This is the story of how former President Olusegun Obasanjo
and former Vice President, Atiku Abubakar, first met, and how their
relationship blossomed before nose-diving over political ambition. In his
soon-to-be released auto-biography, ATIKU ABUBAKAR, THE STORY OF MY LIFE, it is
discovered that whereas Obasanjo appointed Atiku as his running mate in 1999,
there are pieces of information before that fact to suggest that the former may
indeed be indebted to the latter.
Below is the complete exclusive report:
He was arrested on March 13, 1995. But before Olusegun
Obasanjo was picked up that day,
he had been forewarned. It was the second
meeting between one Atiku Abubakar, then known as a politician who made massive
waves during the Social Democratic Party, SDP, presidential primaries held in
Jos, the Plateau State capital – the SDP primaries took place in March, 1993,
some two years earlier.
That day, Atiku (who is one of the few Nigerians identified
by their first name) visited Obasanjo at his Temperence Farm, Otta, Ogun State,
in the company of Oyewole Fasawe, a mutual friend and business partner of both
men. They were there to forewarn Obasanjo about a possible impending arrest in
connection with a coup plot.
In a rare snippet by Vanguard into the soon-to-be-released
autobiography of Atiku, it was found that, contrary to the generally held
belief that prior to the politicking of 1998/1999 which produced the presidency
of Obasanjo/Atiku, both men had never been close; it came to light that their
relationship dated back to 1993. In the book, ATIKU ABUBAKAR, THE STORY OF MY
LIFE, Sunday Vanguard discovered that Atiku had, indeed, gone to the same Otta
for avuncular consultation with Obj,as Obasanjo is fondly called.
Just some weeks before the landmark June 12, 1993,
presidential election, Atiku, who withdrew at the last minute in the run-off
primaries to allow for Bashorun Moshood Kashimawo Olawale Abiola gather some
gravitas against Babagana Kingibe, visited Obasanjo. His request was simple:
“Please prevail on my boss, Shehu Musa Yar’Adua, to support the presidential
bid of Abiola at the general election”.
Although Vanguard could not confirm whether Obasanjo indeed
prevailed on the elder Yar’Adua to support Abiola, Obasanjo’s statement during
the crisis that trailed the disputation over the election, to the effect that
“Abiola is not the messiah” betrayed the workings of the mind of the former
President.
The second meeting between both men, according to the book
on pages 247 – 248, is reproduced, verbatim, here: “The United States
Ambassador to Nigeria, Walter Carrington, picked up the information on Obasanjo’s
impending arrest. He immediately alerted the former Head of State who was
attending the UN social summit in Copenhagen, Denmark. Obasanjo returned to the
country, confident that he had not committed any crime.
Atiku had also been tipped off about Obasanjo’s impending
arrest. “He went to the retired General’s farm in Otta, Ogun State, to alert
him. He had hardly finished speaking to Obasanjo when the divisional police
officer in Ota arrived with some plain-clothes security officers to arrest
Obasanjo. “What has he done? What is his offence? Is this the way to pay him
back for the services to the country?”
Oyewole Fasawe, who was with him at Otta, emembered Atiku
asking the security agents as they led Obasanjo away. “I had never seen Atiku
so angry as he was that day. He was ready to fight them if we had not
restrained him”, Fasawe recounted. Atiku and Fasawe left Otta to break the news
of Obasanjo’s arrest to many prominent Nigerians. “Obasanjo’s arrest and
detention brought closer international attention to the reign of terror in
Nigeria”.
Obasanjo was tried for being part of the coup plot against
the maximum dictator of the time, General Sani Abacha; he was sentenced to life
in prison. Owing to international pressure, this was later commuted to 15 years
– the pressure came from friends abroad, including South Africa’s Nelson
Mandela, former US President, Jimmy Carter, and former German Chancellor Helmut
Schmidt.
After his sentencing, Obasanjo was taken to the SSS (now
Department of State Services, DSS) Interrogation Centre in Ikoyi. From there,
he was moved to KIRIKIRI Maximum Security Prison alongside Shehu Musa Yar’Adua.
But something happened there as you would discover later.
Mind you, the recent controversy over character, leadership and integrity was
ignited by Obasanjo at the 4th Annual Ibadan Sustainable Development Summit
organised by the Centre for Sustainable Development of the University of
Ibadan, an engagement in collaboration with the African Sustainable Development
Network.
The former President, characteristically, waxed pontifical
when he declared that the younger generation of leaders under 50years has
betrayed the nation because they lacked integrity. He mentioned the likes of
Atiku, whom he said he picked as his deputy but was soon to “show his true
colour”.
Obasanjo also took on Bola Ahmed Tinubu, referring to his
controversial scholarship and academic qualification, insisting that it was not
different from the scandal which led to the removal of Speaker Imam Salisu
Buari in 1999. However, what Obasanjo did not mention was the fact that he
fought tooth and nail to retain Buari as Speaker of the House of
Representatives, even in the face of Buari’s glaring folly of claiming what he
was not. Back to Atiku! Obasanjo launched a sweeping diatribe against Nigeria’s
younger generation of politicians whom he accused of lacking the integrity,
character and credibility to lead Nigeria to progress and development.
According to Obasanjo, he didn’t know Atiku well enough and
that the former Vice President had not met his expectation as a credible
successor. Now, at the risk of holding brief for the former Vice President, the
questions are:
Is this claim altogether correct? Was Obasanjo trying to be
economical with the truth? What degree of familiarity was Obasanjo talking
about? At what point did he realize his knowledge of Atiku was not comfortable
enough? Did he complain to Atiku at any point that this lack of familiarity
could disqualify the former Vice President from succeeding him? What degree of
personal familiarity could qualify a politician to be nominated to become a
running mate to a presidential candidate of a political party?
What is the length of time needed by one politician to trust
another? Did Obasanjo not invite former governor of Rivers State, Sir Peter
Odili, to Aso Rock Presidential Villa for morning prayers after which the
former broke the news to the latter that he should drop out of the presidential
contest?
Could all those Obasanjo bullied out of the presidential
contest be described as lacking integrity too? As earlier stated, contrary to
Obasanjo’s claim, he and Atiku had met twice closely before 1999.
In any case, pray, Could an enemy have visited an adversary
to warn him about the imminent risks to his life or freedom? Could an enemy
also have extended such goodwill fraternal visit? How many years would an
individual need to know a man who had wanted to put him out of harm’s way? Yet
again, destiny played a fast, very fast one on both men.
Vanguard learnt from very authoritative sources that Atiku
it was who arranged for and warned Obasanjo, as an inmate (a prisoner), not to
allow himself to be injected or his blood taken. Sunday Vanguard gathered from
very impeccable sources that “this warning became necessary following confirmed
reports that the late Major Akinyemi and Shehu Musa Yar’Adua were both injected
with lethal viruses that eventually led to their untimely deaths”.
In fact, dependable sources close to the family of Major
Akinyemi confided in Sunday Vanguard that the sentiments being expressed in
favour of those who operated at the very top echelon of the security machinery
of the late General Sani Abacha junta is misplaced because the officers devised
very sinister ways of eliminating those they considered as troublesome
subjects.
In the instance of Akinyemi, the now infamous military
medical doctor through whom a series of eliminations was carried out, walked
into his cell in the company of another serving military officer and demanded
to extract blood from the incarcerated Major. He refused. They pressed him.
“But he maintained”, according to a source close to the family, “that he had
neither complained of any ailment nor was he afflicted by any. His refusal
almost led to a scuffle.
But the serving military officer simply looked outside the
cell, nodded to two body guards who were waiting in toe, and gave them
instructions to subdue Akinyemi. “Worse still, rather than extract the
so-callled blood from the Major, the military doctor brought out a syringe that
was almost filled with some form of solution. Having been held down by the
bodyguards, the doctor injected the Major”.
Vanguard was made to understand that it was later learnt
that the solution injected into the body of Major Akinyemi was nothing but the
Human Immuno-deficiency Virus, otherwise known as HIV. By the time the Major
was released from prison, it had developed into almost full-blown Acquired
Immune Deficiency Syndrome, AIDS. He gave his life to Christ afterwards and began
a ministry which ministered to prisoners. Sunday Vanguard was told that during
one of his ministrations, Major Akinyemi returned to Kirikiri where he again
met with the serving military officer who superintended the administration of
the lethal injection on him but was now doing his own time.
The officer saluted Akinyemi in military style and
apologized for what had happened about a decade earlier. The Major was said to
have laid his hands on the now-jailed officer, prayed for him and told him that
he was forgiven of the dastardly act.
It was gathered from multiple sources last week that had
Obasanjo “not heeded Atiku’s warning, only God knows how they would have dealt
with him too”. At least, if they could do that to Yar’Adua, they could do it to
anybody. God used Atiku’s to save Obasanjo’s life”, the source concluded.
Beyond that, however, Sunday Vanguard learnt of the details of how Atiku and
some associates engaged a strategy that ensured that Obasanjo was moved from
Kirikiri Prisons in Lagos to far away Yola Prisons.
The thinking of those in the corridors of power at that time
was that Yola, considered distant, would serve a more punitive purpose.
However, what Atiku and his people actually schemed was for Obasanjo to be
close to the former’s base in Yola, Adamawa State.
Indeed, there were reports that there was a systematic
engagement strategy that was perfected by that regime to eliminate known
opponents of the military junta.
According to mutual friends of both Atiku and Obasanjo, the
claim by the latter that he did not know the former until a year into their
tenure of office is equally beyond comprehension, considering the facts as
written in at least two earlier unchallenged books that Atiku and others made
life easier for the former the President in his stay in prison by arranging his
meals and doctor’s visits. Obasanjo’s late wife, Stella, was said to have been
privy to these arrangements.
In truth, Atiku got ever closer to Obasanjo in 1999 when his
Peoples Democratic Movement, PDM, threw its weight behind Obasanjo to become
the PDP presidential candidate. Obasanjo invited Atiku to become his running
mate immediately after the Jos convention of the PDP.
He sought reassurance from Atiku that he would be loyal if
he made him his running mate and the Turaki Adamawa, who was then a
governor-elect of Adamawa State, pledged his allegiance. Perhaps, Obasanjo
should have told Atiku that loyalty included supporting constitutional
breaches. Indeed, Obasanjo, in a self conceited manner, junked an earlier
consensual agreement by leaders of the PDP on how to select his running mate,
by unilaterally picking Atiku.
The beginning of the distrust between both men started with
the botched impeachment attempt on Obasanjo – an attempt which was alleged to
have been masterminded by Atiku.
Then came Atiku’s politics of attrition which dragged into
the eve of the presidential primaries of the PDP sending jitters down Obsanjo’s
spine when he threatened to contest for the ticket against his boss – Atiku
actually set some state governors against Obasanjo and the agenda to dump the
then President almost succeeded. But the third term agenda of Obasanjo in 2006
brought their mutual disdain into full public glare. Atiku openly disagreed
with his boss over the attempt to extend his constitutional term limit of eight
years.
It remains plausible that any other Vice President could
have faced the same hostility from Obasanjo once he had opposed the idea of the
third term project.
The man Obasanjo
Obasanjo has his qualities. Here was a man who has
accomplished much more than most African leaders. Here was a man who, while the
great Nelson Madiba Mandela was in prison, bestrode the African continent and
the globe like a colossus.
Here was a man who, as co-chair of the Commonwealth Eminent
Persons Group, EPG, a journalist had thought he could embarrass Obasanjo by
accusing him of bias in the report of the group sometime in the late 1980s,
citing Obasanjo’s nationalisation of British Petroleum, BP, (which became
African Petroleum, AP), but got more than what he bargained for.
Obasanjo’s response was simply that had he seen and known
what he saw and got to know during the tour by the EPG, while he was a military
head of state, he would have done more to hurt the British. That was the end of
the discussion for the journalist.
Again, here was a man who could have refused to hand over
power but did so – even if under duress – to the consternation of his peers in
Africa in 1979.
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