IBB Legacy

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Jibrin Ibrahim

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Aug 13, 2021, 7:06:47 AM8/13/21
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The IBB Legacy

 

Jibrin Ibrahim, Deepening Democracy Column, Daily Trust, 13th August 2021

 

“Anybody who headed a military regime subverted the wishes of the people… We all subverted the wishes of the people.”

 

Gen Ibrahim Babangida, interview with Tell Magazine, 7/12/98

 

In preparation for his 80th birthday celebrations, General Ibrahim Babangida is back in the news working hard to craft a positive image for himself. In an interview with Arise News, he took up the issue Nigerians have against him – annulling a democratic and credible election. In his words: “Do you want me to be honest with you?... If it materialised (If the election had gone through), there would have been a coup d’état which could have been violent. That’s all I can confirm.” In other words, he sacrificed democracy to stop a coup against his regime – this is the only explanation for his argument that I can see. This begs the real question because he was supposed to be transiting out of power so why remain to stop a coup that would remove him out of power?

 

The real purpose of the interview however appeared to have been to seek to change the memory Nigerians have of him as the President who turned Nigeria into one of the most corrupt countries in the world. To counter the idea, he attacked the current regime led by the same General he had removed from power so he could rule without encumbrance – Muhammadu Buhari: “From what I read, from analysis, I think we are saints when compared to what is happening under a democratic dispensation”, he said. “Today, those who have stolen billions and are in court are now parading themselves on the streets. Who else is better in fighting corruption?”. The message is - Babangida is better than Buhari. Maybe in the next interview, the issue might be that Babangida is better than Obasanjo. My view is that all of them, as coup plotters, subverted the will of the Nigerian people for democracy and we should avoid the trap of who was less subversive.

The Military ruled Nigeria for almost 30 years and has impacted strongly on the country's culture and institutions. Their rule has impacted negatively on society by generalising its authoritarian values, which are in essence anti-social and destructive of politics. Politics in this sense is understood as the art of negotiating conflicts related to the exercise of power. Military regimes have succeeded in permeating civil society with their values - both the formal military values of centralisation and authoritarianism and the informal lumpen values associated with "barrack culture" and brutality that were derived from the colonial army. The contemporary Nigerian elite has been acquiring a lot of "barrack culture" over the period. Why for example do Nigerian elite starch and press their clothing in a very military style? Many within the aging ruling class we have today have spent a lot of their younger days in army barracks - major social centres at that time for sports, discotheques, consumption of alcoholic beverages, gambling and prostitution. Yes, my young compatriots, the elders in power today did all that also. The decline in civility and a rise in violence in social interactions that we have today has its origin in the orientation received under military rule. The specific legacy from the military is therefore neither corruption nor authoritarianism, much as they took both to new heights. The military legacy is the fabrication of a political culture oriented towards the imposition of a command and control structure on the political process that is destroying the residual democratic values that have survived in the Nigerian society.

 

At the time of the 1999 transition, the Nigerian military, serving and retired, was the major segment of the power elite. They occupied the summit of the most powerful organisations in the country's polity and economy. In May 1999, there were forty retired generals in the leadership of the ruling party, the People's Democratic Party (Thisday, 22/2/99). The elected President, General Obasanjo was from the military. Four other retired generals were elected senators - Tunde Ogbeha, Ike Nwachukwu, Brimo Yusuf and David Mark. Others elected people from the armed forces included Senator Group Captain Haruna Aziz, Senator Nuhu Aliu, former Deputy Inspector General of Police and the Governor of Kwara State, a retired army officer. In the economy, many banks and other financial and economic institutions were owned by retired and serving military officers. The military, with its high concentration of corrupt and crass individuals, hedonists and putschists have wielded power for so long and were so wealthy and influential that they became some of the most respected members of their communities and were thus capable of winning democratic elections, which they had guided over a long transition period to be money-based politics.

 

The current generation of Nigerians are young and have no memories of military politics. Let us remember that the Gowon regime sought to perpetuate its rule and repudiated its promise for a quick transition to civil rule after the civil war. It was the Murtala coup that led to the acceptance of the agenda of civil society and eventually to the Second Republic. The Buhari regime that ended the Second Republic sought to impose on Nigerians a clearly military value system - that discipline and force, applied in a military manner could resolve the numerous problems confronting Nigeria. The Buhari regime could be considered to be a sincere attempt to militarise Nigeria and Nigerians abhorred it. Don’t ask me how he came back to power, that is for another day. The negative responses of Nigerians to the culture of militarism created the conditions for the emergence of the Babangida regime, who took the title of <president> and embarked along a trajectory of personal, as opposed to the tradition of collegiate military rule. For example, he dissolved and reconstituted the ruling military council at will and informed his military colleagues of his decisions rather than consult with then in the official decision-making bodies.

 

The Nigerian military transformed the country's body politic in a very significant manner. They entrenched the culture of public corruption established by earlier civilian regimes. It was a major change in the country's political culture, before the military, corruption was corruption - unethical or illegal advantages procured through official positions. Gradually, the military became power drunk and started believing they could generalise corruption and use their monopoly of force to prevent Nigerians complaining about it. The turning point in this regard was Gowon's attempt to prevent the swearing of affidavits containing accusations of corruption against leading members of his regime. Under the Babangida and Abacha Administrations, what used to be known as corruption become the art of government itself. There was a complete prebendalisation of state power and virtually all acts by public officials involving public expenditure or public goods of any kind led to the looting of the treasury. The routine operations of government were subjected to prebendal rules. It was widely known for example that officials of state governments and parastatals had to pay, as they put it, <up front> a percentage of their statutory allocations to the Presidency, Ministry of Finance and Central Bank officials before their allocations were released. They in turn simply take their own personal shares, <up front>, from so-called government coffers. 

 

Secondly, the military succeeded in destroying Nigerian federalism, sacrificing it on the altar of over-centralisation. The military are structurally incapable of running a federal system of government. Their unified command structure is incapable of accepting that a state government, which they consider to be hierarchically subordinate to the federal government, could have domains over which she is sovereign, which as is generally recognised, is the essence of federalism. Nigeria's geopolitical realities have been completely modified. The tripartite structure which had become quadripartite with the creation of the Mid West in 1963, has changed drastically as a result of the multiplication of states whose number, now stands at 36. The multiplication of states has produced a Jacobin effect that strengthens the centre by eroding the autonomy of the states. Nigeria thus finds itself now with a so-called Federation that is for all practical purposes a Unitary State with some limited devolution of power to the states. As we wish the amiable General IBB happy 80th birthday, let’s not forget.

 

 

Professor Jibrin Ibrahim
Senior Fellow
Centre for Democracy and Development, Abuja
Follow me on twitter @jibrinibrahim17

Oluwatoyin Adepoju

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Aug 13, 2021, 7:39:06 AM8/13/21
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Well done.

Your writing recurrently demonstrates true grounding in political analysis though your writing shows blind spots when dealing with negativities from the Muslim North, the region you identify most with.

Thanks

Toyin

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ugwuanyi Lawrence

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Aug 13, 2021, 9:42:28 AM8/13/21
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Let's not forget.You can say that again! 

A 1994 Newswatch edition, cover title that does not  deserve to  be forgotten  in a hurry says -June 12:How Nigerians Were Fooled!

Can anyone spend a a minute to wonder on  what it means to have courage to fool tens of millions of people and what idea of  life and worldview would have led someone to  such thoughts?Can a socio-pathologist  or psycho-pathologist help this wonder?

Honour can only come from honesty and whoever thinks that he or she can be dishonest and yet be honourable at the same time certainly needs a socio-pathologist  or psycho-pathologist for help just as he or she may need a certain kind of  people to achieve such laughable relevance! To be great might in the end depend who calls the other great and why!!


Lawrence Ogbo Ugwuanyi.
UNIABUJA


Ibrahim Abdullah

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Aug 13, 2021, 12:23:13 PM8/13/21
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The original sin again--the ethnic in the Nigerian! 

Emeagwali, Gloria (History)

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Aug 13, 2021, 1:13:58 PM8/13/21
to Oluwatoyin Adepoju, usaafricadialogue
TA,
Where are the alleged blind spots in this account?
Please clarify your comment. I found this to be
a balanced scholarly write-up. What have I
missed?


Professor Gloria Emeagwali
Prof. of History/African Studies, CCSU


From: usaafric...@googlegroups.com <usaafric...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Oluwatoyin Adepoju <ovde...@gmail.com>
Sent: Friday, August 13, 2021 7:21 AM
To: usaafricadialogue <USAAfric...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - IBB Legacy
 

Please be cautious: **External Email**

Oluwatoyin Adepoju

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Aug 13, 2021, 4:10:39 PM8/13/21
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Thanks Gloria.

I was not referring to this account but alluding to others.

In all his acute sensitivity to national affairs I have never read him commenting on the terrorist group known as Miyetti Allah which opened the current climate of absolute lawlessness by recurrently justifying massacres of Nigerians and remaining unquestioned by the Buhari govt.

He would write about the non-factual euphemism of farner-herdsmen clashes and never mention this group, run by the nation's most elite Fulani, never comment on the sheer bloodthirsty absurdity of a group run by elite citizens making itself a terrorist group and being accepted as an arm of govt.

On reading his last post before this one, I was just looking at him, as they say in Nigerian Pidgin, a man telling a story by leaving out big holes in the narrative.

He opened with a factual account of the kind of kidnapping undertaken by the Niger Delta militants, a carefully contained kind , avoiding the general public.

I'm not sure if he mentioned the wave of kidnapping in the South, of some years ago, in which the capture of Evans in the SE was climatic in it's winding down.

He was eloquent on the pervasive state failure now evident but was careful not to trace the links between Miyetti Allah, Fulani militia whom the fed govt pretends is not globally known as one of the world's deadliest terrorist groups, the kidnapping and armed robbery franchise run by Fulani brigands across Nigeria, figures whom their victims consistently identify as Fulani in 90 percent of the cases, figures who are never apprehended by law enforcement, their herdsmen kin who extort entire communities and massacre nationally, a kidnapping business who even have Sheikh Gumi as their spokesman, going and coming from their enclaves even as those enclaves remain untouched by the fed govt which is busy chasing Igboho and Nnamdi Kanu.

Have you ever read Jibrin write about this daylight hypocrisy?

No.

He won't.

He is part of the Mafia like culture that dominates the Muslim North.

I'm happy to be shown articles by Jibrin that prove me wrong.

Thanks

Toyin

OLAYINKA AGBETUYI

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Aug 13, 2021, 8:55:02 PM8/13/21
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Babangida's statement about coup detat had been recounted to the winner Aare Abiola in the struggle for the actualisation of the mandate. It did not mean Babangida would be overthrown.

Aare Abiola said Babangida told him his government would not last six months before it was overthrown.  My Great Aare then said he replied that they would cross that river when they got there and sensing that Abacha was the man Babangida fingered on the coup, he said Abacha would be redeployed to Army resettlement corp where he would not be up to any mischief once he assumed power.  My Great Aare knew his ' friend' did not want to relinquish power and was acting on behalf of the powerful Kano mafia led by the likes of Maitama Sule who turned deaf deaf ears to entreaties by his Majesty, the late Ooni Sijuwade ( Àbú gbangba bí ękùn- He with the tiger's roar!) who was his erstwhile business associate.  Thus the departure coup was mounted by losers like Maitama Sule  ( and to some extent the late Shehu YArAdua) who were humiliated in the business world by the likes of south westerners like Aare Abiola and Kabiyesi Sijuwade with whom they could not compete in straight business acumen except by stealing state funds by the barrel of the guns.  YArdua ( the preferred ex-military successor) confessed to Newswatch he appealed to Babangida to help him with a business grant to fight his rigged elections rumbled by Arthur Nzeribe ( the head of state who was supposed to be the neutral umpire, creating parties without loyalties to any political juggernaut.)  This was why the main goal  of Abacha on assuming power was to create a northerner of Abiola's stature in Aliko Dangote, beholden to the Kano mafia for whom Abacha was the post- Babangida arrowhead as Maryam Abacha tangentially revealed in an interview bemoaning how the Kano Mafia deserted her husband in death.

Thus it was Babangida who deliberately created the groundwork of the post military ex military dominance of the civilian polity in which he and Obasanjo rank among the wealthiest billionaires in the country.  I have no doubt that when El- Mustafa said he knew who orchestrated the murder of Aare Abiola in captivity and paying people off, after Useni got rid of Abacha; the only person capable of that reach in the Armed forces and with an axe to grind with my Great Aare is none other than the master of infamy Ibrahim Babangida.  Only he would not be prepared to face the prospect of an Abiola walking alive free from gaol to confront him about his treachery.  He then went to orchestrate the release of Obasanjo from prison to give the impression there was no ethnic agenda behind his machinations which was to create an exclusive northern ruling class to which all others were beholden for patronage

I have said on this forum Aare Abiola in the run up to that election fired a broadside at Babangida that if he Abiola had been dipping his hands in the till ( as Babangida did)  he would not be where he was then.  Babangida had no reply to that challenge.


OAA



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-------- Original message --------
From: Ibrahim Abdullah <ibdu...@gmail.com>
Date: 13/08/2021 17:31 (GMT+00:00)
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - IBB Legacy

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The original sin again--the ethnic in the Nigerian! 
On Fri, 13 Aug 2021 at 11:39 AM, Oluwatoyin Adepoju <ovde...@gmail.com> wrote:

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mb4383 (null)

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Aug 14, 2021, 10:15:37 AM8/14/21
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“I, therefore, did not have a house in Lagos. I didn’t bother to get one in Kaduna and still I am not interested in getting one in Abuja, because I haven’t got the means. Even in Kano after the coup, I had no house, except the mud house, where I was born and lived with my father. That was the house I went back to after almost seven years living in a palace in Lagos.

“From the palace house in Lagos, I went back to my mud house in Kano and started racing with rats and mice again (general laughter). But the interesting thing is this: when I was sending my family home after the coup, I had no money, I had to borrow money from my permanent secretary and a friend in Lagos. I had to hire a lorry to carry my goods to Kano. I had no bank account then, no bank account anywhere in the world. And I came back to Kano to live in that mud house.”

Maitama Sule 


On 14 Aug 2021, at 10:01, OLAYINKA AGBETUYI <yagb...@hotmail.com> wrote:


…  Thus the departure coup was mounted by losers like Maitama Sule   could not compete in straight business acumen except by stealing state funds

Oluwatoyin Adepoju

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Aug 14, 2021, 10:16:00 AM8/14/21
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On second thought, this characterisation by me is rather strong-

''He is part of the Mafia like culture that dominates the Muslim North.''


true, terrible things are happening in relation to which those whom one should expect to speak are not speaking up.

it would be helpful, though, to hear those people's own side of the story of why they seem negligent in the face of an inferno devouring a collective home.

thanks

toyin


OLAYINKA AGBETUYI

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Aug 14, 2021, 6:34:16 PM8/14/21
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That confirms my take on Maitama Sule, who was quoted to have told IBB that he should not because of mere friendship yield to pressure to cede power ( which Sule permanently thought should be kept in the North.)


Another report quoted Maitama Sule as saying during Abacha's dictatorship that Aare Abiola should not be allowed to leave captivity alive for the simple feat and crime to unseat their front man and demanding that the wishes of Nigerians be respected. 

 So fearful were they of Aare Abiola at large that he could  undo any dictatorship that they concocted the ' final solution' for him.  All out of jealousy that he was more successful than they were and chose to side with the people.

And how did Maitama Sule afford to live in a palace in Lagos?, his interviewer ought to have asked him.

Whatever Maitama Sule was doing in Lagos for SEVEN years, if he had no bank account how was he paid?  By  stuffing a pillow with currency? Shameless liar!


OAA



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From: "'mb4383 (null)' via USA Africa Dialogue Series" <usaafric...@googlegroups.com>
Date: 14/08/2021 15:29 (GMT+00:00)
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - IBB Legacy

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“I, therefore, did not have a house in Lagos. I didn’t bother to get one in Kaduna and still I am not interested in getting one in Abuja, because I haven’t got the means. Even in Kano after the coup, I had no house, except the mud house, where I was born and lived with my father. That was the house I went back to after almost seven years living in a palace in Lagos.

“From the palace house in Lagos, I went back to my mud house in Kano and started racing with rats and mice again (general laughter). But the interesting thing is this: when I was sending my family home after the coup, I had no money, I had to borrow money from my permanent secretary and a friend in Lagos. I had to hire a lorry to carry my goods to Kano. I had no bank account then, no bank account anywhere in the world. And I came back to Kano to live in that mud house.”

Maitama Sule 


On 14 Aug 2021, at 10:01, OLAYINKA AGBETUYI <yagb...@hotmail.com> wrote:


…  Thus the departure coup was mounted by losers like Maitama Sule   could not compete in straight business acumen except by stealing state funds
OAA



Sent from my Galaxy



-------- Original message --------
From: Ibrahim Abdullah <ibdu...@gmail.com>
Date: 13/08/2021 17:31 (GMT+00:00)
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - IBB Legacy

Boxbe This message is eligible for Automatic Cleanup! (ibdu...@gmail.com) Add cleanup rule | More info
The original sin again--the ethnic in the Nigerian! 
On Fri, 13 Aug 2021 at 11:39 AM, Oluwatoyin Adepoju <ovde...@gmail.com> wrote:

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