Olusegun Obasanjo
Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, an ex president of Nigeria,on Friday, relieved his last days with late Shehu Musa Ya’adua at the Kirikiri Maximum Security Prison, and how he turned down an offer by those he called “my international friends” to get him out of Yola Prison using commando style operation.
According to The Nation, Obasanjo who spoke at the commemoration of
the 20th anniversary of the death of the late Yar’adua regretted that
even though both of them strategized on how to move Nigeria forward even
while in prison, their strategy failed, adding that his meeting with
his former number two man at the Kirikiri prison could have been his
greatest mistake.
Former Vice President and one of Yar’adua’s biggest political
associate, Atiku Abubakar who is also the Vice Chairman of the Board of
Trustees of the Shehu Yar’adua Foundation was conspicuously missing at
the event, but his wife, Titi attended the event.
Speakers at the event which included Sierra Leonian President,
Ernest Bai Koroma eulogised the late Tafidan Katsina for his selfless
service to the country, while one of his course mates in the Army, Gen,
Paul Tarfa explained that the coup that toppled Yakubu Gowon was staged
principally against the junta and not aimed at Gowon.
Obasanjo who said he shared a lot of good times with Yar’adua said “When
Shehu died in prison, my international friends decided that they will
use the commando plan to get me out of prison and they actually did make
the plan, got the money and wanted to get an helicopter to get me out
of Yola prison and take me to Cameroon.
“They sent a message to me and I told them, if you do, I will
not get out of prison and that was when they dropped the idea of using
commando effort to get me out of prison. That would have defeated what
we stood for. We stood for Nigeria and we stood to face whatever
consequences standing for Nigeria would cost us. It cost Shehu Yar’adua
his life. Those of us who believe in what Shehu stood for that are at
still alive, the only thing that we can do is to allow the struggle to
continue because we are not at the end of the struggle yet.
“If anything, we are beginning have the struggle. As Shehu said
to his son, we want to bequeath to Nigerians. Our children and our
children’s children a country that we can be proud of. We are not there
yet. May God make us get there.”
The former President told the gathering that Shehu Yar’adua was the best deputy he could ever dream of saying “I
could not have had a better deputy than Shehu Yar’adua. When I was
military Head of State, we had quite a number of exciting and serious
times together that we shared. Let me give you a few of the times that
are interesting and some that are also not very serious.
“One day I had cold and the doctor came to see me and I said to
him, supposing this cold decided to take my life and I slump, what will
you do. He said I will try first aid and I will do all I need to do to
revive you. I said if you tried that and it didn’t work, what will you
do and he said, I will call the Chief of Staff.
“Just then, Shehu came in and I said Shehu, listen to what we
were talking about and I relayed to him the discussion and told him, now
that you have come in, I am here on the ground, what will you do. He
said I have no problem with that, I will kick you with my military booth
and say get up, this is your job.
“We had such an interesting time together. We also had
difficult times together. We had to put our heads together and discuss
on how we can handle the issue of transition, how to implement our own
programmers and how to move Nigeria forward. We succeeded in doing what I
believed was the right thing for the country at that time and putting
in place a democratically el ted government.
“A few years after that, Shehu came to me in the farm and said
he wanted to set up a grassroots party. He said from his study, he has
discovered that Nigeria has never really had a truly grassroots party,
not even NEPU.
“I asked him if there was anything he wanted us to do while in
government that we did not do and he said no. I said then, I pray that
this grassroots part that you want to build will succeed. I asked him,
do .you want to use this grassroots party to get into power, he said not
really, but if that turned out to be the case, will you ask me not to,
and I told him not really, but I will be very glad if that turned out to
be the case.
“Many members of that party have remained loyal to the course
he set out to build. His ideals and what he stood for both when he was
alive and when he departed.”
Obasanjo said Yar’adua lived a life of service, saying “those
of us who know Shehu very well, know the type of man he was, the type of
love he lived, his commitment to his family, to his religion, to his
nation and his friends. When you asked the question, what is life, I
think Shehu Yar’adua’s life typifies the answer to that question.
“He lived his life and gave us eloquent answers about what life
is and that is also evident from what we have seen here today. Twenty
years after he passed on, we are here with his memory still green and
fresh in all of us.”
Sierra Leonian President, Ernest Bai Koroma described the late
Yar’adua as a great African leader who was greatly loved by his people
because he played his part well, saying “we are consoled by his
exemplary life. He was a great patriot. The interest of the nation was
first in his heart.
Former Minister of Foreign Affair and member of the Board of
Trustees of the Yar’adua foundation, Chief Dubem Onyia said the
democracy the country is enjoying today could not have been possible if
Yar’adua had not put in place mechanism for it.
“Shehu believed in a United Nigeria built on people rather than
territory, a country that where you come from or your religion does not
matter. Where our faith and passport matters. He believed that we must
be able to do for ourselves what others cannot do for us.
“His faith and belief in this country is undiluted without
being immodest, no political leader, dead or alive in this country, not
even our founding fathers have ever developed political, associates like
Shehu did. We believe in his ideology and legacy, came together to
establish a foundation that has no comparison in this country.”
Some of those present at the event include retired military
officers, captains of industries, politicians including former Minister
of Finance, Mallam Adamu Ciroma, former Minister of Police Affairs,
Adamu Waziri, former Governors Donald Duke of Cross Rivers and Peter Obi
of Anambra, Mrs Titilayo Ajanaku, Hajia Titi Abubakar, Amb, Patrick
Dele Cole, Gen. Paul Tarfa among others.
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