Who Leaked President Buhari's Speech - Reuben Abati Speaks Out

Former Presidential Spokesperson to Former President Goodluck Jonathan, Reuben Abati, has revealed that the person who is in charge of signing off on President Muhammadu Buhari's speeches should be held responsible for the leakage of his speech on Monday. 

Abati said it was his job then, as the Special Adviser to Jonathan on Media and Publicity, to sign-off on all speeches of Goodluck Jonathan.

Today, Femi Adesina is holding the same office held by Abati five years ago, being the spokesman to Buhari. The two of them are experienced journalists. Discussions about President Muhammadu Buhari's Monday's speech being in circulation before the President read it have dominated the social media space.

Many described as unethical and breach of trust, the fact that President Buhari's speech was already trending online, even before the President appeared for the live broadcast.

Speaking on the matter in Arise TV this morning, Reuben Abati said those handling the same office he held till 2015 should be blamed for the gaffe. He said there are protocols for drafting and releasing the speech of the President.

According to him, after the speech must have been drafted, it is given to the President for corrections and inputs, after which the approved copy is signed off by an appointed person.

He said during his time, he used to be the one signing off Jonathan's speeches; adding that speeches never leaked out under his watch.

Abati stressed that there should be an aide who monitors the President as he reads his speech, for likely adjustment that may be made by the President at the point of reading; saying the aide will quickly adjust the draft copy so that the one that would be sent out won't be different from the one read by Mr President.

“Somebody will be on standby, who will be double-checking the speech, if the President adds anything while reading, he corrects it immediately. So that what goes out at the end of the day is exactly what the President delivers. It's a very difficult job, but as I said, somebody drops the bulk, and that can be investigated. That should not happen again. Because if you compare the draft with the original copy, the draft has 44 paragraphs; they even got the paragraphing wrong. And the other copy that came out has 54 paragraphs.

“This is a question of administrative error and they will take their lessons from it." Asked if it means the President's speech was hacked, Abati vehemently disagreed.

“Nobody can hack the President's speech. There's a process in place. Someone is to sign off on the President's speech. If they don't have that then they should find somebody who signs off. Somebody must be responsible. We are talking about the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. It couldn't have been a hack. Somebody made a mistake. What kind of a nonsense hack is that?

“When a draft speech is written, it goes through a certain process. Then the President looks at it, he makes inputs. You don't release it until the President himself has delivered it or towards the end of broadcast. I don't want any explanation that doesn't make sense. You know that was my job at a point in time." Abati emphasised