe and tongue may differ, in brotherhood we stand.’
“This was exactly what the late Nelson Mandela of South Africa stood for, and the late Martin Luther Kings Jnr of the United States of America fought and died for.”
He said he was happy that the President conceded defeat, an action, he said, disappointed the nation’s distractors, both within and outside the country.
These unnamed enemies, he said, had thought that the result of the elections would not be accepted by any of the two major contestants and thereby create a chaotic situation in the country.
If this had been done, he explained, the action would have satisfied those prophets of doom, whmo he said felt there would be no more Nigeria after the 2015 general elections.
Clark however insisted that every citizen of the country must be treated equally and should also be respected.
He said the minorities of the South-South region had supported and worked with every government in Nigeria, and that they waited for 50 years before it pleased God to make of them the ruler of the country.
He said he and the people of the region remain grateful because of this.
Clark said, “We remain grateful for that and no one has faulted the majority ethnic group for ruling over the years.
“This is the principle I have always stood for and supported. But some people misunderstood me.”
OLUSOLA FABIYI
