Sir, as you mark your birthday today (Thursday, November 20, 2025), I am compelled to write to you this brief open letter of congratulations, while also using the opportunity to reflect on the state of the beloved country you once governed as president, and to ask fellow Nigerians, in the local parlance, "How far?".

Let me begin by saying that while it is public knowledge that you lost the 2015 presidential election to former military Head of State, General Muhammadu Buhari (of blessed memory)—an outcome that placed you as "the first incumbent president in Nigerian history to lose re-election"—it was however a victory for you, in disguise. In reality, especially as things are today, you have been the winner all along. You won over those who branded you with negative names, and above all, over those gullible Nigerians who are yet to see the "Eldorado" promised them by "political magicians and merchants".

Till date, Nigeria is still groping and struggling to recover from the mess created by your successor since your leaving office. The same "innocent Nigerians" who were once cowed by yahoo politicians and who jubilated in the celebration of their defeat (not yours) back then, are now eager for your comeback. But I say "Nay!" They cannot eat their cake and then have it back. Let them revile in the after-effects of their choice. Even those who ganged up against you in betrayal are no better today.

I still recall vividly the Occupy Nigeria socio-political protest movement that began, precisely on Monday, January 2, 2012, in response to the then fuel subsidy removal by your led government the previous day. Fast-forward to 2025, the same subsidy that your opposition referred to as a "scam" has been removed two years ago, and the same so-called Nigerians that made a mockery of your fuel subsidy removal policy lost their voices.

In the aftermath of the Occupy Nigeria protest, doomsday was only postponed. The negative impact in the present after the removal of fuel subsidy is huge, bearing down its burden on those I tagged "victims of a ploy". If only gullible Nigerians were sensible enough to allow your policy scale through back then, by now the effects of its removal might have eased out, and the dividends could have been harvested today. But alas, for the past two years, the hardship went from a state of frying pan to fire, especially for those who are the "vulnerable" in society. 

The lesson of Occupy Nigeria is that citizens need to exercise their brains to think, rather than being swayed by emotion or allow their actions to be controlled by those who are only selfish and can best be described as 'political scammers". Has the average Nigerian learned any lesson yet? I doubt. Because majority are still swayed by emotions rather than "sensible facts".

Your Excellency, your ill-treatment did not end on leaving office; they kept blaming you for the worsened state of a failing economy as if that is the solution to the dilemma of a nation whose leaders believe in triumphing with lies. Nigerians soon got tired of "their fake excuses" and demanded a fix. But is there a quick fix to a cancerous polity whose head is rotten and infested with chronic corruption? Certainly not!

I also recall the abduction of about 276 Chibok Girls on the night of April 14–15, 2014, from the Government Girls Secondary School in the town of Chibok in Borno State, and the episodes that played after. Your administration was taunted as "clueless" and that you were "too weak" as president to act. Even when you did act, it was misconstrued and labelled as a plot to decimate the northern population. Fast-forward to 2025, the same scenario is playing out in the faces of those who earlier had accused you of being "incompetent" in handling the state of insecurity. 

The abductions, kidnappings, and killings of innocent Nigerians have not ended, but increased. Of latest is the abduction of 25 schoolgirls from the Government Girls Comprehensive Secondary School in Maga town, Kebbi State, before dawn on Monday, November 17, 2025, and that of the killing of three persons and the abduction of several worshippers at the Christ Apostolic Church (CAC) in Eruku, Kwara State, on Wednesday , November 19, 2025, adding to the statistics of the rising cases of abductions in Nigeria.

The insecurity situation, despite the procurement of arms and ammunition to counter terrorism, continues to deteriorate to the extent that the power house of the world, the United States of America, threatened to invade Nigeria directly to deal decisively with the wanton killings of "innocent Nigerians" amidst the allegation of "Christian Genocide". Since Donald Trump's threat of invasion, rather than come up with strategies to combat the state of insecurity holistically, the politicisation of the U.S claims has rather dominated the public space. Nigeria is a country filled with blind people, who only gain sight when injustice is meted out on them. But as long as Lucifer dines with them, they will not cast out demons, but defend satanic actions as a "justified necessity". That is the unfortunate state of the country we find ourselves in today.

Your Excellency, as you turn 68 years today, I move a motion on the floor of Nigeria's public parliament for a national apology to be tendered to you. That is the first step to cleanse this country from a self-inflicted spiritual curse. In all that has happened, one thing is certain, which is that those who truly are patriotic are scarce, not those vampires disguised as leaders, but who continue to suck the blood of their people and sacrifice them on the altar of their selfish desire for power, fortune, and fame!

Happy Birthday to His Excellency, Dr. Goodluck Ebele Azikiwe Jonathan GCFR GCON, one of the very few patriotic Nigerians, who once declared boldly that: “My ambition is not worth the blood of any Nigeria”. 

#penglobaldiscourse #GEJ #birthday