The Presidency, yesterday, argued in defence of the involvement of Christian Association of Nigeria’s ,leader, Ayo Oritsejafor in the controversial $9.3m arms deal in South-Africa, clearing him from the case.
Speaking on behalf of President Goodluck Jonathan, his Senior Special Assistant on Public Affairs, Dr. Doyin Okupe, told us in Abuja that Pastor Oritsejafor who doubles as founder of Word of Life Bible Church, had nothing to do with the matter.
According to Okupe: “Most Nigerians do not also respect the sensibilities of other people. Oritsejafor is the President of CAN and Head of all Christians in Nigeria who is representing at least, 50 per cent of people in this country. When it comes to a man like that, people should be cautious and circumspect,” he said.
Okupe strongly warned Nigerians against playing politics with every issue of national concern, saying, they are not good for the nation.
In defence of the revered cleric, Okupe said: “The linking of Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor is the most unfortunate thing; to put the very respectable, responsible, honest and sincere President of CAN in this matter is the extreme of mischief. It just shows you what Nigerians do, they go to any extent to politicise everything and everyday. What bothers me here is the manner with which people want to bring down Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor on this matter. It is pure absurdity,”
“Oritsejafor has no business in this matter. It is true that he owns the aircraft but there are over 200 Nigerians who own jets. Apart from those who use it frequently, some give it out to get some money and defray some of the costs. If you put your jet down, you pay money and parking charges everyday,” he told Us
“He gave the private jet to a company to manage. The company is handing it and these people gave out the plane that is available. What has this to do with Oritsejafor? If I have many cars at the airport and decide to give one to car hire services. And he decides to carry somebody having Indian hemp, and you will link it up with the man who gave it out?” Okupe asked. “ Excuse me, this is ridiculous,” he said.
He also refuted the claims that the matter backfired because the government did not make the deal public before embarking on it.
He noted, “the Nigerian government cannot share all information about the issues because it is a security matter. It is an issue which we cannot just bring to pubic domain. For goodness sake, we need to have some quiet innocent support. I am surprised that Nigerians want to discuss security issues openly and publicly when a war is going on”.
“These are very serious national security affairs and running a government is not the same thing as running Shoprite, where everything is on the table and on display. There is nothing shady about the South African deal and the Office of the NSA has done very well because at the appropriate time, they came in and said, ‘yes, this money belongs to us and this was what it was meant for.’ That explanation itself was okay. There is no hanky-panky on this matter.”
“A company was mandated to do a national security assignment for the Federal Government of Nigeria and because of the extant laws in South Africa, that company was unable to deliver its contractual agreement with the Nigerian government; the company now wants a refund which is normal,” Okupe said.
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