Alhaji Abdulkarim Daiyabu, National President, Movement for Justice in Nigeria, MOJIN, in this interview with The News describes Ibrahim Babangida’s presidential ambition as wishful thinking, a mission impossible to actualise going by his unpopular record as a former military head of state.
Q: Former military president, Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida has finally decided to contest the 2011 presidential election. Do you think his return is good for this country?A: As far as I am concerned, the long time I have known Babangida has afforded me the opportunity to understand him very well. I believe that his much touted presidential ambition is only wishful thinking. It will be impossible to actualise it. In fact, the PDP government’s days are numbered. For the fact that from 1999 to date, what the government generated as revenue is far higher than what Nigeria has ever generated from 1914 to 1999, yet those at the helm of affairs have not in any way affected the people of this country positively. It will be injustice to humanity to allow any product of PDP to get to power again. You can see that despite all the wealth in this country, Nigerians are pauperised to the core, that every infrastructure is out of place including potable water, electricity supply, health care, education. The security of life and property is not guaranteed. And it must interest you to know that Babangida has been calling the shots in PDP right from when it was established. And I tell you, Babangida can never be president of Nigeria again. Nigerians deserve somebody better.
Q: What are the crimes his government encouraged?
A: He introduced systematic looting in government. He encouraged what we today refer to as 419 or obtaining by false pretence. We still can remember Gloria Okon, how she came to die during Babangida’s time when he was using proxies for drug trafficking. We can also remember how Dele Giwa died—the unraveled mystery surrounding his death. Babangida’s tenure as military head of state recorded the proliferation of unprecedented crime and criminal activities.
Q: What other factors do you think may work against Babangida’s presidential ambition?
A: The masses are no longer as gullible as they used to be. They have seen the light and are now wiser. They are against Babangida and his like and are waiting for an opportunity to show their disgust against these looters. So, the major odd against Babangida’s tall dream of becoming president under a democratic setting is the impending venom the masses will produce against him and other looters of the public treasury who are still walking the streets of Nigeria unpunished.
Q: But Babangida’s apologists believe he should be given a chance to come back and correct the past mistakes. Don’t you buy this idea?
A: My friend, if somebody could stay eight years in government only to come back to say he wants to correct past mistakes, he must be very stupid to think that people will trust him—after using public funds to enrich himself and his children—he must be very stupid. The fact that he has succeeded in craftily surrounding his arch-enemy, General Muhammadu Buhari with his agents––the PDP agents and CIA (Central Intelligence Agency) under his payroll––does not mean that the Almighty God is asleep. By the grace of God, we shall win before we die.
Q: Can you recount in a nutshell, some of the socio-economic woes recorded when Babangida was military head of state?
A: Babangida came and met Nigeria with excellent infrastructure economically, socially and politically. We had our structures for agriculture for both rain and dry season and which was the mainstream of the economy of Nigeria but which he appointed General Alani Akinrinade (rtd) as Minister of Agriculture only to destroy totally and entirely these infrastructures that were put in place right from the first Republic. Then of course, he met Nigeria Airways with over 47 airplanes, including Boeing 747, many of them flying everywhere in the world but which are no more—even the name of Nigeria Airways is no more today. It was also during Babangida’s tenure that the power sector got weakened, resulting in mass closure of industries.
So, I must tell you that Babangida must be stupid to think that he has enough charm to hypnotise 150 million Nigerians. I urge the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, to go and dust up Babangida’s looting dossier and prosecute him, before the masses step in and do it their own way.
