TheCable

Former President Goodluck Jonathan has revealed how the late Kenneth Kaunda predicted his election. 

Jonathan was elected president of Nigeria in 2011.

Delivering a speech at the second Kenneth Kaunda memorial public lecture in Pretoria, South Africa on Saturday, Jonathan said the deceased issued the prophecy in 2006 when he visited Bayelsa state.

Kaunda, who was the first president of Zambia (1964 to 1991), died on June 17, 2021.

According to NAN, Jonathan said though he was the then governor of Bayelsa, he never harboured the dream of becoming Nigerian president.

“My political journey was not the one which attracted much attention from spiritual leaders and seers because many then could not see me playing notable roles in the national affairs of my country, since I was not active in partisan politics back then,” Jonathan said.

“However, I must say it now that Kaunda in the early days of my political career, captured my political trajectory to the presidency in an accurate prophetic revelation that has continued to amaze me till this day.

“In 2006 when Kaunda had ended his visit to us in Yenagoa and was returning to Zambia, I remember seeing him off to the Port Harcourt airport in neighbouring Rivers state.

“As he stood up and was about to board a vehicle that would convey him to the aircraft, he turned back and said to me, ‘young man, you will be the president of this country one day’.

“Myself and my secretary to the state government (SSG), Amb. Boladei Igali who was with me, simply looked at each other in amazement, because the presidency was never in our dreams, at that time.

“Farfetched as these words seemed to me then, I later saw his prophecy fulfilled in my life within a decade.

“So I can say that KK was the man who saw tomorrow as it related then to my political future and fortune, as I eventually became the president of my country.”

Jonathan also said his political trajectory, in certain ways, mirrored that of Kaunda.

“I am glad I made that happen without any contestation in the interest of peace and sustainable democracy,” he said.

“Let me end by saying that Dr Kaunda’s political profile as a leader and pan-Africanist experienced varied fortunes, but in the end, he refused to be defeated and lived his life to show others that politics is about the people and that there is life after office.

“He was a man of the people right to the end of his ripe old age of 97 years when he passed on.

“This is what I am learning from him as I continue to devote my time to the pursuit of peace, good governance and sustainable democracy in Africa.”