by Collins Uma

He has also been Heracles, with the unenviable task of cleaning the Augean stable in one day, a mess that existed long before he came. At least that’s how he feels whenever he is blamed for Nigeria’s poor power situation.

There are times he has been Medusa. You challenge him to a stare contest at your own peril. Ask Vincent Ogbulafor, former PDP chairman, and Michael Aondoakaa, former Attorney General of the Federation, both of whom wouldn’t let him become Acting President before David Mark stepped in with that Doctrine of Necessity. Ask Sanusi Lamido Sanusi.

He has also been Heracles, with the unenviable task of cleaning the Augean stable in one day, a mess that existed long before he came. At least that’s how he feels whenever he is blamed for Nigeria’s poor power situation.

He could also have been wearing Don Quixote’s cap when, on January 1 2012, in one ill-advised move, he squandered all the goodwill he had by insensitively announcing that infamous fuel subsidy removal when many Nigerians who travelled for the holidays were yet to travel back to their stations, leaving them to grapple with the sudden fuel price hike and its attendant effects, a move totally lacking in social chivalry.

No matter who Nigerians think President Goodluck Jonathan is, rightly or wrongly, or how he views himself, the fact is that the man has won some very important national battles within the time he has spent at Aso Rock. As he said at a forum in January, “Sometimes when you hear people talk about this government on television or in the newspapers you will think this government is 10 years old, but we are only two years eight months old. By May this year we will be three years old and by May 2015 we will be four years old. And I challenge some of those who criticise without thinking to compare what we have done in the two years eight months with that of any other administration in this country and outside”.

Let’s take a look at some areas the Jonathan administration has excelled in.

Roads

Over 2000 kilometres of roads built or rehabilitated in 2013. The highest in a single year by ANY government. The Abuja-Abaji-Lokoja Express is in advanced stages. Ditto the Vandeikya-Obudu, Enugu-Abakiliki, Ogoja-Ikom, Mokwa-Bida, Akure-Ilesha, Sokoto-Tambuwal-Jega, Lagos-Ibadan, Onitsha-Owerri, Kano-Maiduguri, Enugu-Portharcourt dual carriage, Apapa-Oshodi, and the Benin-Ore-Sagamu Expressway.

Power

The privatisation of PHCN is potentially the greatest thing to happen to Nigeria’s power sector since 1960.

Aviation

Nigeria, under Jonathan, signed the Bilateral Air Service Agreement (BASA) with Israel and, for the first time ever, there will be direct flights between the two countries. The potentials in this will take an entire article itself. All 22 federally-owned airports across the country were also reconstructed or remodelled and five International Terminals in Lagos, Abuja, Port Harcourt, Enugu and Kano were constructed. This is added to the Perishable Cargo ports introduced.

Education

There are, among other things in this sector, nine new federal universities.

1] Federal University, Lafia, Nasarawa State. —North Central.

2] Federal University, Lokoja, Kogi State. ——-North Central.

3] Federal University, Kashere, Gombe State.– North East.

4] Federal University, Wakari, Taraba State. —-North East.

5] Federal University, Dutsin-Ma, Katsina State.-North West.

6] Federal University, Dutse, Jigawa State.——-North West.

7] Federal University, Otuoke, Bayelsa State. —South South.

8] Federal University, Ndufe-Alike, Ebonyi State.-South East.

9] Federal University, Oye-Ekiti, Ekiti State.——-South West.

President Jonathan has also advised the National Economic Council (NEC) to approve the upgrade of six Federal universities to Mega tertiary institutions with absorptive capacity of 150,000 students to 200,000 students each.

Agriculture

The Growth Enhancement Support (GES) scheme introduced by the Jonathan administration is ending four decades of corruption in the fertilizer sector and already scaling up food production by 9 million metric tonnes. Even world richest man, Bill Gates, has described Nigeria’s agricultural reforms as ‘extraordinary’.

Goodluck Jonathan is a man who, as is said in Africa, has had his palm kernels cracked for him by the gods. In spite of all these, nobody, no matter how deluded, can say Jonathan is Midas. Midas was a king who turned everything he touched into gold. Under Jonathan, Nigeria isn’t even gold-plated. He is more of Achilles. Winning in ways that cannot be disputed, like he has done in the South East with the Enugu International Airport, the first in the region in over 40 years, and the 2nd Niger Bridge which has come more than 50 years after the existing one was built. Achilles. With oh that fatal flaw. That heel. In Jonathan this is represented by his inexplicable desire to protect the obviously corrupt or, when convicted, ensure they land on a bed of feathers. It is not only the financially corrupt, like the brains behind the fuel subsidy scam, that enjoy this protection, the sponsors of Boko Haram in Northern Nigeria and terrorists in the South-South are also beneficiaries of the fruits of this weakness.

It is however not too late for this Achilles to get his heel dipped in the River Styx. It is up to him. All he needs to do is to distance himself from the corrupt and encourage the courts to prosecute the accused and mete out appropriate punishments, no matter whose ox is gored. If he does this we will not need a Midas in 2015, an upgraded Achilles would do just fine.

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Op-ed pieces and contributions are the opinions of the writers only and do not represent the opinions of Y!/YNaija.