President Goodluck Jonathan has described as fiction the story that he fell ill in London after a “heavy birthday party thrown to celebrate his 56th birthday” at the Intercontinental Hotel.
The President’s special adviser on media, Dr. Reuben Abati, in a press statement today, expressed regrets that despite the open admittance of the president’s ill health in London, some online organs went ahead to make what he called ” scurrilous distortions of the facts of the President’s indisposition”.
“The truth”, said Abati, ” is that President Jonathan observed his 56th birthday anniversary quietly. For part of the day, he was airborne, in transit between Abuja and London. On arrival in London, he spent the rest of the day in the privacy of his hotel room. It has never been his custom to celebrate birthday anniversaries and no exception was made this year. No birthday party was therefore held for the President in London”.
The statement accused Sahara Reporters and “some other reckless, lawless, impudent and unpatriotic internet-based media of cooking up the ” entirely fictional, malicious, hate-driven and scurrilous distortion of the facts of the President’s indisposition.
The statement does not rule out legal action against the peddlers of the false report.
“As unregulated as they are, Sahara Reporters and their ilk are not beyond the bounds of legal action for libel and willful defamation of the character and reputation of a President who has courageously stepped forward to serve his country. They know very well that they can never substantiate or prove the constant false allegations and innuendoes they publish for the sole purpose of negatively portraying President Jonathan and his administration.
“Their incessant claim of a bibulous President is pure fiction and blackmail, and the product of malicious imagination. We warn that our forbearance of their disrespectful caricaturing of the President is not limitless.
“The Presidency will like to reiterate the trite point that no human being is beyond health challenges irrespective of their station in life. Sadly, this commonplace fact appears to be beyond the understanding of the publishers of Sahara Reporters who seem to have lost all sense of propriety, decency and human compassion.
Abati however said that the President took solace in “the prayers, support and overwhelming goodwill of the people of Nigeria, fully assured that the forces of good will continue to triumph over the forces of darkness in our land.”
He expressed Jonathan’s gratitude to all ” patriotic and well-meaning Nigerians, including his supporters, friends and political associates who expressed and conveyed their sympathies and solidarity with him, through various means, following the announcement of his sudden indisposition while on a mission to attract greater investments to accelerate the growth of the Nigerian economy in keeping with his agenda for national transformation.”
But the statement condemned “the utterly irresponsible, deplorable, highly unprofessional and unethical antics of certain fringe elements operating in the nebulous sphere of cyberspace who persist in seizing every opportunity to unjustifiably malign and impugn the character and integrity of the elected leader of their country.”
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