16 POLITICS
Sanctity of Truth
Monday, July 7, 2014
16 YEARS AFTER
Onitiri-Abiola: My husband is Mrs. Dupe Onitiri-Abiola is one of the wives of the acclaimed winner of the June 12, 1993 presidential election, Bashorun Moshood Abiola. In this interview with TEMITOPE OGUNBANKE, she speaks on 16 years after her husband’s death, saying Chief Abiola is not resting in his grave because the picture he saw prior to his death is child’s play compared to the present state of Nigeria. It is about 16 years after the demise of your husband and how do you feel about the recent public acknowledgement of Abiola as one of the heroes of Nigeria’s democracy by his kinsman and former president, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, considering that Obasanjo during his eight years in office never honoured Abiola? I believe so strongly that my husband has been vindicated by Obasanjo’s statement, because one thing that everybody in this country knows about Obasanjo is the fact that he says what he means; whatever he says is what he means and you might like it or not. Obasanjo once said that my husband wasn’t the messiah and now he is saying that my husband died for Nigeria’s democracy. The people that annulled June 12 and assassinated MKO Abiola are from Obasanjo’s constituency, the military. So, for him to have said what he said; he must have sat back and had a lot of thinking. What he said is a deep statement, not just a mere one as far as I am concerned. For him to say that, he must have thought a lot of things and maybe he thought that one day he is going to go to where Abiola is and he wants people to remember him for one or two things. June 12 is going to remain in the history of this country, even though the election was annulled MKO Abiola was the president because whether they like it or not, he was the people’s choice.
He was like Ceaser, they stabbed him on the back; people you never thought will do such.
What gave you the impression that your husband was assassinated because the report on his death stated that he died of cardiac arrest? I do not think; I know that my husband was assassinated. I know that for a fact. I said it before he was assassinated that they were going to kill him. When they killed him and came up with the cardiac arrest theory, I told them that there is nothing like that. He was assassinated; they poisoned and killed him. That is the fact and I know it. They can hide it for many years but it’s the fact that he was assassinated. Maybe some of the key players will come out and say it before they leave this world, but if they don’t, somehow it is going to come out. Some people have given different accounts of what happened. I have the real account of what happened but I just refused to say anything publicly because when you get to a point as a believer and Christian, and as someone who believe in Almighty God as God of vengeance, I cannot act to take the position of Almighty God but I know Almighty God is going to act on it.
I know he is not resting; he is turning in his grave because the picture he saw then is child’s play compared to what we have now
Who are those that you thought were actually behind the assassination of your husband? It was the military and there are certain things you don’t do by yourself. The military cannot act without some civilians helping them. And in illing someone like MKO Abiola, you can’t do it alone; you require external influence. So you believe that some of Abiola’s associates had a hand in his death? They know themselves. A lot of people betrayed MKO Abiola; people that he trusted and he believed in betrayed him.
Do you know some of these people and can you mention their names? I just told you that when you hand things over to God; you don’t play any role. It is purely God’s battle and you surely leave it for Him to fight it. They know themselves. Some of them are dead while some are still alive. One thing you cannot take away is the fact that Abiola left his family, friends, allies because of some people. Some group of people did that and they think that his family will cry, while they smile; it is not possible. Their generation till eternity will see sorrow. They will live in sorrow no matter what it is, except they go to Almighty God for forgiveness. What was the experience during the four years that your husband was incarcerated? At that time one believed he was going to come out. The struggle was kind of hard but at the same time one was still determined to see to its end, to make sure the mandate of the people was defended. You know that people trusted him and gave him their man-
date and we believed that this mandate should be defended. During his incarceration, it was like we were going to continue the struggle because it was like he was going to come out. What was your last moment with MKO Abiola like? I remember clearly, June 11, 1994. That was when he did the Epetedo Declaration. It was raining on that day and I got the message that my husband was under house arrest that nobody in the house can come out and go in. So, I left my own house and drove to where he was. As I was driving into to my husband’s house, there was an armoured tank and they said I have to come down; that I can’t go further. I stopped the car and walked towards my husband’s house and I said I have to go in to see my husband. They resisted, saying that there was an order from above that nobody could go in or come out. I told them that I never knew of any law that says that a woman should not enter into his husband’s house. They insisted and I refused to leave; that whatever they are going to do, they should do it. Then it started raining and I got soaked by the rain. When it stopped raining; they said madam you have to go now that the rain has beaten you, but I insisted on entering my husband’s house. When they realised that I was not going to change my mind, they allowedme to go in. When I saw my husband, he said he was writing the speech to make at the declaration and I told him to look outside; that armoured tanks are surrounding the house. He said he didn’t know and asked me what happened. I said I didn’t know; ‘maybe they are here to arrest you or something I don’t know, but now the game is changing; one thing you need to always remember is that you must not betray the people of this country. You have to defend this mandate, you will not go to war, but at the same time you have to defend it. The game is changing right now and I want you to remember the people of this country who gave you that mandate; you might get to the position when you will think of stepping back and throw the mandate away, but you cannot do that because people’s blood is involved now. When Ibrahim Babangida annulled the elec-
Onitiri-Abiola
tion, the people of this country did not come to you; they went straight to the streets and defend that mandate, and there was order to shoot at sight; people were killed but the people believed in
Abiola: The president who never Felix Nwaneri
T
he anniversary of the death of the acclaimed winner of the annulled 1993 presidential elections, Chief Moshood Kashimawo Olawale Abiola, offers renewed opportunities to assess the occasion of Nigeria’s truncated stride towards true and representative democracy. It is equally important because it offers the opportunity to assess the man who has come to singularly symbolise that period of national history. After the painstaking eight year conduct of a transition programme to return Nigeria to civilian democratic rule after nine years of military rule, the then military government led by General Ibrahim Babangida voided the results of the election. His action added the word “annulment” to the Nigerian political vocabulary. Though the election’s result was inconclusive before it was annulled, everyone knew that MKO (as Abiola was popularly known) won. Initial figures released by the then National
Electoral Commission (NEC), showed that he was already coasting to victory, before the military junta directed it to stop further announcement of results from the remaining few states. This prompted Abiola’s insistence that he won the poll although the claim was a subject of debate for years until Prof. Humphrey Nwosu, who then headed the electoral body, set the record straight 15 years later (June 12, 2008), when he affirmed that the Ogun-State born business mogul won the election. Nwosu, in his book Laying the Foundation for Nigeria’s Democracy: My Account of June 12, 1993 Presidential Election and its Annulment, stated that out of the 14, 396,917 votes cast in the election, Abiola, who was the candidate of the defunct Social Democratic Party (SDP), scored 8, 323,305 votes while his opponent, Alhaji Bashir Tofa of the defunct National Republican Convention (NRC) had 6, 073, 612 votes. He further said that Tofa one-third of the votes in 23 states out of the then 30 states in the country and Abuja, while Abiola had one-third of the votes
in 28 states, thereby satisfying the constitutional requirement to be declared winner. According to results of the election published on pages 296 to 298 of the 392-page book, the states which Abiola won included Akwa Ibom, Anambra, Benue, Borno, Cross River, Delta, Edo, Enugu and Jigawa. Others were Kaduna, Kano, Kwara, Lagos, Ogun, Ondo, Osun, Oyo, Plateau, Taraba, Yobe and the Federal Capital Territory. On the other hand, Tofa won Abia, Adamawa, Bauchi, Enugu, Imo, Katsina, Kebbi, Kogi, Niger, Rivers and Sokoto states. Nwosu, however blamed an order by the Abuja High Court which was served on the commission on June 15, 1993, for the inability of the electoral body to release the entire result of the election at the time. Babangida, on his part, years ago explained that he was compelled to nullify the poll because of security threats to the enthronement of a democratic government at the time. He pointed out that the Armed Forces Ruling Council (AFRC) he headed then knew that Abi-