Former President Goodluck Jonathan has strongly denied the reported statements credited to Governor Rochas Okorocha of Imo State that he was offered a bribe by the former president ahead of the 2015 presidential election as part of efforts to enlist his support.
Jonathan said this in reaction to the specific allegation that he offered “huge sums of money and an influential ministry” to Okorocha in order to make him abandon the All Progressives Congress (APC) for the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
Jonathan insisted that there was no such encounter between the two men, adding, that it could only have happened in Okorocha’s dream.
The former president made his views known in a statement through Ikechukwu Eze, his spokesman.
The statement read, “We offer to quickly dismiss these claims as lies, because we are clear in our minds that such conversation never happened. “We are wondering whether this truly came from the governor because we are sure that even governor Okorocha himself did not believe that anybody would accept these claims.
The statement read, “We offer to quickly dismiss these claims as lies, because we are clear in our minds that such conversation never happened. “We are wondering whether this truly came from the governor because we are sure that even governor Okorocha himself did not believe that anybody would accept these claims.
In the first place, it sounded irrational and absurd. Besides, it was obvious to all and sundry that the south-east, being Dr. Jonathan’s political stronghold, the ex-President did not need Okorocha to win in the zone. However, to set the records straight, we make bold to say that former President Jonathan never made any contact with Okorocha, ahead of the 2015 elections. All those who had either worked closely with him in any capacity, or served in Jonathan’s administration can bear testimony to the fact that idle talk is not his style.
Since we know that the only proof the purveyors of this bribery allegation could offer is to probably claim that the transaction happened in a dream, we can only offer the governor sincere advice, to avoid rumours and twaddle, and get down to the business of result-oriented governance. Governor Okorocha would have served his state better, if he directed his enormous drive to creating growth and development opportunities for the good people of Imo state, rather than allowing himself to be drawn into dissipating his energy on platitudes and propaganda”.
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