Guinea-Bissau crisis: Why I was flown to Nigeria with Ivorian aircraft – Jonathan

Former President Goodluck Jonathan has set the records straight on his return to the country after the botched elections in Guinea-Bissau.

Daily Trust had reported how the Nigerian leader, who led election observers to Guinea-Bissau was trapped in the country after the military shut down airports and land borders while announcing a coup.

The House of Representatives had asked the Federal Government to ensure the safe return of Jonathan to Nigeria.

But no sooner than Jonathan landed at Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja, than rumours began spreading that it took the intervention of another African country for the former President to leave crisis-ridden Guinea-Bissau.

Some social media users had even accused the Tinubu administration of slow response to the situation.

“Ivory Coast a country of 86billionGdp saved the former president of the country with 245 billion GDP. The president of Nigeria recently bought a 150billion presidential plane that the National Assembly was ignore for this purchase. At least the president could have deployed one of the planes to help the former president,” Rufai Oseni, a news anchor and social media user, had said.

But addressing the issue during an interactive session with journalists on Friday, Jonathan explained why he was brought back home in an Ivorian aircraft.

“I’ve always been scared talking to the media, but in this particular case, I decided to speak to the media. First and foremost, thank Nigerians for the show of empathy, the encouragement while we’re in Bissau, and this so-called coup happened.

“The information we got was that the whole country was agitated, young and old, irrespective of religious divides or political divides. And I sincerely appreciate Nigerians, and I want them to hear directly from my mouth, to appreciate their concern. And secondly, to thank my president, President Tinubu and the President of Ivory Coast.

“Both presidents were to send aircraft to lift us, but somehow, Ivory Coast is closer to Guinea-Bissau, and there’s always some relationship between Francophone countries, and they were able to penetrate their system to get a landing permit before Nigeria did.

“The Ivorian aircraft was already on its way to Bissau when we learned about the Nigerian aircraft about to depart, so we asked them not to bother.”

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