Former President Olusegun Obasanjo has lambasted the Awujale of Ijebuland,<\/p>\n
Oba Sikiru Adetona, describing him as a serial liar and a manipulative
\nrumour monger.
\nIn the letter dated December 30, 2016, Obasanjo described the claims made
\nabout him by the Awujale in his autobiography as a tissue of lies and
\nuntruths.
\nIn the book, entitled \u201cAwujale: The Autobiography of Alaiyeluwa Oba S. K.
\nAdetona, Ogbagba II\u201d, the Ijebu monarch had accused Mr. Obasanjo of having
\nused the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission to blackmail and extort
\nduring his tenure as president.
\nThe book was published by Mosuro Publishers in 2010, but the aspect about
\nthe former President was extracted by unknown persons and widely
\ncirculated in the past few weeks.
\nMr. Obasanjo has now written to Oba Adetona, saying his claims in the book
\nand the spreading of falsehood about him was unbecoming of a monarch of
\nhis standing.<\/p>\n
Read Obasanjo\u2019s letter below.
\nAlso posted below Obasanjo\u2019s letter is the excerpt from the book which
\ntriggered the former president\u2019s missive to Oba Adetona.
\nFORMER PRESIDENT OBASANJO\u2019S LETTER
\nDecember 30, 2016
\nHis Royal Highness,
\nOba Alaiyeluwa S. K. Adetona,
\nThe Awujale & Paramount Ruler of Ijebuland,
\nOba Adetona Road,
\nP. O. Box 263, Ijebu Ode.
\nThe extract from your Autobiography \u201cAwujale: The Autobiography of
\nAlaiyeluwa Oba S. K. Adetona, Ogbagba II\u201d, published by Mosuro Publishers
\n2010, pp. 187-195, which I attach to this letter was presented to me for
\nmy attention.
\nYour assertion in the publication was a tissue of lies and untruths.
\nOlopade is one of my best friends and yes, I would be at his birthday
\ncelebration but I would not have invited Mike, your cousin, to meet me
\nanywhere other than my office or official residence as President of
\nNigeria. Kabiyesi, do you think I would set the press up to capture me and
\nMike in a photograph for the newspapers? That would be puerile of me as
\nPresident. Of course, I could not say that Mike could not do that. That
\nyou think that I, as President of Nigeria, would descend to such depravity
\nmakes me think of you much less than I thought of you, until now.
\nThe invitation to Mike to contribute to the building of the Library block
\nof Bells University was issued to him by the then Vice-Chancellor,
\nProfessor Julius Okogie, who never told me about inviting Mike to so
\ncontribute until Mike pulled out. And that I have not and I will not talk
\nto Mike about it should convince you that I know nothing about its
\ngenesis.
\nUnder my watch, Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, was free
\nto do its job as it saw fit. Common sense would suggest that wild rumours
\nshould not be perpetrated by an Oba of your calibre. Kabiyesi, your cousin
\ndid not tell you that My Chief of Staff, Abdul Mohammed, put his
\nreputation on line by assuring EFCC that Mike would go nowhere and they
\nshould trust him to give him his passport. I did not even know that Abdul
\nhad done that until the Chairman of EFCC, Nuhu Ribadu, reported the case
\nof my Chief of Staff seemingly colluding with Mike to run out of the
\ncountry. But I had implicit confidence in my Chief of Staff and I was to
\nresolve the issue. Should your cousin not have mentioned to Abdul who
\nguaranteed the release of his passport his fears and intention to go on
\nexile?
\nOn several occasions, Nuhu Ribadu has asserted that, under my watch, he
\nwas a free agent to do his work as he deemed fit. Where it was necessary,
\nhe reported the outcome of his work to me and the subsequent or follow-up
\nactions he intended to take. On no occasion did I guide, lead or direct
\nhim on what to do.
\nMike did not need to send anything to me to satisfy me, he needed to
\nsatisfy EFCC and so your sending any documents to me was insinuating that
\nI am the one to be satisfied rather than the EFCC. So, such documents were
\nnot paid any attention by me. You, as the cousin and part beneficiary from
\nMike as you have told me in the past, would not be able to see the tree
\nfrom the forest as far as the mode of operation of Nuhu Ribadu was
\nconcerned viz-a-viz Mike. If the EFCC was investigating anybody, I did not
\nconsider it right for me as the President of Nigeria to be undermining
\nEFCC by hobnobbing with that person. EFCC must be given free hand to do
\nits work. Even if such a person was my child, the best I could do would be
\nto secure a good lawyer to handle the matter before the EFCC for that
\nchild.
\nIt is not only in the case of Obajana Cement that you were
\nrumour-mongering about me. You have done that repeatedly on many
\noccasions. The latest one you did in 2016 was you telling me that you
\nheard that I had gone to Rasak Okoya to seek to marry her daughter,
\nAbiola, when it was the girl that came to appeal to me to intervene to
\nplacate and appeal to her father to forgive her for all her misbehaviour
\nto her father. I did and the father and daughter were reconciled. I told
\nyou even then that it was unbecoming of an Oba. Of course, I am used to
\nsuch rumours, slandering and insinuations since my days as a Unit
\nCommander in the Army and I have developed thick skin. If ten per cent of
\nthe rumours ascribing businesses and properties I know nothing about were
\ntrue, I would be the richest man on earth.<\/p>\n
But recently, when Aliko, yourself and myself were together, Aliko assured
\nyou that I never ever had a single share in any of Aliko\u2019s business
\ninterests but whenever he has called on me to help within and without to
\npromote his business interest, I have always helped and I will always do
\nbecause that is part of my job as a Nigerian leader \u2013 to help Nigerians
\ngrow their businesses or interests \u2013 and I have done that for other
\nNigerians and indeed for non-Nigerians, Africans and non-Africans who have
\nrequested me for help.
\nIt was revealing to me on that occasion when Aliko made the point that one
\nof his directors on his cement company is somebody very close to you.
\nI owed nobody any apologies in the course of doing my work as I believe I
\nshould do it or in the course of defending the interest of Nigeria and
\ndefending my integrity. As I could not open the treasury for S. O. Bakare
\nfor your so-called political support to me, I did not regard that as an
\noffence. To the extent that I believed and regarded as proper, I
\ninstructed Tony Anenih as Minister of Works to patronize S. O. Bakare as a
\nPeugeot car dealer. I will not comment on Atiku issue that you touched
\nupon in your book because I have dealt with that elsewhere and you were
\nonly dabbling into an area where and thing you are absolutely ignorant
\nabout.
\nAll that you wanted me to do in respect of Mike was improper whether when
\nI was President or when I was out of office. I must not be seen to be in
\nthe way of allowing law to take its natural course. All I should do is to
\nhelp the course of the law and help secure a good lawyer to help the
\nprocess.
\nIt is of interest to me that Mike did not tell you that when he wanted
\nnational honour, he came to me and I did not react until Babangida
\nrecommended him and said, \u201cOf all those I have helped, Mike is one of the
\nmost appreciative.\u201d
\nKabiyesi, if I have squandered all the goodwill I had, you would not have
\ncontacted me on behalf of All Progressive Party, APC, to receive them in
\n2014 and you would not have been personally present when I received them
\nas I demanded. I probably have greater goodwill today internally and
\nexternally than I had in office.
\nKabiyesi, the total sum of what you have put down in those pages of your
\nbook is that I dislike Mike. Maybe I need to remind you that if there was
\nany iota of truth in such a position or mindset, Mike would not have been
\ngranted the mobile telephone licence which made him a billionaire. It was
\nmy prerogative as the President so to do. You may also be reminded that in
\nthe first round of the auction which Mike did not make, the country earned
\nUS$285 million for each licence. The country earned only US$200 million
\nfrom the licence transaction with Mike and in the subsequent transaction
\nwith Etisalat, the country earned US$400 million. It was a deliberate
\naction on my part that a Nigerian should own one of the licences. Anybody
\nelse but Mike could have been that Nigerian.<\/p>\n
Kabiyesi, the type of hate propaganda you have tried to project in that
\nsection of your book against my person is grossly unbecoming of an Oba let
\nalone an Oba of your status and stature.
\nHowever, I still accord you the respect which I believe an Oba should be
\naccorded and one for that matter who I presume to be a friend. In spite of
\nyour unfortunate projection, my position remains the same \u2013 respect for
\nyou as an Oba and a friend.
\nKabiyesi, I believe that I should set the record straight for posterity
\nand to caution you from engaging in unedifying rumour-mongering and
\nuntruth. Accept the assurances of my highest consideration.<\/p>\n
OLUSEGUN OBASANJO<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Former President Olusegun Obasanjo has lambasted the Awujale of Ijebuland, Oba Sikiru Adetona, describing him as a serial liar and a manipulative rumour monger. In the letter dated December 30,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":52815,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-55320","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-exclusive"],"yoast_head":"\n