By Lasisi Olagunju

June 2015, freshly minted President Muhammadu Buhari hosted General Olusegun Obasanjo at the Villa.

“Whatever anyone might have done to you in the past, please forgive and forget,” Obasanjo advised the new president. Buhari looked up, surprised. His countenance changed.

“Including Ibro?”

“Yes, especially Ibro,” Obasanjo answered very quickly and curtly. The two leaders exchanged glances.

Silence.

The ‘Ibro’ in that discussion is General Ibrahim Babangida. The question on whether Ibro should be forgiven was a surprise to Obasanjo because twice, Buhari was in IBB’s home seeking his endorsement ahead of the 2015 election. And his host supported him all through, publicly.

But there was no overt commitment to ‘peace’ from the new president. Old soldiers they were, host and guest quickly drifted to other issues. The meeting ended.

The event I reported above happened. It was one of the earliest signs in Nigeria’s power circle that the new man had come to power to do more than governance. I got the gist a few days after the Villa meeting. And, I asked the source what Babangida’s reaction would be if he heard that conversation. Or was he aware of it already? My source smiled and said “Of course. But, you know he is a veteran in such intrigues.”

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For the eight years of Buhari, the journalist in me patiently looked forward to how he would take his pound of flesh from IBB for toppling him in 1985. I was aware that IBB also was on the alert. I was told that Buhari really wanted to take on Ibro. “He was told that he would need more than two terms to fight that war. He got the hint and backed off.” My source told me.

Babangida is very lucky to have outlived Buhari and his regime. President Shehu Shagari, the man Buhari toppled in December 1983, was not that lucky. He was president for four years and three months. He died in December 2018, right into the mouth of Buhari’s awesome powers as president. A State House press statement mourned the dead but that was where it ended. President Buhari stayed away from Shagari’s burial and made sure the dead president enjoyed no state burial. It was Buhari’s second December coup against Shagari.

Last week, Shagari’s grandson, Nura Muhammad Mahe, reacted to Buhari’s death with a caustic press release. He said the very expressive state burial honour which President Bola Tinubu gave Buhari was “in sharp contrast to how my grandfather, President Shehu Shagari, was treated during the administration of Muhammadu Buhari.” Muhammed Mahe recalled that upon Shagari’s death on 28 December, 2018, “Buhari neither attended the funeral nor approved a state burial, despite being in the country at the time.” The man said “it was a painful experience for the Shagari family and many Nigerians who expected more honour for a man who served as Nigeria’s first Executive President…Even in death, Buhari failed to show due respect to his predecessor.”

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Probably under pressure, Buhari visited the Shagari family a day after the burial and signed the condolence register. When he left, journalists who wanted to feast on what he wrote in the register met nothing in there. It was a blank page. Was that an error or a fulfillment of a pledge to dishonour the dead?

Whether you overthrew the man as IBB did, or he overthrew you as he did Shagari, he believed he was your victim and considered you an enemy till he breathed his last breath in London on Sunday. I read IBB’s beautiful tribute in honour of Buhari. The Minna-uphill General is lucky that he lived through the Buhari years. If he had gone when Buhari was president, it is almost certain that there would not have been such positive review from Daura. The Shagari treatment would be certain. It would be worse. Friends would be afraid to ‘show face’ in Minna because Mr President would have kept a register of mourners for the appropriate punishment.

Niccollo Machiavelli warns that a leader can “make mistakes of ambition and not mistakes of sloth.” Buhari made both and got away with them. Muhammadu Buhari’s engagement with Nigeria is a study in entitlement. The textbook meaning of entitlement mentality is to believe that you deserve the best from your people while giving back far less than was required of you. Buhari represented that forever in our history. And it wasn’t his fault. Very literate, knowledgeable people openly said our country owed the old soldier power; they said we owed him reverence and accolades; they put unquestioning loyalty as the icing on his cake. For 30 years, Nigerians Earnestly Yearned for Buhari. He came, and he failed. When he was exiting power, he warned us never to attempt asking him questions: “Nobody should ask me to come and give any evidence in any court, otherwise, whoever it is would be in trouble because all important things are on record.” He threatened us in January 2022, and we complied and bought padlocks for the laws he broke. Who born Nigeria and Nigerians!

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The gentleman officer was a beautiful snake who carefully positioned himself as the gift the nation had been waiting for. Physician Buhari donated himself to Nigeria and the nation bled from all the orifices: from the nose, from the ear, the mouth, etc. Under his watch, life got tragically devalued. For eight years he added nothing of value to the lives of ordinary Nigerians. He instead took from many their food; and from many more their lives through unremitting insecurity. As peace progressively turned ashen, the man who swore to protect us sat back, belched, picked his busy teeth and demanded appreciation from all of us for graciously failing us. We paid him that debt of gratitude last week with the fairy tale celebration in Daura and a national holiday declared by Abuja. He was the luckiest leader the nation has ever served.

Instead of checking the dictionary meaning of inertia, just open the book of blank pages called Buhari. He was absent for eight years even for his 12 million children in the North. The North-West was healthy before he came; he left it gasping for life. Where the president’s voice was needed, Buhari planted silence and watered it with absence. He never cared; he was a leader for whom mere presence in office was enough achievement.

Everything Buhari denied others, he got from others, even when he didn’t deserve such. Tinubu gave him every support possible for him to be president and he became president. When it was Tinubu’s turn to contest for the presidency, the General he exhumed from political retirement in Daura denied him every support at his disposal. Buhari escaped every bad treatment he gave others, even when he deserved it. Apart from Sani Abacha, whom he served diligently, no other leader since 1979 got Buhari’s respect. Yet, the living among them – all of them – last week used words which you and I know were hyperbolic untruths to bury him. He was Nigeria’s most successful charmer.

By William Bozimo

There are seasons in politics. Some are sown in silence, others harvested in thunder. As 2031 draws nearer, the Ijaw people of Delta State are not merely watching the calendar, they are watching history, and what it has stubbornly denied them. From Burutu to Forcados, Bomadi to Gbaramatu, the land speaks in neglected bridges and abandoned schools. These are not merely just underdeveloped regions, they are also under-recognized legacies.

For a people who lit the flame of minority rights and carried the nationalist dream through tidal creeks, the reward has been astonishingly lean. Governor James Ibori, the architect of modern Delta’s political rhythm, rose from the central zone. His successor, Emmanuel Uduaghan, emerged not from the Ijaw-dominated South but from Itsekiri stock. The pendulum then swung North, and Senator Ifeanyi Okowa stepped forward with poise and plans.

Okowa built Anioma with a craftsman’s eye. Roads were laid, institutions rebranded, and identities elevated. Now, Rt. Hon. Sheriff Oborevwori, back from the central zone, follows suit. But what of the Ijaw South? The rotation is fair in mathematics but faulty in morality. For the Ijaw people, they do not demand charity. They are simply asking for symmetry. In a democracy where rotation substitutes for merit, equity must substitute for silence.

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The oil that built Delta’s skyline was first drilled in their backyards. Their sons and daughters have bled in military uniforms, paddled ballots through floodplains, and kept the pipelines flowing; but when decisions are made in Asaba, they remain too often as footnotes. 2031 must not be another delay disguised as diplomacy. It must not be another “Almost” whispered in party caucuses. It must be the year the Ijaw dream of leadership crosses from agitation into realization.

Let no one say there are no Ijaw sons capable of governing. From academia to the civil service, from the creeks to the corridors of Abuja, they have led without limelight. All they ask now is the chance to lead from the centre, not the sidelines. This is no tribal plea. It is a moral alert. The rotation will lose its legitimacy if it keeps returning to the same addresses while skipping over the forgotten. A truly united Delta State must look every ethnic group in the eye and give them a reason to believe again. 2031 is not just an election year. For the Ijaw nation, it is a referendum on belonging.

William Z. Bozimo
Veteran Journalist | Columnist | National Memory Keeper

The Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) and four concerned Nigerians have filed a lawsuit against the Federal Government at the ECOWAS Community Court of Justice in Abuja, over its failure to publish the forensic audit report of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC).

According to SERAP, the report, which allegedly details the disappearance of a staggering N6 trillion from the NDDC between 2001 and 2019, is said to be shrouded in secrecy despite being submitted to the Federal Government (FG).

Specifically, the rights group, alongside its co-plaintiffs, are contending that withholding the report amounts to a grave breach of Nigeria’s international human rights obligations, particularly the right to access public information.

The suit, designated ECW/CCJ/APP/35/25, also lists Prince Taiwo Aiyedatiwa, Chief Jude Igbogifurotogu Pulemote, Ben Omietimi Tariye, and Princess Elizabeth Egbe as co-applicants.

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In their submissions, the plaintiffs are asking the court to declare that the Nigerian government’s refusal to release the audit findings violates the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, both of which Nigeria has ratified.

They are further seeking an order compelling the publication of the audit report and demanding systemic reforms to ensure transparency and accountability in the management of NDDC funds.

“The Nigerian government has violated our right to know the truth about the corruption allegations documented in the NDDC forensic report.

“The obstruction of the publication is aiding impunity and shielding high-ranking officials from accountability,” the plaintiffs said.

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The forensic audit was initiated in 2019 by the late former President Muhammadu Buhari following widespread allegations of grand-scale corruption within the NDDC.

More recently, Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Nyesom Wike, alleged that the wife of a former minister received N48 billion within a single year under the guise of training the women of the Niger Delta.

Counsel for the applicants, Kolawole Oluwadare, emphasised the public’s right to scrutinise government actions.

They argued that the NDDC audit report is not classified information, and that continued concealment undermines citizens’ ability to hold leaders accountable and weakens the rule of law.

“There is an overriding public interest in the publication and disclosure of the NDDC forensic report.

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“The continuing failure to publish the report denies the plaintiffs the ability to study its contents and pursue accountability for the documented corruption,” the lawyer stated.

Citing international human rights instruments, the plaintiffs insisted that access to public information is a critical component of freedom of expression and civic participation.

They stressed that information regarding the NDDC audit falls squarely within this right and cannot be withheld arbitrarily or indefinitely.

“Access to public information is a fundamental human right protected by Article 9 of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights and Article 19 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

“These treaties obligate Nigeria to respect, promote, and ensure transparency,” the suit reads.

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They also invoked the principle of ‘maximum disclosure,’ a core tenet of the right to information, stipulating that transparency should be the default, and secrecy the rare exception.

Any restriction, they noted, must be lawful, necessary, proportionate, and justifiable under international law.

“The burden is on the Nigerian government to prove that withholding the NDDC audit is consistent with its human rights obligations,” they added.

Furthermore, the plaintiffs stated that the government’s inaction obstructs victims of corruption from seeking legal redress and undermines the integrity of public institutions.

“By denying access to this information, the Nigerian government is violating our right to an effective legal remedy. Secrecy and impunity cannot be the norm in a democratic society,” they said.

No date has been fixed for the hearing of the case.