Some 32 years after the debacle of the June 12, 1993, presidential election battle through which he stays the villain, Common Ibrahim Badamosi Babangida (IBB)’s account of his eight-year stewardship in a memoir has not solely raised extra questions than solutions, it has set raised mud on the actual purport of the ebook. On one hand, his self-documentary about participation and contributions to shaping the nation’s trendy historical past are commendable.
Nevertheless, coating the nationwide narrative in calculated handy truths reveals much less regret for apparent notorious roles and extra of a backdoor strategy to rewriting a nationwide historical past. If the ebook was meant to place the information straight, it’s controversial and seemingly an afterthought. If it was designed as an apology to a nation with its “Hope ‘93” dashed in a brutal and everlasting method, the ebook is timidly low in esteem. It bears little point out that the ebook presentation itself ought to have been a day of nationwide mourning than certainly one of celebration of a best-forgotten rape of democracy, with reverberating pains nonetheless felt so far.
After many years of hiding in close to oblivion, the previous head of state, Babangida, took the nationwide area by storm. This time, to not once more shift the goalpost of democratic transition or annul a free and honest election with panache, however to current his autobiography, titled: A Journey in Service. The 440-page ebook of 13 chapters led the readers to fulfill the characters that made and formed IBB’s gene into changing into the genie he turned and nonetheless nurturing at 83.
The twelfth chapter, which is devoted to the June 12, 1993, saga, is essentially the most controversial and has expectedly set tongues wagging. Therein, IBB, with the advantage of readability that usually accompanies hindsight, stated: “Wanting again now, the June 12 saga was undeniably essentially the most difficult second of my life and, in sure respects, some of the painful. If I needed to do it throughout, I’d do it in a different way.”
For a reality, IBB’s eight years in energy, also called the Babangida Period, is notorious as some of the controversial in Nigerian political and army historical past, particularly characterised by a burgeoning political tradition of manipulation and flagrant absence of transparency. As we speak, a baggage IBB tries to clarify away is the extended transition dribbles, banning and unbanning of politicians, and the routine alterations within the transition programme.
Whereas he believes he was exorcising demons within the previous politicians to create a brand new breed of civilians and bequeath a brand-new nation, the nation noticed an effort dissipated at self-succession in energy that went awry. Curiously, he nonetheless finds it handy in charge the political class that has, for 3 many years of the post-IBB period, persistently accused him of polluting the fashionable political panorama. General, IBB, through his autobiography, lets readers into his Machiavellian world of management and his naivety — going by his account.
Notably, although belated now, he admitted that Abiola received the June 12, 1993, free and honest election with a large margin. That report is already within the public area and never new. Nevertheless, what’s new to readers is his blaming of Abacha and others for the annulment simply after admitting accountability for annulling the election and wishing to have achieved issues in a different way. The battle in taking accountability and concurrently pointing accusing fingers at one other individual is palpable, and can’t be simply wished away.
First, his buck passing to Abacha and his clique, in a veiled self-exoneration, is grossly unhelpful. Why after 32 years, and when Abacha is useless, and can’t reply? Who’re the individuals averse to Abiola’s victory and presidency that he (IBB) needed to succumb to their alleged risk and captivate their annulment marketing campaign? Is it not true that whereas some officers won’t have rued an MKO Abiola’s presidency, for no matter causes, many different senior army personnel had nothing in opposition to him and certainly, canvassed for the expression of the want of Nigerians as demonstrated in that close to flawless June 12, 1993 polls? Ought to IBB have allowed the whims of some officers, regardless of how extremely positioned they have been, to override the desires of tens of millions of Nigerians?
Common Babangida admitted that the first purpose of his authorities was the transition to civil rule, which he spent seven years making ready. Nigerians spoke loudly on June 12 as a becoming coda to the groundwork amid the winding preparation flaws. So, how is it believable {that a} handful of army personnel in the identical administration led by IBB have been permitted to override the one voice of Nigerians and that of the top of state to stage a daylight theft of the folks’s mandate? How is it attainable that he, for eight years, failed “to firmly safe the help and agency dedication of my army colleagues to the Transition programme from the start”? Above all, on condition that the unity of Nigeria has by no means been extra pronounced than it was on June 12, IBB can not exonerate or exculpate himself for the everlasting dent he inflicted on that unity together with his annulment.
Secondly, IBB’s narrative on the powerbroker that Abacha allegedly turned in his authorities and his (IBB’s) professed helplessness in upholding the folks’s will, showcase extra cowardice that belies the braveness of a army Common or an IBB in his heydays. That inconsistency, if not self-duplicity, suggests extra of an afterthought that’s fairly damaging for his half-hearted apologies for the calamitous repercussions of the annulment. Or was it a case of a deft manoeuvrer who constructed a Frankenstein Monster bent on consuming him up or sending him on retirement?
As a window into Nigerian historical past, the ebook is rather more than a file of IBB. It makes it instructive for posterity. It turns out to be useful in deconstructing and reconstructing the nation and its myths and theories. Readers should, nonetheless, learn it fastidiously and never a gospel fact. IBB has led us into his worldview as he sees it and as most handy. We should learn it conscious of human limitations at self-indictment or disparagement. Nigerians have to be cautious of the historical past of Nigeria, particularly as advised by politicians and political officeholders.
Nonetheless, what number of Nigerian leaders – together with those that graced IBB’s ebook presentation – could be brave sufficient to desk their stewardship accounts for public scrutiny shortly after exiting the privileged management place? It resonates with our collective lack of transparency, forgetting that public workplace should stay public and by no means a personal property of the political class. Ideally, no individual with an unknown pedigree or a imprecise previous deserves to guide Nigeria into its future.
Lastly, the gathering on the ebook launch and its attract communicate volumes about Nigerian society and its organised decadence. Minus the political class which might be beneficiaries of the June 12 struggles, not many Nigerians on the receiving finish of these darkish days of army rule and bloody civil unrest of the June 12 battle may have variety phrases for the ‘celebrant’. Amongst these Nigerians are households that had their family members killed or maimed into everlasting disabilities and are nonetheless traumatised by injustices which have by no means nor will ever be assuaged. Not one was talked about, nor was a minute of silence noticed of their reminiscence!
The assemblage suggests one meant to assuage dangerous emotions and grievances and to make sure that any individual isn’t requested to account for his deeds and misdeeds to keep away from justice. It’s, due to this fact, commendable that among the victims are actually stepping out to problem IBB for the atrocities perpetrated beneath his watch, no less than to indicate that public officeholders can nonetheless be held accountable on this a part of the world. Regardless of the final result, these martyrs and victims stay the true heroes and heroines of at the moment’s democracy. And no quantity of veiled apologies, calculated lies and half-truths in afterthought memoirs, nor gathering of traducers and vultures, will exchange their place – in addition to these of their tormentors – from Nigeria’s nationwide consciousness and historical past.
