Pages

Thursday 27 June 2013

How Babangida Betrayed My Husband — MKO Abiola’s Wife


Dupe Onitiri-Abiola is one of the wives of the late business mogul and politician, Chief MKO Abiola, she speaks with BOLA BADMUS on her ambition to become governor of Lagos State as well as other national political issues. Excerpts:
AS one of the wives of the late MKO Abiola, the acclaimed winner of June 12,1993 presidential election and as somebody also deeply involved in the struggle for the actualisation of the mandate, can you share your experiences with us? 
My husband was not an acclaimed winner, he was the winner and history will take care of that; you know, time will tell. He will be placed in the rightful position as the president of this country. Regarding the June 12 election, when the process started, I was behind the scene, because personally, I am a very private person and I like to remain private. I used to do everything behind, not letting anybody know the role I was playing. But by the special grace of God, I played a very major role at Jos when we went for the convention. Everything that my husband planned at the place worked out, but with the special grace of God, the plan that I put in place was the only one that worked and the entire family benefited from that.

Still, I kept very low profile, very private. I did a lot of campaign and all that for my husband, but the problem was that I kept telling him I still didn’t trust his friend, Babangida, because he had already cancelled few of the processes of moving into democracy. And all the indicators outside at that time showed that he didn’t want to go. He wanted to perpetuate himself in power; he was already seeing himself as a president. You know, a military man calling himself president. That had never been done in Nigeria. A military man as head of state; nobody voted for him. Why did he call himself president?
I asked my husband; was he sure the man wanted to go? He (Abiola) told me he (Babangida) swore to him that he was going to leave and that he was his friend; that he had known him for a long time, that he wouldn’t lie to him. But I still said I didn’t trust him. I did not trust the one that killed General Mamman Vatsa. I said I didn’t trust him; it was under him that we had the Ejigbo crash. I just didn’t trust the one that called himself the evil genius.
He (Abiola) said ‘no, you should trust him.’
They believed my husband was not going to win because they had tried everything. They put out so many things out there, saying so many bad things about my husband; what he did what he didn’t do; and all that and made him look bad.

Do you mean the government of the day then?
Yes, Babangida; they said so many things about my husband’s faults which were the fault of every man; the weakness of every man on earth regarding women. As Jesus said, you cast the first stone, if you know you are not the sinner. If any man can throw the first stone at Mosheed Abiola that he was a womaniser, or that he liked women, let him do it. But the problem was that they escalated it to the point that they were even campaigning at that time that they didn’t want to pick him as president; that if they did, he was going to take people’s wives and all that. You know, the propaganda was terrible.
So, they believed that people were not going to vote for him, but unfortunately for them, the will of God always prevails. The people said they wanted him. They used everything to stop him. They used religion that he was a Muslim and that his deputy was also a Muslim. They used everything, but the problem they had was that my husband was a man of everywhere. 
There is hardly any part of this country that my husband didn’t touch, and that is something most of the leaders, most of the rich people in this country, most of the powerful people in this country, cannot boast of. A lot of them don’t know a lot of places. People voted for Moshood Abiola, not because he had money or anything; they loved him; they saw him on the ground. You won’t believe the villages he would go to, places he would go in this country and he would feel for the people.

When the election was annulled, what was Chief Abiola’s initial reaction?
When he heard about the annulment, he didn’t believe it.

What I mean is that did he not say ‘but you said it?’
Many times I told him ‘but I told you so.’

What was his reaction?
It was like ‘no, it was not true;’ that maybe something was happening around him; that he needed to see Babangida and I said okay. But there are certain things you just feel, just know and they came to pass easily. You can understand Babangida; I studied him, understood him and knew where he was going and where he was coming from. He wanted to perpetuate himself in power. He wanted to be life president of this country like the former president of Togo, Nasingbe Enyadema; that was what he wanted to do.

It was said that the night the election was annulled, Abiola went to see Babangida in Abuja. What message did he bring back?
From the account I have, Babangida invited him and he went with the late Alhaja Kudirat Abiola and his son. And when they came back, my husband said Babangida told him that he wasn’t going to hand over power to him. He said he asked him why he annulled the election. He said Babangida told him that he had to stop it because the boys; the military guys, said they were not going to allow him to be president and that he said if he had continued the process and announced and install him as president, they were going to kill my husband and that they would also kill him (Babangida) for doing it.
He said he asked Babangida ‘why didn’t you put me there and let them kill me.’ He said he was not going to do that because they were going to kill him too. But all that, to me, wasn’t true, because if you study Babangida well, believe me, I studied Babangida, I made it a point of duty to study Babangida and I studied him and you can see that all were a mere charade. It was just all the machinery Babangida was trying to put together to make sure that the remaining people on the way, my husband, Abacha and those few other people that remained on his path were removed.
So, this entire story about ‘the boy’s don’t want you’ was not true because Babangida knew the boys who didn’t want him to stay there perpetually; he moved them out the way.
Under his watch, through the Ejigbo crash, those that were the best of the best of the Nigerian Armed Forces were moved out of the way. General Mamman Vatsa was removed. So many people were silenced and moved out of the way. He knew what he was doing. The last set of people that were going to stop him, Abacha and Abiola, had to go. So, he already had the machinery in place; he knew what he was doing, but my husband told him right there that he was not going to give up or surrender the people’s mandate, except the people themselves demanded that the mandate be surrendered.

Did you also tell him to go for the mandate or forgo it?
I know a lot of people advised him to surrender the mandate; to sign off the mandate, but I, Dupe Onitiri-Abiola, did not advise him to surrender the mandate. The reason was because people trusted him. When he came to me the first time that he was going to contest, I did ask him, why he wanted to contest, because he had already what it took because he was a leader. He said the situation on ground was very bad and it was going to get worse, if nobody came out to do something about it and he said ‘I can deliver. So, this is why I am coming out to help the people, to help the nation.’
So, I said it was okay and he said ‘you know I travel a lot and see how things are getting bad at that time and now, it is worse. I know what to do as a leader to make everything look nice; make everybody so good and feel the prosperity we have in this country.’
So, I said okay. It was about power not because of love for power. I realised towards the end that he meant that it was for the people that he was fighting to get to that position. When people came out and were killed, that changed the whole thing. He said no, that they started shedding blood because the people showed they believed in the cause, and that was why he said he was not going to give up.
So, I also told him he could not afford to give up at that time because he was the leader and had followers and some of his followers had been killed; some of his followers were in prisons and some of them had been brutalized.
In fact, when he was in prison, there was this propaganda they were carrying about that he had already signed off the mandate. I held a press briefing at that time where I said he did not sign off the mandate. I didn’t see him, I didn’t talk to him, but I knew him very well.

Every year, people remember and celebrate June 12 and ask that Abiola be recongised as president. Obasanjo, who was Abiola’s kinsman, became president, but he didn’t declare Abiola president. Do you think it is still possible to declare Abiola president?
It is going to happen; history would do it. Time would tell because he already has his name in the history of this country. And as long as we have the democracy we are having now, which was built on Abiola’s blood; on the blood of a lot of people that were killed in the streets, on the campuses and everywhere, whether they like it or not, they are going to remember Abiola and these people.

Since the death of Chief Abiola, how has the family been coping?
I can speak for myself. You know as a widow, it is not easy. It is only the special grace of God that can help you to continue to survive and be yourself. As a widow, it has not been easy at all.

But Abiola left a lot of money, a lot of properties, a lot of estates behind. Why wouldn’t that help?
As I told someone, my husband was taken away. We didn’t know where he was. Later, we found out he was in Maiduguri before they brought him to Abuja. During that time, that tells you how kind and sensitive my husband was. He actually sent a message that money should still be given out, because he gave out money every month. He gave instruction that the process should still continue even though he wasn’t around. And they brought my share of the money and I told the person that brought the money; ‘why are you people doing the same process?’
He was not at his business places; he was there sacrificing for everybody. So, how come we should not do the same thing? They said no, he said they should continue the same process. And I said no, I was not going to take his money; that they had to take the money back and sign that I did not take it.
So, from that day that he was taken away from his house, till today, my husband’s money in any way, in any form, did not touch my hand. It didn’t touch my hand, not for myself, not for my children.
I was married to him legally. As a wife, I have the right, but I didn’t take anything. I didn’t touch anything of his. My children know we have not taken anything from my husband at all. I did not take a cent from anybody that is related or close to my husband. I decided not to trust man or to look unto man; I just put my faith in Almighty God to provide. In fact, the house that I am living now, he said he was going to build it. He demolished it, he didn’t build it. And I did not go anywhere to ask anybody for help, or say ‘oh please, you have to build this house for me.’ It was not that he decided not to build it; it was because of what happened. Yes, he was already in detention. So, I now thought as soon as he got out of detention, he was going to build it, he started building by doing the fencing. He demolished the main building because it was a bungalow. He demolished it because he said he wanted to build a duplex.
So, after building the fence, he said he wanted to start building the house. We started building the fence during the convention. When we were done with that, there was too much pressure during the campaign. We thought after the election, it was going to be taken care of. I didn’t have time myself; I was campaigning all over the places. At the time, we thought everything was going to turn around, but things didn’t turn around at all. Things started getting worse regarding his mandate. So, I decided I was going to use my money to start building and that was what I was doing, thinking he was going to pay back.

You decided not to take his money while he was in detention; but when he died, there was no doubt he would have a will that you ought to share from. Or were you not mentioned in the will? 
No, one thing about my husband is that I was very close to him and he told me too many things. I know a lot about him. Actually I know about his will. But the thing is that when I got married to my husband, it wasn’t because of his money or anything like that.
Actually, my family members did not want me to marry him because they didn’t want anybody to say to them that ‘oh no, your daughter went to marry somebody because of money. You know, we already have our money from generations past and we still have the money. So, why should we go somewhere and somebody would say it is because of his money.’ So the relationship between my husband and I was not because of his money, never at any time.
My house in London was sold at that time so that the money could be used for all the kids to pay for their school fees so that when he comes out of detention he was going to replace it. I didn’t go back and say you have to buy me another house in London.

Do you have any regret for getting married to Abiola and seeing him die that way?
No. As I told you, it was my destiny and again, this is a man that went through history. I can’t regret that. It is painful, but not regretful. I feel proud because a lot of people could not believe it that he could stand detention for a month. They didn’t believe he could hold on to that mandate; they never believed it, but I knew he was going to do it. I was proud he did not disappoint the people and he did not disappoint me.

Is any of your children taking after the man; have you ever noticed anyone doing that?
As I told you, I don’t discuss my family life, but I can just mention one thing. I don’t know what he (Abiola) had in his mind. He had a lot of children. But you know, he actually named my last child after himself. I asked him, you have had so many children, why are you calling a girl your name? I asked how anybody would call a girl Moshood.

Recently we heard that you signified interest in being the next governor of Lagos State. Can we talk about your political ambition?
I can express myself; that is what we fought for. That was why my husband was killed and that was why I decided to take over the mantle when Alhaja Kudirat Abiola was killed too. The military was gagging us. We have freedom of expression now, even though it is not to the point we want. By the special grace of God, I am going to be the governor of Lagos State in 2015.
By the special grace of God, it is going to happen. It is going to happen not because I was married to my husband.  The equation I am using is that I am from Lagos State and I want my state to be one of the best in the world. That is the number one motivation.
The second one is because I know what my husband wanted to do. I was part of the process. I knew what he wanted to do. I also know there are lots of good people out there that are going to come out if I say I am going to come out now. It is going to give a lot of people the courage; good people will come out not just anybody that doesn’t know anything, who would come to mess up the system.

On which platform are you contesting?
I haven’t decided yet and the reason is because I have to study all of them. First of all, when we were struggling; fighting against the military; when it got to a point that they were not going to release my husband, we started agitating for Government of National Unity and Sovereign National Conference because as of that time, the North had this notion of being born to rule.

No comments:

Post a Comment