Guardian

• Fasehun calls for Unity Day, cautions Tofa

A MEMBER of the Presidential Advisory Council on International Relations and a Professor of History and Strategic Studies, Ambassador Akinjide Osuntokun has urged President Goodluck Jonathan never to relent on his efforts at immortalising the winner of the annulled June 12, 1993 Presidential election, Chief Moshood Abiola.

The former Nigerian Ambassador to Germany commended Jonathan’s attempt to immortalise Abiola last year but he also noted that it would be more appropriate for a national figure like the late politician not to be immortalised by the Federal Government in South-West but the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), lest it confines him to a regional player.

Osuntokun told The Guardian in an interview Tuesday that the concession to the South-West in 1999, by the rest of the country as to who became president signified dramatically that the person who emerged as president in 1999 literally walked on Abiola’s blood to Aso Rock.

“Abiola thus was the sacrificial lamb on which the current democracy rests. The three people who have been elected presidents since Abiola’s death owe him a debt of gratitude and the leadership of Nigeria that Abiola was fighting for has not done enough to honour him.”

President, Campaign for Democracy and recipient of United States International Women of Courage Award, Dr. Joe Okei-Odumakin has said the admittance of the Chairman of the defunct National Electoral Commission of Nigeria (NECON), Professor Humphrey Nwosu, that Chief Moshood Abiola won the June 12, 1993 Presidential election should be a clear message for the Presidency to honour the late politician.

In a interview with The Guardian Tuesday, Dr. Okei-Odumakin said: “The implication of the admission by Professor Nwosu is that after a very long time, there has been a justification for the decision taken on June 12 by Nigerians and the subsequent struggles towards the actualisation of the mandate before the unfortunate death of the acclaimed winner of the election, Chief MKO Abiola.

“This we expect should be a clear message for the present ruling political class in Nigeria on the need for the Nigerian government to formally recognise Chief Abiola as a former President of Nigeria,” she said.

Okei-Odumakin also noted that the intrigues behind the refusal of General Olusegun Obasanjo to honour Abiola is best known to him “but to an average Nigerian, it is seen as a fundamental display of ingratitude by a man who became the first major beneficiary of the June 12 struggle in which Chief MKO Abiola had to pay the ultimate price of sacrificing his life. I think Obasanjo still owes it a duty to let Nigerians know why he failed to recognise or immortalise the memory of June 12 and Chief Abiola.”

Founder and President, Oodua People’s Congress (OPC), Dr. Frederick Fasehun also called on the Federal Government to declare June 12, Unity Day as a mark of honour to all the constituent units of Nigeria that spoke with near-unanimity and elected Bashorun MKO Abiola as their President on June 12, 1993.

The OPC leader said it is a matter of must for the government to name June 12, Unity Day as it has declared May 29, as Democracy Day.

Speaking at a press conference yesterday, Fasheun, who is also the Chairman of the revived Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN) said June 12 is Nigeria’s truest mark of unity “and we cannot afford to lose its significance.”

Fasheun also flayed the presidential candidate of the defunct National Republican Convention (NRC), Alhaji Bashir Tofa, who was also the opponent of Abiola over his recent comment that “Nigeria should forget June 12.”

According to him, “A foreigner may ask us to forget June 12 and he will be forgiven. A child may ask us to forget June 12 and he will be forgiven. A dim-wit may ask us to forget June 12 and he will be forgiven. However, when someone in the calibre of Alhaji Bashir Tofa , presidential candidate of NRC, and Abiola’s opponent in the 1993 election, attempts to rubbish and belittle that historical event, then Nigeria is in trouble.”

According to her, in as much as such a good decision by President Goodluck Jonathan would have been appreciated, the fact remains that the decision was never made to pass through any due process.

“A university is not just like any other infrastructure of government that can be renamed without consultation with critical stakeholder in such an institution. This I am sure you know was responsible for the various criticism and protest that greeted the renaming of the University of Lagos as Mashood Abiola University. Our government must learn to always carry the people along in taking critical decisions that directly affects them,” Okei-Odumakin stated.

He lampooned Tofa for having lost touch with history.  “And if we cannot learn from history, then how can we properly define the future and embrace development? Bashir Tofa does himself, Abiola and the entire Nigerian people gross injustice by asking us to forget June 12. Nigerians cannot forget June 12. We remember the rape of June 12. We remember the pain of June 12. We remember the dislocation caused by its cancellation. We remember the lives lost, the limbs lost and the livelihoods lost, because of June 12.”

Insisting on the need for the former Military Head of State, General Ibrahim Babangidato apologise to Nigerians for annulling the election, Fasheun said that Babangida’s reckless action “cost the country colossal loss in human and other resources. IBB must apologise for annulling the election and IBB must apologise for the people killed by agents of his government and those of General Sani Abacha.”

Emphasising the need to compensate the victims of June 12, Fasheun said, “We have always said that June 12 gave birth to May 29. Without the concerted struggle of pro-Democrats for the actualisation of the June 12 presidential election, Babangida would have converted to civilian President, so would General Sani Abacha. If those two Generals had succeeded in perpetuating themselves in office, it would have led to the extension of Military rule. But the intensity and internationalising of the June 12 struggle by democratic elements finally culminated in the termination of Military rule on May 29, 1999. Those in the current civilian regime are beneficiaries of the June 12 struggle. Those in position today owe their relevance to everyone who made sacrifices towards the establishment of this Republic; and those are the heroes of June 12.”

He added that as long as President Goodluck Jonathan announced the payment of N5.7 billion in compensations to victims of the 2011 post-election violence during the last Democracy Day, the president should immediately expand the scope of the current compensation plan to include victims of June 12, especially the ordinary Nigerians who were killed while protesting the annulment of the 1993 elections. Those who died for June 12 must not die in vain. Victims of June 12 must be compensated.”