Humphrey Nwosu

Accusations of insincerity and deliberate attempt at foisting selective historical facts have begun to trail last week’s outing of one time recluse former chairman of the defunct Third Republic’s National Electoral Commission, NEC, Professor Humphrey Nwosu. Professor Nwosu is also being accused of allegedly collecting an upfront “settlement” of N150 Million from his former boss, ex-military President, General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida in order to suppress the whole truth surrounding how he was pressured midway into announcing the winner of the June 12, 1993 Presidential election. 

Pointblanknews.com has also obtained the story behind the last minute refusal of former Kaduna State Military Governor, a pro-June 12 activist within the military, Col. Abubakar Dangiwa Umar to make a personal appearance as the reviewer at the formal launching of Professor Nwosu’s book last week in Abuja, and why he is now regretting the forward he once eagerly wrote. 

According to sources Nwosu’s memoir is not a personal rather an “orchestrated hatchet job book”, the writing of which was bankrolled by the mastermind of the annulled 1993 Presidential election, General Babangida, allegedly to the tune of N150 Million.

Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida

Although, initial media reports had quoted Col. Umar as threatening to make a gargantuan disclosure of the leading actors in the June 12, 1993 treachery, he told Pointblanknews.com that he never made any such statement. However, he confirmed that he would do justice to the matter as witnessed by him within the inner military caucus of the time in a book that would be published soon. 

Concerning the issue of backing down at the last minute as the reviewer of Nwosu’s discredited book, Umar said that it was a matter of principle and that his decision has nothing to do with the allegations of illicit N150 Million payment by IBB to professor Nwosu. “I am not aware of the N150 Million payment to Nwosu by IBB and I did not attend the book launch on principle. My book will detail everything anyone wants to know about the June 12 annulment.” 

But highly placed sources close to both IBB and professor Nwosu told Pointblanknews.com that the exercise is part General Babangida’s well known obsession for helming his “legacy” as part of the indelible history of Nigeria. Critics take issues with the wrongful title of the book as misleading because neither Nwosu nor IBB has anything to do with the presence democracy in Nigeria. The book is inappropriately titled “Laying a Foundation for Nigeria’s Democracy.”  The so called democracy in which they were involved was the aborted Third Republic experimentation. 

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Babangida was said to be well aware of his negative niche in the evolutionary history of Nigeria with no good name or good legacy to boast of. He first started by trying to capture the Presidency which he first cornered through bullets and treasonable antics, having failed he is “unearthing paid ideologues like Nwosu to “deliberately distort the living history of Nigeria.” 

Sources hinted that Babangida had secretly met with professor Nwosu first during one his visit to one of the states in the Eastern part of Nigeria and secondly at his Minna Hiltop Mansion. At the two separate meetings, IBB was said to have prevailed on professor Nwosu to embark on the book project as a way of saving him from the unending allegations that he annulled the June 12 1993 presidential election. The choice of Professor Nwosu, according to a source was based on the fact that as the head of the defunct NEC who was yet to make any pronouncement on the annulled election, he stands most credible to make any statement that would lay to rest the blame on IBB over the annulment of the June 12 election said to be the most credible in the history of Nigeria. 

As the source puts it “IBB is very desperate to clear his name from the annulment of June 12 election and he rely heavily on professor Nwosu to do the job.” 

After an agreement was reached on the book, a source told Pointblanknews.com that General Babangida promised to be responsible for all financial implications in the course of publishing the book. The source alleged that IBB agreed to release N150 Million to enable Professor Nwosu who had claimed economic hardship, to begin the process of publishing the book. 

According to the Source, “as soon as IBB and professor Nwosu reached an agreement on the book project, IBB released N150 Million through one of his aides for the book.” 

A well known former Military Governor in the South Eastern State said that “Nwosu must be joking, I mean this guy who was literarily kidnapped by the military and placed under gag and was not allowed to utter a single word for over a decade now coming around to deceive the nation that has given him everything. He owes all his success to Nigeria and for him to want to lie without shame, I think he ought to be arrested and tried alongside his paymaster IBB and if found guilty, he should be shot.” 

A former aide to Chief MKO Abiola, winner of the annulled election, Chief Olu Akerele while accusing Professor Nwosu of laundering the image of IBB said “history and posterity will not forgive him for trying to twist the truth to launder Babangida’s image.

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Those of us who are witnesses to the sordid annulment of the election looked forward to a credible book  on the undercurrents that led to the annulment of the election, with courageous mention of the dramatis personae in the entire saga.” 

According to him, “Nwosu has ended up dashing our hopes. He has served us poison instead of food. What the professor did is reprehensible and I am sure that God will judge him appropriately.” 
 
 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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