By Richard Akinnola II
(Col. Abubakar Dangiwa Umar, an outstanding Officer, an IBB acolyte but a June 12 fundamentalist, recalls his June 12 struggles and his aborted plans to restore Abiola's mandate in this three-part series. The full text is contained in my book - MANDATE BURIED ALIVE)
"My relationship with General Babangida"
“I had on several occasions in the past explained why I enjoy a very close relationship with IBB. IBB was my instructor at the Nigerian Defence Academy. Since then, I found him to be a very brilliant and inspiring officer.
In fact, he had great influence on my career choice of the armoured corps, being an amour officer himself. Of course, we had disagreements, some of them quite straining, but they have not succeeded m changing my perception of him.
This is true with most officers who worked closely with the man. With all this, I had never allowed such a close personal relationship to becloud my vision and judgment of his performance as a superior officer, particularly during his eight‑year rule as President and C‑in‑C. Mr. Edwin Madunagu, a man I have high regards for as an accomplished intellectual and a socially concerned person, confirmed what I have always suspected that most outsiders believe I am too fanatically loyal to IBB to the extent that I failed to attribute any fault to him even in the June 12 saga.
This definitely ignores my decision, to demonstrate open dissent to the annulment by writing a letter to the President resigning my hard‑earned Commission, a letter that was mischievously leaked to the press.
The truth however is that such strident opposition to IBB's faltering steps was a remarkable and consistent feature of that fanatical loyalty.
I must confess that were it not for IBB's magnanimity and unusual patience with dissenters, or opposition parties as we were jokingly called, I would have been kicked out of service a few months after he took over. Some senior officers, including the late Gen. Sani Abacha and Gen.
Dongoyaro, queried my continued retention in service even though to them, I constituted a grave threat to the regime by what they regarded as my anti‑regime activities.
Not many Nigerians are aware that I escaped execution or jail by the whiskers during the Mamman Vasta coup trials.
The evidence used to cause my interrogation came from some senior officers who later confessed that they found me too confrontational and rude to be left in service. I was set free when no evidence of my involvement could be established.
Later events changed the minds of some of these officers but the point here is that IBB appreciated officers who possessed high moral courage and could deploy reason to influence his decisions.
The IBB boys that many want to denigrate were some of the best and brightest in the service. IBB encouraged the culture of dissent and dialogue and this is why some of us became emboldened to speak out when we disagreed with him.
Sometimes we won and many other times, he taught us that junior officers could have their say, but Generals decided on the course of action. Readers will also be surprised to learn that IBB had no respect for sycophants.
The June 12 crisis and events leading to it are evidence enough to buttress the above points. My loyalty to IBB which people allude to, did not prevent me from vehemently disagreeing with and opposing him when he was being misguided by sinister forces to take decisions that were injurious to good governance and inimical to the existence and unity of this country. I had in the past resisted all temptations to recount these sad events.
In fact, I rejected a very lucrative book contract simply to avoid any attempt at what may appear as self‑glorification and causing injury to some of my colleagues.
It must be made clear that I didn't contribute more to the democratic struggle than most of them, the fact that I become more prominent could be a result of my very good relationship with the Nigerian press which I certainly identified as a most veritable weapon for such struggle and used so effectively. It must also be remembered that I was the first military casualty of that struggle and that I persevered to the end.
The fact that I belong, by birth to a group which was perceived by that press to be the major beneficiary of the continued military rule which the pro‑democracy groups were fighting, added poignancy to my participation in that struggle.(To be continued in part two)
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