In Defence of Shehu Shagari

By

Umar Tsauri Abdullahi

OSGF – Abuja

umarabdullahikd@yahoo.co.uk

Most often I do come across vexatious articles like the Friday 14^th September treatise by Malam Adamu Adamu at the back page of daily trust, but for two reasons I never brought myself to commit pen to paper even when the urge was there. One, I am a civil servant and likely possible of running foul of beurucratic mood; two, I always believe that the people who were the butt of such abuses were quite capable of defending themselves.

Today I am writing not because I have overcome my fear, but because the credibility of such a mendacious accusation deserves the reply of those privileged, to straighten things. 

I was not only privy to the meeting in question, but was equally privileged to know some things that probably Adamu Adamu does not know, and if he does, that further worsens the case he was trying to protect.

I would like to make it clear here that what ever might have been the reason  behind Adamu Adamu’s write-up, he has done more harm than good, by that write-up not only to his principal, in this case General Muhammadu Buhari, but to his reputation as a writer and the North he was presumably trying to protect. I do believe that crass mischief rather than democracy was the reason for this ill conceived and un informed write up.

It is unfortunate at this age, when the general catharsis was that of celebratory mood, mindless the faulty process, and the re engineering of a holistic commitment towards the gradual building of regional blocks of interest buffeted by years of divide and rule, coupled with regrettable poor political arithmetic, that somebody seen as a literary icon in the North will seek to make a mince meat of personalities that symbolize all the goodness about Northern leadership; simplicity, honesty, forthrightness and frugality.

According to Malam Adamu Adamu, people like Shehu Shagari were in cohoot with all the evil that Obasanjo represented and were never seen near Atiku Abubakar at the time of his desperate need, when he as the northern representative in the Obasanjo government, was the victim of executive highhandness and other political rascalities. All this because according to Adamu Adamu, Shehu Shagari and Yakubu Gowon alongside other notables were trying to prevail on General Muhammadu Buhari to drop his court challenge of the 21 April polls against President Yar’adua.

I was at the venue of the meeting referred to by Adamu Adamu and I can not remember sighting him near or around the place. If he was, then he wouldn’t have been so unfair as to accuse General Gowon of being part of the meeting when in reality the General was in far away Lagos preparatory to his departure to U.S.A. Probably his only crime was the fact that President Shehu Shagari used his house as the venue for the meeting and the General’s food was served to the visitors. It is noteworthy to note that President Shagari has no house in Kaduna. In any case, the meeting could have taken place in Buhari’s house if not for his objection to the use his house for that purpose.

What Adamu Adamu did not know is the fact that Shagari, the parliamentarian he referred to, has his strong feelings towards and against Obasanjo on both regional and national matters and he was never pusinallimous about that, but like military President Babangida said, as somebody with access to the corridors of power, he had other ways of communicating his feelings rather than resorting to the gallery. This I am sure General Buhari knows, and inspite of Adamu Adamu’s closeness to General Buhari, if he had discussed writing the said article with him, certainly he wouldn’t have written it, because Buhari would not have allowed an abuse against somebody he holds in the highest of esteems.

In 1992 I was discussing with General Buhari generally on affairs concerning the nation and he made one statement that has remained in me all years. According to General Buhari, in Nigeria there are three people he does not understand. These people are Tafawa Balewa, General Gowon and Shehu Shagari. This, according to him was because, history as a judge has so far not been fair to these Gentlemen. One is always confronted with barefaced lies against these people as if there is nothing impressive about them, but on getting to know them well, one will get to know that they are among the best stock that humanity has endowed Nigeria with. They were selfless to a fault and honest beyond abuse. That history he was in 1992 referring to is the world symptomatic of Adamu Adamus of this world in 2007. As far back as 1958 Shehu Shagari was a cabinet minister and to the time the same Buhari overthrew him in 1983 after being president for four years and three months he had only sixty eight thousand naira in his account. What name can you give to such a man?

In an attempt to hoodwink the gullible and walk logic on its head Malam Adamu not only abused the respect I used to have for his intelligence, but went further to rubbish any modicum of intelligence that his mentor General Buhari possessed. The write up was more against the service of Buhari than to his service. Imagine the reason adduced by Adamu Adamu that President Shagari called for that meeting simply because he never wanted to see Buhari as president being the person that overthrew him! What kind of infantile nonsense is that? Assuming Shagari feels like that, which any way is not true, what does that suggest of Buhari’s intelligence to attend such a meeting? Was it he was daft to know or feeble to refuse an invitation from a supposed adversary? He was never beholden to attend a meeting organized by his adversary. And what kind of advice were people like Adamu Adamu giving to him? Maybe Adamu Adamu is seeking from the public what he couldn’t achieve in the privacy of his discussions with the General through that unfortunate write up. It is people like Adamu Adamu that are creating problem for general Buhari in their simple zeal to be heard. In the whole of this country only two people can summon Buhari and he will answer, and these people are Gowon and Shagari. Not for fear but for the respect existing between them, so please Malam don’t spoil a relationship that predated your knowledge of the general.

For the sake of putting record straight, Shagari has never held Buhari responsible for overthrowing him. Far from that, he is up till date pitying Buhari because he was cajoled and used by some people with a different agenda to achieve their ambition after which he was found no longer relevant to their cause and was thoroughly disgraced thereafter. I remember that Prof. Dahiru Yahaya once told me that the difference between IBB and Buhari is that, while IBB manipulates evil people around him, Buhari is manipulated by evil people around him. Without having to go in to details, that was what happened in 1983, and that is what is happening today. At least Malam Adamu Adamu should endeavor to take a  sample of opinion among the talakawa’s that are the strength of Buhari’s politics and he will discover how the TBO and co have thoroughly demystified this political history.

Coming to the issue of Atiku Abubakar, this remind me of the hadith of the holy prophet where he said one who believes in Allah and the last day should say what is good or keep quite. Mal. Adamu should have kept quite if he is ignorant than disgracing himself with unsubstantiated and pedestrian invectives. In the first place it is on record that in the whole of Africa, history has never witnessed a leader whom when he was out of power has held those in power in contempt and, when he was in power he had no respect for those that left power, than Olusegun Obasanjo. As far as Obasanjo is concerned good leadership in Nigeria started and ended with him. At the vanguard of this tirade was Atiku Abubakar in 1999. They saw nothing good in any body that ruled Nigeria before them. Obasanjo used Atiku to not only demystify our revered leaders, but to destroy their reputation and supplant their influence with his new order. Shagari is among those constantly vilified. Now when it was Atiku’s turn for comeuppance after the honeymoon was over why should Shagari come to his aid? And does it make a fair justice for anybody to accuse him for not coming to Atiku’s aid? In any case, being the gentleman and the statesman he is, he never took to heart all those abuses. He was always there to give support and render advices whenever sought for. Infact at the height of Obasanjo/Atiku feud Shehu Shagari single handedly solicited the understanding and intervention of his fellow former leaders and led them to a rapprochement meeting with both Obasanjo and Atiku. This team included General Babangida, Chief Shonekan and Abdussalami Abubakar.  They met with the two and if not for Obasanjo’s recalcitrance and stubbornness the issue could have been long buried. Atiku Abubakar appreciated this and many other efforts and dispatched his Security Adviser, Brigadier General Lawal Ja’afaru Isah, to Shagari to thank Alhaji Shehu Shagari for his efforts. And if the truth be told, part of the reasons why president Shagari was confident of the futility of Obasanjo’s war with Atiku Abubakar was the belief that Obasanjo could not get the required legislative backing to harm Atiku Abubakar. Atiku Abubakar knows this and he was appreciative. If people like Adamu Adamu are not, then it is not only for lack knowledge, but rather the misguided belief that everything must be done in the market place.

On the issue of the North and Obasanjo, I wouldn’t want to reply Adamu Adamu here, for I believe by now it is apparently clear that his write up was more informed by passion than reason. But if he knew the hold Shehu Shagari had on the Northern delegates at the last Political Reform Conference through the same “villain” Umaru Dikko on Northern concerns and interests he wouldn’t have written what he wrote. If Adamu Adamu knew the exchange that took place between Obasanjo and Shehu Shagari over the later’s effort at bridging the political gap between the North and the South South, which was the fall out of Anenih’s Enugu meeting where the North was the subject of attack, Adamu Adamu wouldn’t have written the nonsense he wrote against Shehu Shagari. People like Shagari are asset to humanity, we should wish them well rather than pray that they lie in state. For heaven sake this coming from a person living free in a mosque quarter that was conceived, initiated and executed by the Shehu Shagari government. May God forgive him.

Yes, I agree that it is only when there is a fight or misunderstanding that you try to reconcile people, and as he rightly said, there was neither a case nor any misunderstanding between Umaru Yar’adua, Buhari and Atiku Abubakar to settle. The question then as put by Malam Adamu Adamu is what was Shehu Shagari trying to settle? I agree with him hundred percent here, but what he failed to realize here is that, Shagari if anything, was doing service to Buhari than probably Umaru Yar’adua. Where was Adamu Adamu when the Friday to the Saturday of the presidential elections in the whole mosques across the country the prayer was one; may Allah choose for us the leader that will be the best for our country. Was that not the prayer? Who chose Umaru Yar’adua? Was it Obasanjo or Allah? Where has Adamu’s imani gone? One million Obasanjos can not make Umaru president, so also one million Kutugis can not make Buhari president except Allah wills. Buhari understood this Allah’s judgment and declined to go to court. People like Adamu craving for relevance bamboozled him into this decision. What Shagari is trying to tell him is “oh Allah! owner of sovereignty, thou givest sovereignty unto whom thou wilt and abasest whom thou wilt. In thy hand is the good. Lo! Thou art able to do all things” not the rubbish people like Adamu Adamu are trying, to tell him. And I am sure he wouldn’t have any case with that.