Whiteguru:

n d roles she shd playfor christ's sake guys, who even needs a first lady!!!  The office, d role, d pomp n pagentry dat goes wit d office r all unconstitutional!  Shw me in d constitution were we av d office of d first lady.  It all has to do wit ds unwantd, unnecessary duplicatn of roles.  Shee shd go home n take care of ha kids!!!! Women for change ma foot!  Spending billions of taxpayers moneyin trottin arund d country n speakin trash. D hilary clintons n ellen saleaf of ds world did n ride on d back of 35% to leadership positions, they rose with their brains n wits!  So patience should go home n restbb

DeeJay20:

Dude u need to fix-up, why r you soo "hung-up" on this
british accent crap,

STOP MAJORING ON MINORS, !

HER ENGLISH SKILLS ARE CRAP, ! PERIOD!!!

Gbawe:

We can all appreciate that but dont you think Nigeria's image is far more serious than the need to indulge Patience Jonathan ? She is our First Lady yet her position should not make her above reproach . If not a[b] grammatically competent [/b] speaker then she should not speak in public . It is very simple. The rest of us can't be placed on a guilt trip because we don't wan't to hear a cringeworthy error-laden speech from our First Lady speaking in our official language. You forget the days when we had a politicians answer Coke, Fanta ,Sprite when asked the minerals to be found in his State !!! Those who are our visible representatives should present a good image of us . If they cannot do that then they should remain in the background .  The world has moved on. We are in a PR age .

Hi_Tek:

@ Cap28,

Did you actually watch the speech on Youtube or are you going by what somebody told you? I have mentioned that the only place I saw her stumble was in trying to pronounce a South African name. Please point me to any other part of the speech where she stumbled.

The fact that she does not speak with a British accent does not mean she cannot read. Did you hear the following people speak when they were in power:

Murtala Mohammed
Shehu Shagari
Sani Abacha
Olusegun Obasanjo
Umaru Yar'adua

Did you raise similar complaints? If not, you should because they all had thick Northern or Southern Nigerian accents.

lagerwhenindoubt:

It goes without saying - Education must be in the top 5 priority improvement areas in Nigeria. Most times Nigerians over-look signs of impending disaster and choose to make excuses for failure without examining the symptoms and curing the illness. Patience level of literacy (or should i say Illiteracy) is damning. It takes a President who is truly honest to say. This is not good enough for Nigeria- This is not good enough for me. If children are failing WAEC exams at an alarming rate, why blame them when the 1st Lady cannot do any better. One person who struck me as a stark illiterate was factional OPC leader Gani Adams. Look at him today - polished and educated. I watched him give an interview and i could not believe the level of change in his intellect and awareness. What about Synagogue Pastor TB Joshua, these days he can actually give preach rather than spout phrases he has memorized.

If GEJ is fine with Patience, then it is his personal business, When it starts to show up on national and international circles, it becomes Nigeria's business. She must get educated even if it is just basic primary school education

cap28:

she found it difficult to pronounce words like :"participate", "advocacy" and "women"

cap28:


Mrs Jonathan stumbled all the way through the speech, she found it difficult to pronounce words like :"participate", "advocacy" and "women" she read in a painfully slow and hesitant manner indicating that she had no understanding of what she was reading.

cap28:

Right from the beginning my argument has beeen about her inability to read english not her accent.

cap28:

Why can't you accept the fact that Mrs Jonathan has no business making speeches in public in a language which she has difficulty reading and speaking?

ADint:

I[b]So because she is not fluid and articulate in English she should not speak in public?? [/b]

ADint:

She is communicating enough for anyone who is not looking at her with a preconceived judgemental and prejudiced mindset. It was eloquent and articulate people that have always brought the world to its knees, be it through Wars or complex financial manipulation the result of which we are experiencing world wide today.

Krayola:

Haha

I think the real joke/embarrassment here is that some actually believe that being unable to speak English "fluently" is an embarrassment to the country.

What kind of embarrassment exactly is it?

manny4life:

If you cannot speak, YOU CANNOT READ, period.

manny4life:

Speaking very well is the first step to reading very well, speaking lays the foundation for better readers. If you cannot speak fluently, and freely, like let you tongue loose, there is high probability that you will flunk when it comes to reading. Speaking fluently makes good readers; it’s a tried and true learning process.

Bawss1:

YES! It is not compulsory that she speaks in public. Why should she disgrace the country like that.

So since it is eloquent and articulate people who have brought the world to its knees we should now hail the mediocre and terrible public speakers as the new messiahs? A failure of logic I tell you if we reason that way.

It is pitiful that one tries to defend what is apparently an embarrassing condition, the woman should stay away from microphones or if that is unavoidable (which it is not) get first rate teachers to school her in the art of public speaking.

Bawss1:

Please don't tow the stutterer line here, Patience is obviously not one. I bet she speaks her native language fluently however thats not the case here. Her reading of a prepared speech was terrible, it was not because she was born with any speech impediments, that much is clear. Her command of the English language - Nigeria's official language - is very poor so thats why her speech delivery came out all forms of bad.