Babangida Aliyu is a former Governor of Niger State. In this interview, he speaks on the memoirs of former military president, General Ibrahim Babangida, and why Nigerians should accept his accounts of the June 12, 1993 presidential election, among other issues, ANAYO EZUGWU writes
How extraordinary was it that all these men who carried out coups against each other and detained each other were all gathered in the same room as friends to celebrate IBB?
Certain things do happen not necessarily because you are enemies, but because of the circumstance of the time. And in terms of governance and democratic elections, yes, at the time of campaign, you can say whatever you want to say, but I think you should also be moderate in the way you say it, because of days like this, when you will all come together, and whether you pretend or you say the right thing, at least you are all in one boat at the time.
So, I think one thing to learn also from that meeting is that we must be moderate in whatever we do and that we must also understand that there is a future. I consider that day as one of the luckiest days of my brother, President Babangida. And I’m happy with even the speeches that were made. It shows that we have a future. Nigerians must try to unite.
Nigeria must take care of those who are less privileged because that’s our major problem now. When people are talking of taking people out of poverty, our situation is that people are falling into poverty. So, those are some of the things to consider.
As I said, President Babangida is very lucky that he got a chance after 32 years to be able to say and indeed to apologise to Nigerians for some of the actions that he took. It takes a great man to do that and he had always been one, right from his youthful days.
If you recall, they said he was a prefect, he was a head boy, and gradually up to the president or head of state. That showed a sign that he was ready for the leadership. And like you said, great man, yes and a man of very high consideration.
A man that I have known since I was a small boy. At first when I was invited, I thought I was the most disqualified person to talk because of my relationship with him and the kind of assistance that he has rendered to me along the line.
We may have had some little misunderstanding here and there but I believe that he is somebody that God has gifted with a sense of forgiveness and a sense of generosity. I think he feels bad any day he does not assist people.
Looking at his autobiography titled “A Journey in Service,” how forthright would you say it is?
I’ve glanced through it. So, I wouldn’t say I have read it because I tend to be very critical when reading books like that. And more so, in his case, now that I know some of the issues, I might tend to be more critical.
But I glanced through it, and I think he has been very honest with many of the points that he has raised. He has come straight and the language is also very simple for you to understand and appreciate.
Anybody who reads that book will benefit tremendously in terms of his knowledge and education and understanding the intricacies of the politics of Nigeria. It’s subjective to the extent that there had been information before.
So, whatever he is saying, whoever is writing an autobiography must be conscious of the fact that, particularly in the case that these things are in the public arena.
People have their opinions. People have known the views and the opinions of the particular writer, so they will now look at it more critically than if they don’t know anything about him.
Yes, hard decisions have to be made in developing a country, but the decisions must be communicated properly to the people
He addressed issues like the death of the popular journalist, Dele Giwa; the execution of his childhood friend, General Mamman Vatsa and the annulment of the June 12, 1993 election. What do you make of his views?
That tells you that even in military coups, there are also sections that could be stronger than the leadership or than the president or head of state.
If you read the book, you will discover that he, as a person, did not annul the election, but a section of the military annulled the election but he didn’t go into the details.
Under duress, he had to accept that annulment because he was the leader. If he did not, you know what would happen. Those who were probably involved have been waiting for their chance and opportunity.
So, I guess many people will be endeared to his acceptance of what has happened. He has confirmed that Chief MKO Abiola won and I’m happy that Abiola is now one of our former presidents.
Do you think that by that forthrightness, he has laid those many decades of controversies to rest by telling the truth?
Many people would believe. but some critical minds are not likely to accept this. They will start to give other reasons of why did you not say it earlier on? Or why didn’t you take the bullet at the time if you disagreed.
But they will be very few. For now, at least we have the 32 years that have given us some respite. Now, the truth has come out and I think many people will be satisfied with what transpired.
I wonder how Babangida feels that many years after he left office, Nigeria is still grappling with the same problems he had to grapple with when he was head of state…
You should remember how he left and the invocation or the setting up of the so-called transition committee, which left Abacha as one of the key figures, and which Abacha used also to become head of state and then the subsequent issues.
Somebody said that, sometimes, to make a country or a people develop, you must take the hardest decisions. But the case of Nigeria is that we do not communicate as leaders.
We do not communicate properly with people. We tend to assume that the people know the problems and they know the solution we are offering them.
If you look at most developed countries, apart from the president himself, in the case of the US or the prime minister in the case of Britain, da if you are to quantify the information that comes out from government to the people on a daily basis, you will be so surprised that it becomes almost like a propaganda that you don’t even have a room to argue the issues.
When I tell people that the CNN that we see here is not what they see in the US. People tend to be surprised. And when you discuss with other people in many democracies, you will the level of ignorance because they have confidence in the government and because of the communication that comes from the government on issues that affect them.
But here in Nigeria, we assume. Take for example, the tax issue, everybody knows that after every five or 10 years, the tax law should be reviewed, either upward, downward, or whatever but you must communicate with the people. I expected that’s a major issue that will require the president to speak to Nigerians and then his aides now to continue to explain to Nigerians.
We wouldn’t have gone into all the problems that we have had because it’s only one or two issues that generated all these problems. Even, that could be explained properly in a very sound communication.
So, I think that while we are still grappling with those issues, which one of them is leadership, we should to reinvent the wheels. Whoever comes in tends to do something different and that’s why you have so many abundant projects.
Why is that the case? Is it fear that somehow the other person is going to overshadow what you’re doing, or because it’s continuity?
There is a fear. There is also the concern of how come that person was that popular? Therefore, I thought in my case, I would have loved a situation where you take over from a popular person because then you will understand what he has done to be popular. But not to make him look so bad that you are not able even to do anything for the people.
So, this reinvention of the wheel has become a problem in the Nigerian situation. Yes, hard decisions have to be made in developing a country, but the decisions must be communicated properly to the people.
If you remember during his period, the quality of debates, the quality of discussion that he was so known for helped greatly in educating and in making people appreciate what was happening. Even the most horrible, maybe by the definition of the policy, the Structural Adjustment Programme, (SAP).
Later on, because of the way it was done, even though it was debated, many people did not understand the key aspect of the SAP. But as we went along, many were implementing it indirectly without giving it a name. But again, because of many policies, if it is not done in total, it becomes a problem in itself.
You said you sort of flipped through the book. What were your favourite moments in that book, and what were your disappointments?
Disappointment! I haven’t reached that level yet. But I believe the background information that he had given about himself, which showed how he grew, how he became who he is.
Unfortunately, no two people are the same. You can copy some things about an individual, but you are not likely to be exactly like that person.
Even our children that we have brought into the world, many of them are different from who we are in addition to the background or the socialization processes that we have all undergone.
I have been asked several times; is it true that Babangida has a Yoruba relationship? I say, look, all of us who are from this part of the world, we have one relationship or the other, but I have never heard, and I am related to him in a way. So, there is no way I would not have known that.
You know, but because of that, I think that also has explained to the people to understand. If you go far North, you will see so many Badamasis, which are different from the Badamasi of the Yoruba land.
Given how politically astute IBB is, it could not have hurt him in his relationship with the South-West part of Nigeria…
It has helped him. That perception, too, I believe, helped him in a way. And I would not say he used it, but at least, in terms of policies, you will discover that he was not the type of leader that you will accuse of saying he concentrated in a particular area. If anything, the North might feel like they felt during President Shehu Shagari.
They felt during his time, too. I don’t want to talk about other leaders because we can see either incompetence or misunderstanding or direct nepotism that had played a hand in their relationship. But in his case, you cannot see that
. I think he readied himself for the leadership. If you notice, he avoided all this political leadership of being a governor, of being a minister, and he strictly stayed professional in the military after the chief of army staff.
From your interaction with him, what was the biggest challenge for him as a military head of state?
When you put keeping Nigeria united, fending off coup attempts against him and keeping the country from tipping over from things like poverty and corruption together, at that time, he fenced them.
The coup attempts were there. You’ll notice, apart from the one that touched the late Murtala Muhammed, there are silent ones that sometimes, unless they are announced, the common people will not know that something has happened.
Leadership sometimes requires a lot of that. Not necessarily a lot of blood, but sometimes many things happen. Not because the leader, but in most of the coups, they tried to avoid, at least in the ones that he had been involved, they tried to avoid bloodshed. When you are good and wise, and people are normally afraid of you, when they come, they come strong.
They won’t come like in their case where they have planned the thing properly to remove. But in his case, everybody knew that to remove Babangida would have been difficult for anybody. So, maybe, that’s why they went on strongly in that direction.
He came to power when there were two power blocs in the world, the Communist Soviet Union and the capitalist United States. How did he straddle that fence?
If you noticed the number of people that he mentioned that helped him, he relied on the professors, and many of the professors, were more of the middle road rather than communist or capitalist. And if you notice, many of his economic policies were also on the middle road version.
So, I guess that’s how he avoided and then with the Non-alignment Movement. I mean, Nigeria’s role in Africa, and things like that gave him a room to appreciate what to do to avoid falling into the trap of either the communist or the capitalist.
You can say that Babangida was not a communist. By the definition of socialism, if you mean helping people and trying to make things good for the people, not equalizing, but in terms of equity, then you can call him maybe liberal socialist, if you want to give him a level.
Many people, that’s what they’re saying, that the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), whether you want to say the 16 years was not as good as you expected, but the things trickled down at the PDP government level for the 16 years. And then suddenly, people were keeping to themselves and keeping their things. But now I’m lucky, you know, he’s coming out.
