By Iliyasu Gadu, Ilgad2009@gmail.com
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On June 9, 1998 the day he was to be retired from the Nigerian Army by late Military Head of State General Sani Abacha, fate instead intervened to make General Abulsalaami Abubakar the Head of State when Abacha mysteriously passed on.
Before then, General Abdulsalaami endured a torrid time under his boss. His was under round the clock surveillance physically and electronically by the hyper paranoid Abacha. The decision by General Abacha who had survived several coup attempts to sack top military officers of which General Abdulsalami was top on the list was to enable Abacha advance his plans for transmuting from military to civilian President.
But it never happened and what we do know was that General Abdulsalami took over under inauspicious times for Nigeria following the death of Abacha. And the situation was made even more so when a few months after, the assumed winner of the June 12 elections Chief M.K.O Abiola, who was in detention then, also died mysteriously.
It was under these tasking circumstances that General Abdulsalami as Head of State steadily guided the ship of state and implemented a transition programme that returned the country to civil democratic rule under a year in 1999.
Thus the civilian democratic dispensation we practice today was mainly due to the steadfastness and principled commitment of General Abdulsalami. Up until the time of his, had fate not intervened, General Abacha who was in absolute and unchallenged control of the military and political process in Nigeria would likely had succeeded in his plans to transform himself from military to civilian dictator. Most of the political elite then had shamelessly and opportunistically caved in and some of them were even collaborating with Abacha in his plans to throw the country what was certainly a potential political crisis. Others in the name of fighting for democracy had cowardly turned tail and scampered to their bolt holes abroad living it up and sending news releases of their ‘’struggle.’’
It was General Abdulsalaami who opened the political space and allowed those who were cowering in fear in Nigeria and those who cowardly fled abroad to return and participate in the democratic process. The General literarily had to walk through the valley of the shadow of death to restore democracy in Nigeria, thus making it possible for political parties and their candidates to contest and win the elections, ushering the new civilian democratic dispensation we are now in.
General Abdulsalami is a demure man. He is not given to flippancy and garrulous self- glorification about his sterling role in the restoration of democracy in Nigeria. He has not talked publicly about his travail under Abacha as Chief of Defence Staff. He has not even granted interviews about the enormous personal and official pressures and challenges he encountered while trying to keep his promise to return Nigeria to civilian rule.
He has not talked about pressures mounted on him by some opportunistic political players to renege on his commitment to install democracy within one year. Nor has he talked about pressures by some of his closest colleagues and others at large to ban certain politicians with heavy political and moral baggages from participating in the political process. If he had succumbed to such pressures, certain political figures strutting around the political stage today would not have made it.
However behind the demure outlook of the Infantry General however, lies a keen, sharp mind especially as regards political and social developments in Nigeria. As a soldier and statesman who had faced and been involved in some of the most trying challenges in this country the General had cause to recently lament of the current situation of hardship in Nigeria when he hosted the Niger State branch of the Campaign for Democracy in his Minna residence.
He said: ‘’The hardship in the land is getting out of control. Everybody is crying of this hardship and it seems to be getting out of control. People cannot afford three square meals. The issue of transportation, the hike in fuel, the hike in school fees for the children and the lack of funds in everybody’s pocket is making life difficult for everybody.’’
General Abdulsalaami’s statement was not made out of context. Many top Nigerians have made similar statements on the situation in the country. The latest of such high profile statements came from Iba Gani Adams, the Aare Ona Kakanfo of Yoruba land who carpeted President Tinubu and pointedly told him to review some of the harsh policies in order to avert a looming social catastrophe in the country.
These statements are not mere idle talk. They represent the real situation in Nigeria under President Bola Tinubu. I recently gifted a senior civil servant five thousand naira rather hesitantly because I thought the amount was too small for a man of his status. I was however surprised when teary-eyed he told with the money I had given him he was going to purchase grits from maize flour and mix it with ‘’kulikuli’’to serve as meal for the next three days for his household. This is as graphic a reality as it is under the Tinubu administration which General Abdulsalami talks about.
Whatever aura President Tinubu came with has now evaporated. An overwhelming number of Nigerians do not now believe or trust his words of exhortation that his ‘’economic reforms’’ such as it is, will improve Nigeria’s economic situations which has brought more poverty in the land than he met. And it is made worse by the fact that President Tinubu is neither a listening nor empathetic President.
His arrogant and inappropriate replies to the statements by General Abdulsalami, Aare Gani Adams and Nigerians generally who are suffering under his harsh policies was: “There are no free beers anymore.’’ Apparently the only ‘’free beers’’ available now are exclusively reserved for him, his family and his ‘’Baba so pe” flunkeys who dare not to tell him the true situation of things in the country he has laid low with a year of his assuming office as President.
If a personality as esteemed as General Abdulsalami and who is not given to flippancy can come out and voice his mind in the manner he did on the true situation in the country, then we need not be told that President has lost it. The wheels of his rickety wagon of state have all but fallen off and President Tinubu is for all practical purposes drifting along aimlessly on his own.
Across the country without exception, President Tinubu has become a figure of contempt for his double standard of vainglorious ostentation and self-entitlement while subjecting Nigerians to a life of penury and deprivation.
When statesmen like General Abdulsalami throw caution and practised discretion to the wind to make such telling interventions on existential issues in the country, then President Tinubu is better advised to take heed. This is the simple, plain truth contained in the message of the General.
Iliyasu Gadu, a former Foreign Service Officer who served at the Nigerian Missions in Germany and the United Kingdom (UK), is a columnist with Daily Trust
