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PMB and IBB

By Ray Ekpu
02 August 2016   |   3:20 am
The relationship between President Muhammadu Buhari and ex-military President Ibrahim Babangida seems to be defined largely by the coup of August 27, 1985. On that day, a broadcaster on morning duty ...
President Muhammadu Buhari

President Muhammadu Buhari

The relationship between President Muhammadu Buhari and ex-military President Ibrahim Babangida seems to be defined largely by the coup of August 27, 1985. On that day, a broadcaster on morning duty at the Federal Radio Corporation of Nigeria (FRCN) Mani Onumonu, had informed us that someone was about to make an important announcement. At 6.15 a.m., a voice roared through the airwaves. The voice called himself Brigadier Joshua Nimyel Dogonyaro of the Nigerian Armed Forces. The voice said the Nigerian Armed Forces had decided to make a change in the administration of the country. As we knew later, the then Head of State, Buhari, was arrested at four that morning. His deputy, Tunde Idiagbon, who went to Mecca for the holy pilgrimage, seemed to be stuck in the middle of nowhere.

A coup had taken place; Buhari’s autocratic government had been overthrown in an efficient and near bloodless operation. From that first announcement, all that was heard was the sound of silence until Major General Sani Abacha appeared on NTA at 3.15 p.m. that day to break that gripping suspense by announcing Major General Ibrahim Babangida as the man of the moment, the man who would from then onwards be in the driving seat of the nation’s affairs.

Chairman Mao Tse Tung, China’s maximum leader, said that power flows from the barrel of a gun. What he didn’t say was that power can also flee with the barrel of a gun. As martial music dominated the airwaves that day heralding the funeral dirge of the Buhari government it was certain that power had flown away from the tall, ramrod straight soldier from Daura.

Now the dominant figures in that power drama, the victor and the vanquished, are giving us an account, revisionist or revealing, of that historic incident. Stay tuned.

On coup day Babangida had said, among other things that Buhari was “too rigid and uncompromising in his attitude to issues of national significance. Efforts to make him understand that a diverse polity like Nigeria required recognition and appreciation of differences in both cultural and individual perceptions only served to aggravate these attitudes.” Buhari has not really unveiled his own perception of the reasons behind the putsch until now. He told The Interview magazine: “I found out that some officers were spending money. I asked: Where did they get the money from? They said it was from the military intelligence fund. Later, I learnt that General Aliyu Gusau who was in charge of intelligence took import licence from the Ministry of Commerce which was in charge of supplies and gave it to Alhaji Mai Deribe. It was worth N100,000, a lot of money then. When I discovered this, I confronted them and took the case to the Army Council. I said if I didn’t punish Aliyu Gusau it will create problems for us. So I said General Aliyu Gusau had to go. He was the Chief of Intelligence. That was why Babangida got some officers to remove me.”

Outsiders may not be able to confirm or contradict Buhari’s account. His account may be correct but it may not be the only reason why the coupists struck. Coup plotters are like a gang of robbers. They have hidden and unhidden motives known to some but unknown to all. They also operate with the ethics of the underworld. Nothing matters to them except the success of their mission. Anyone who stands on their way is a demolishable obstacle. They may dress up their motives in the garment of national interest but hidden under that garment may be some sinister motives. History is often written in fragments and the history of coups is even more fragmented because of the complexity and secrecy of their operation. Every participant seems to know only a small fragment of the operation because by its nature coups are plotted by small groups of people, meeting clandestinely at unexpected times and unexpected places. So the full history of its operation is never in the custody of one man.

Coup plotters are documentarians. They take note of every dissenting voice in the land, every grievance, every protest, every disharmony, every dissonance and form these into a bundle of interrogation points against their target. Buhari’s government was not innocent in many matters. He and Idiagbon wanted to wipe out corruption, graft and indiscipline but the freedom loving citizens who may have subscribed to the substance did not subscribe to the style of the regime.

Buhari’s Decree 4 was war against the press. Decree 4 could punish a journalist for publishing the truth if it affected the reputation of the government or public official. By this decree two of The Guardian journalists, Tunde Thompson and Nduka Irabor, were jailed for one year. It was clear that Buhari did not acknowledge that the press was an important component in the power equation. More sadly, he did not come to the sobering realisation that if he waged a war against the feisty Nigerian media, they would return the favour. And they did.

Kirikiri prison was full at the time with politicians, businessmen and journalists doing an unenviable tour of duty there, courtesy of Lawal Rafindadi’s Nigerian Security Organisation (NSO). Even in bars and restaurants people talked only in whispers in case a security agent was sitting nearby. It was a tyrannical government but tyranny never survives as an unorthodox religion.

Olusegun Obasanjo has constituted himself over the years into a formidable one man government. Whenever he speaks he does so with the predictive authority of an oracle. Obasanjo was unhappy with the Buhari government’s counter trade. He thought it was a way of mortgaging the country’s future and he wrote to Mahmud Tukur, the Minister of Commerce, to say so. He also wrote to his bosom friend, Dr. Onaolapo Soleye who was the Minister of Finance, asking him not to discuss any matter involving Buhari’s government with him. Clearly, there was fire on the mountain of Buhari’s iron-fisted government.

Many people felt Buhari had brought some sanity into the country’s life but they disapproved of the indiscriminate detention of people for long periods without trial and the general throttling of people’s rights. The people may not have wished for a change of government in August 1985 if the government had done things differently, fairly, and with a sense of compassion. The coupists took their cue from the frustrations expressed by the populace over their loss of freedom. Besides, for the period it existed, the Buhari government never talked about returning the government to civil rule, thus raising the fear that it came with the odious philosophy of sit-tightism.

During Buhari’s several attempts at becoming an elected president some people expressed the view that his agenda if elected would probably be to go after those who overthrew him and put him in prison for many months. Babangida would be number one. In November last year, the PDP strategists thought they had found a viable solution to their leadership conundrum: Babangida. They wanted Babangida as their party chairman and presidential candidate for 2019. They ignored his age, his state of health and the fact that in 2011 he had retired from partisan politics. They thought he would jump at the idea of having at his disposal a wobbly machine that he could beat into shape as a ferocious fighting animal in case Buhari wanted to give him a fight. Babangida gave them a polite brush-off and told them he was not interested.

Most reasonable people would have considered that Babangida has had his own share of life’s scary moments and needed some respite: the civil war, the Mamman Vatsa coup and the more dangerous one, the Gideon Orka coup. The nectar of power is seductive but at 74 a man who has survived some of the enumerated vicissitudes would prefer to ease himself into a more serene lifestyle surrounded by grand children sitting on his laps and on his head. Now that he has brought the matter to a closure, the PDP has no choice but to search further afield for someone who can lift the party from the present pit of obscurantism.

I don’t think Buhari wants to go after Babangida. He has had his comeuppance already: He is the President, an elected President, something Babangida wanted but didn’t get. Besides, at 74 he should do his heart a favour by freeing it of ancient animosities.

The details of that coup and of the ones before it, except that of January 15, 1966, need to be unfolded as part of our history. We hope the dramatis personae will give us a more comprehensive glimpse into the history that has brought Nigeria to where we are now. They should not simply tantalise us with the snippets as they have done recently. We want the main menu.

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