…One Thing I’ll Never Forget
…Feud with Obasanjo media creation
…My son didn’t say he wants to be governor
Former Military President General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida interacted with journalists as part of the activities to mark his 71st birthday at his Hilltop residence in Minna. Weekly Trust’s correspondent was there. Excerpts:
How do you feel at 71?
You know, all I can tell you now is that I am aging gracefully and it is also an opportunity to try at all costs to think about the best way we could go forward so that we could channelize these virtues of ours towards achieving a greater country.
Supposing you are the president now, what would you have done differently from what President Goodluck Jonathan is doing in addressing the present insurgency in the country?
You should understand that President Jonathan, Babangida, Shagari, Obasanjo, Buhari, or anybody that ran a new or developing country should know that what we are going through now, other countries went through that, but through perseverance, hard work and ability to dialogue, these countries has passed over these problems. So, I think as long as we are ready to learn from our mistakes, we will get there. We went through a civil war and I don’t believe we will go again into a civil war despite the drums that have been beaten. I am not sure that you, the younger generations, will like to go to war that we went through. So, we learn as the mistakes are being committed.
Your government has been the most criticized in the history of this country, how do you react when you are wrongly accused?
To be very honest with you, I don’t consider it to be a problem, because in the last 22 or 23 years since I left office, it is the same sing song either by the media or by columnists and so on. If somebody looks at me and say ‘yes, during his time he likes corruption’, now the question is, in the name of God, aren’t you capable of doing something for the last 22 years or you just fold your arms and wait until somebody does same thing? Look, there had been a lot of governments after I had left government. Or you mean you did not have people who are capable of correcting the wrong which somebody did or you just talk about it and you are satisfied? When we talked, we offered solutions. When my boss, OBJ (Olusegun Obasanjo) and I talked, we offered a solution. Is it not laziness for somebody to sit down and say ‘when they were there, what did they do?’ Ok, fine, we were there, but things were happening, we should not be deprived the right to make a contribution. We have presidents who authorized bombings of some countries, but they are not castigated because they organized this and that, but I do understand that this is Nigeria. We look at things differently, but I come to accept that for every subject you raised in this country, you have as many as 160 million opinions. And if you are hypothetical, people will still not leave you alone.
Don’t you think that the present insecurity situation in the country is capable of affecting political transition come 2015?
Not at all! When I was growing up I was involved in so many things in this country which bordered on what I will call stability of this country. From about 1963 and 1964, we faced many riots like, Tiv riots, Isaac Adaka Boro insurgency and you name it. These are all because we are a developing country, so we went through what we had to go through, but in a different dimension. I participated virtually in every operation from 1964 till I left office, but I was sensible enough to know that every developing country goes through the process that we went through. I believe it is a passing phase in the life of this great country. I once told some students in a unity school that I did not have the pleasure or the luxury of going to a school where virtually everybody is there. From my own observation and reading, what you guys write (referring to media), I want to say that you have not done enough study, you have not done enough investigation to find out the causes of all these problems, not only Boko Haram but even communal strife, boundaries between one tribe or the other, it could be in Akwa Ibom State or some other places, including the problems between some Fulanis and some Gwaris and so forth. Somebody should be able to tell us or do a research of all these conflicts in parts of the country.
Recently, there were accusations that the present security challenges in the country could have been tackled, if national and northern leaders are in one way or the other not behind the insurgency?
It is a democratic society, isn’t it? Those who said northern leaders are involved in the activities of the outlawed organization or that some of us are involved, they know what to do and they should do what they ought to do to help all of us. So, I would ask them to do what needs to be done. Well I am quite comfortable that I said what needs to be said. I said that in a recent press statement, so what else?
Can you please tell us about a particular incident that you will never forget in your life?
In July 1966, when we went through the first crisis, there was a feeling that the leadership at that time, that one part of the country does not want the other and so the best thing was to discontinue, but the most important lesson which I learnt as a young officer then was the fact that despite the relationship we had established with my colleagues when we were in the Nigerian Military Training College, circumstances separated us; I was on this side while they were on the other side of the war. Honestly, what impressed me most was that when we met each other, we don’t look ourselves as enemies; we still remembered our younger days when we were cadets. Political misunderstanding brought us into this war. I have always given this as an example: I had a classmate, he was on the other side while I was on this side of the war and he knew I was there and I knew he was also there. When the war ended in January 1970, we became friends because what had happened had happened. We used to tease ourselves that ‘you were fighting me’ and vice versa. I think the ability to go back to the Nigerian society and still remain as one, I think that was the most remarkable thing we did. Hardly do you find a country that goes through the civil war and still remains the same and this has been about 42 years ago. The credit goes to Nigerians, but as a leader you have to go through certain things in life, sometimes traumatic, sometimes good, but God has been most kind to me.
How is your relationship with President Goodluck Jonathan?
We are in very good terms with President Jonathan. We talked to him, but it is the same Nigerians that we once led and knew very well including one of your colleagues here that said I had never talked about the present insecurity and that I had never addressed the issue because such people had never heard me. I had been accused of not talking and what we said is that the President should take an opportunity of the Ramadan period in conjunction with every other leader both current and former leaders to do something about this country. We should live in peace in the spirit of the season of fasting and prayers. And we thought it is only appropriate that what we are doing is appealing to people on behalf of the government of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
Your relationship with Obasanjo has become frosty over the last one year, but surprisingly you issued a joint statement recently, have you re-united?
People like you would say that formerly I was quarrelling with OBJ and now we are talking, but we knew who we are and there are certain things we shared in common. If there is any man in the history of this country today that does not want the country to be disunited, it is OBJ. I also share the same view with him. So, we have something that is bigger than all the tantrums in the newspapers and the rest of them. So, if we have a common thing which is for the common good of the country, why not? We had been talking and we want to disabuse your minds that we did not sit idle and not doing anything about the insecurity situation in the country.
If truly you are friends, why did the two of you brought your differences to the media rather than resolving it privately?
If I would be honest with you, I think you heightened it and when I say ‘you’, I mean the media. It was very unnecessary. You were supposed to look at what is sensible and write and throw away the nonsense.
Your son, Mohammed, has declared his intention to vie for the number one seat in Niger state …(interjection)
No, let me correct you, he hasn’t, because I read what he said. He said he is very grateful for the people of the state who considered him worthy of holding a new political office. He did not say he wants to be a governor. I am very critical about this, because it affects me and when big headlines stated what you have just said, I called his attention to it and his response was that I should go and read what he said. And he was quoted well.
How can you assess the nascent democracy in the country?
I hate to talk about this, but I can always give you an example. Well, you operate a democracy and I did not, I was a dictator, I removed a governor for N300,000 but no one can remove them now for N3 billion.
Why did you leave late General Sani Abacha behind when you stepped aside in 1993?
If you remember, we had an interim government. That government came into force in November 1993 and it was supposed to expire in February of 1994. We needed to make sure that that government was supported by the military so that they would be able to conduct an election in February of 1994. And we can only do that, knowing the environment in which we operated. We thought then, quite rightly too, that Ernest Shonekan should be supported by a strong military so that the threat of toppling him did not arise. And they provided the stability for 82 days. That was the whole idea. And the late Abacha of course was the Chief of Defence Staff and the Minister of Defence. We felt that if anything happened, the public can be rest assured that there was somebody still there with a lot of strength and experience who would still be able to pilot when it was necessary. But whatever happened subsequently, it was a different thing altogether. You know it as much as I do. It was not the fault of the military.
Is Nigeria ripe for the creation of state police?
When you say ripe, what do you mean? These fears manifested themselves in the 50s and part of the 60s when you had Yan Dokas (native authority police). Why the fear we established in 1950s is it still hunting us, because we are lazy and we have not cared to ask ourselves why these have fears persisted and this is what to do to eliminate those fears in our system. I think this is the way I just looked at it. In other words, left to me, the whole purpose of government is for the security of the citizens like the security of lives and property. And you will do anything to make sure these are guaranteed. It is in order in accordance with our constitution. I don’t want to believe that because of 1959 elections, the police or the Yan Dokas were used to beat up or harass the people who were opposed to the government of the day. We are not in that sort of situation now. Yes, it happened before, why should it happen now? People should try to move forward. When we were in office, we came out with the concept, for example, the National Guards and that was the first thing that was criticized and we had to drop it, but people are coming back to talk about it. It grieves me that because something happened in 1959, why should Nigerians still think it can happen in 2012. A lot of things like the constitutional amendments had been put in place and I am not sure a governor would use the state police to intimidate the people who are opposed to them because the people can go to court and seek redress. However I think the fear being expressed is unfounded to be very honest with you; the Federal Police takes responsibilities of all the federal laws of the country. The police in the state, they have to operate within the law and I hope you know that. So you are buttressing the federal efforts and some people seem to forget something that if you have a state police in a local environment like in Bida in Niger State, the state police are likely to be very conversant with the local environment because they virtually know each other persons. So, the detection of crimes is not going to be a problem. Sometimes ago there were presence of the policemen specifically about two weeks ago and it did not take time to fish out the terrorists gang in Bida, because the people knew where they were hiding. I have advocated for it in the past and I still believe it can be made to work.
Culled from Daily Trust