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Why IBB regrets his place in Nigeria’s history
Former military ruler Ibrahim Babangida has come shy of regretting he annulled Nigeria’s freest and fairest election on June 12, 1993.
He still insists he was a sort of hero in the 1993 debacle, though he admits Nigerians have since dismissed him for playing that role.
Babangida said this during a programme on Channels Television’s ‘Roadmap 2019’ on Monday.
“They say, ‘He cancelled the freest election in the history but nobody gives me credit for conducting the freest election in the country,” he said.
The 77-year-old said he hopes the younger generation would understand why he did what he did back then..
“We try to rationalise why we did what we did but nobody is prepared to listen to us. So, it is a matter of time,” he said.
“One day, the younger generation will say they have heard one side and want to hear the other side of the story.”
He said no one had ever reflected the fact that he and the acclaimed winner of the election, MKO Abiola, were friends before and after the annulment.
“Nobody has ever sat down to say the two personalities are friends, what went wrong,” he said.
According to him, when Nigerians become well informed of what happened within a period of their existence, they will then be able to separate the fib from the fact.
Asked if he would publish his biography soon to tell his own side of the story, Babangida said nobody would read it because of his past.
“People may not read it because it is coming from a dictator,” he said.
” A lot will say, ‘He is the one who cancelled June 12, and that will kill everything that I have to talk about.”
However, he prayed he will live long enough so that he can discuss it someday because he believes people don’t get what we were trying to do.
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