Bayelsa State Governor, Honourable Henry Seriake Dickson said only former President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan should take the credit for conceding defeat in the 2015 presidential election.
A statement by his Chief Press Secretary, Daniel Iworiso-Markson, said the Governor was reacting to the conferment of the joint award of ‘Person of the Year 2015’ on the former president by the Leadership Newspaper.
He also used the opportunity to call on Nigerians at home and in the diaspora to always accord Jonathan the respect and honour of a true statesman that he is.
According to the Chairman of the newspaper, Mr. Sam Nda Isaiah, the award was in recognition of the sacrifice made by Jonathan in conceding defeat to President Muhammadu Buhari even before the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) finished collating results of the presidential election.
Governor Dickson also commended the Leadership Newspaper for the honour done Dr. Jonathan and described the former President, as a distinguished statesman of inestimable quality.
The Governor noted that Democrats all over the world would continue to appreciate him for his exceptional display of sportsmanship in the 2015 election as an incumbent president, stressing that, that singular action puts him miles apart from other leaders, within the African continent and beyond.
The award, he said, was well deserving of the former president.
Dickson believes that the action taken by Jonathan saved thousands of lives that would have been lost and kept the unity of Nigeria intact, particularly against the backdrop of predictions of the nation’s disintegration.
