New York [RR] New York—new shocking revelations show that “IBB killed Abiola, Abacha, Idiagbon, Ige and Elewi – Abacha died of spiked viagra – SSS kept Abiola’s sex tape – Abiola kept Samuel Doe’s money in Swiss Bank – Abiola funded 1985 Coup with $10 million – Nigeria might break up soon”, reports say.

Photo: Ex-Military Dictator Ibrahim Badamosi Babangida of, Nigeria.

But RepublicReport was first to report that not only did Babangida kill many innocent people, he sometimes killed double agents that worked for him, he, Babangida is also alleged to be a CIA agent. Reports alleged that IBB also recruited Orji Uzor Kalu as a go between agent for IBB and CIA during 1980s Nicaragua WAR in Latin America when US Congress caught funding to fight US secret wars in Latin America including Nicaragua, Panam, without the approval of the US-Congress.

Reports alleged when funds was caught by US-Congress, CIA turned to drug trafficking and due to chaotic nature of Nigeria political landscape picked & used Nigeria as shipment and supplies conduit for drug trafficking, with funds accrued from the drug-trafficking used to prosecute Nicaragua war and other wars in the 80s.

These and many other reports about alleged IBB-CIA links, is why United States trust Babangida more than Goodluck Jonathan to lead Nigeria come 2011 general election. Indeed, if anything, America would even use ”by any means necessary” to impose IBB, regardless whether 2011 presidential election is free or not, if US have their way. 

Nevertheless, with massive publications and increasing publications by other media outfits out there, aggressively exposing so-called strategic interests of the US may force US to stand-down from overtly & overtely backing IBB, but I doubt it.  We must brace for an impact, because anything, if not earthquake, something terrible will happen that will change forever the geo-political equation of what is called Nigeria very soon.

Already IBB’s side-kick, Orji Uzor Kalu is a mess at hoem and abroad, with recent death of one Chinwe Masi [Ogbonna] in his US-Mansion with him smuggled out of the US shores, that was widely covered and expository reports electonically mounted telling about his fraudulent and criminal baggage, efficiently and effectively circulated in the US and in the homeland makes OUK and IBB a dead wood but don’t count anything over, until it’s OVER.

Read more…

From the Excerpts we learn that: – IBB killed Abiola, Abacha, Idiagbon, Ige and Elewi – Abacha died of spiked viagra – SSS kept Abiola’s sex tape – Abiola kept Samuel Doe’s money in Swiss Bank – Abiola funded 1985 Coup with $10 million – Nigeria might break up soon

No other journalist in Nigeria would challenge his impressive fearless reportorial style with which he took on the military for a deceptive transition agenda in 1993 Nigeria. The 1988 graduate of Education and Political Science from the University of Lagos, Nigeria threw himself into the thick of the effort to dislodge the military from power.

Long before many of his contemporaries understood the game of deception foisted on his native country Nigeria, by gap-toothed sly by smiling Babangida, husky trimmed Egba Lawyer Ernest Shonekan, and the dark goggled General Sani Abacha, Fayewimo clearly interpreted, investigated and reported how Nigerians had helplessly turned to pawns in a complex political chess manipulation.

He used his media, Razor, to monitor and expose every move of the 14 year Nigerian military dictatorship.

The military was irreverent and extremely stubborn in tormenting Nigerians. Fayewimo was a consistent and dogged nemesis. He used the power of words to expose the stealing and plundering military politicians. He was always publishing their secret and coded foreign accounts containing money stolen from Nigeria.
The military caught him and kidnapped him from exile in neighboring Benin Republic in 1997. He did not see the light of day light until after Abacha’s death. Abacha would not release him even after Pope John Paul II came to Nigeria and entered a plea on his behalf.

Since he left Nigeria in 1999, he has not returned to the country of his birth. As a matter of fact, he said he may never step his foot on Nigerian soil again. But he has done well with himself. An holder of three masters degrees, one in MA Journalism (2004) from University of South Florida at Tampa, another one from State University of New York in Information Science (2006), and yet another from the same University in African History. He is also finishing his PhD in Public Administration and Public Policy even as he has just started another doctoral work in law Juris Doctor (JD). He finds time to practice as an International Consultant, writes a weekly column for pointblanknews.com and has also worked as a journalist with The Informed Constituent of Albany, New York, The Crow’s Nest Newspaper, Florida and The Works Magazine.

This is his first major interview since leaving Nigeria in 1999. When he came to pointblanknews.com’s corporate headquarters in Manhattan, New York last week, he was again his characteristic self. He held nothing back. He confessed the undue favors extended to him by some of the key actors in the Nigerian intrigue. And issued a range of challenges to living Nigerian leaders to speak up on their atrocities and rape of the country.

He was interviewed by POINTBLANKNEWS Managing Editor, OLADIMEJI ABITOGUN.

Excerpts:

You got into student union politics very early. How did that happen?

I was interested in politics immediately I entered the University of Lagos. University of Lagos, as you know, was very unique and strategic in Nigeria, not because of anything, but because of its location close to the government, because Lagos was where the seat of government was then.

So very early during my undergraduate years I was involved in students’ union politics. In 1983, one of my friends, actually I was his campaign manager, Lateef Gbadamosi, became the president of University of Lagos Students’ Union. If you could remember, his secretary-general was late Chris Imodibe who eventually died in Liberia while working at the Guardian as Foreign Correspondent.

Mr. Imodibe was part of our group and it was the first time I met Chief Abiola. It was Gbadamosi who invited him to our campus. He was with us at the Students’ Union Building. From there we went with him to Eni Njoku Buttery he ate with us and addressed us. That was my first time of meeting Chief M.K.O. Abiola in real life. Gbadamosi later graduated and left the University of Lagos. I participated in politics and became the president before I was eventually removed.

What led to your removal and how were you removed?

Well, we had problems. When Abiola learnt that I was preparing to play politics in UNILAG in 1984, he sent for me. But I ran into problems with the administration of the then Vice Chancellor, Prof. Akin Adesola as a result of my principled opposition to some of the policies. I was banned from contesting the presidency of the Students’ Union. I had problems at the University. I almost became a permanent student. It was hot (laughs). So I took a year off. And I went to Abiola’s house and explained my situation.

Were you on suspension or you acted on personal volition?

I was not on suspension. I acted on my own because I was also having some academic problems. Let me just say that I was not in a hurry to graduate. That is why I said it was fun. Well I had an interesting meeting with Chief Abiola who, having listened to me, gave me a letter to the then Deputy Editor of National Concord, Mr. Ismaila Mohammed. That was in 1984. That was how I knew and witnessed the Babangida coup of 1985. You want us to continue from there?

What kind of personality did Chief Abiola project when you first met him?

There were many students. We all surrounded him at the Buttery. Gbadamosi brought him. So many people hated Gbadamosi because there was the erroneous impression that the students’ union was being sold to the government of National Party of Nigeria (NPN) led by Shehu Shagari. Lateef Gbadamosi had gone to congratulate Alhaji Shagari for being re- elected in 1983 shortly before he was removed by the military.

Abiola was a very simple person. He ate with us. He waited in line. Everybody saw him in queue, he was served. He projected a populist personality. He made people laugh. People liked him. That was my first time in his company. He took and shook my hand after I was introduced to him by Lateef Gbadamosi. And that was it.

Nigerians often complain about falling standard of education. I feel it has always been that way. How were things during your time?

I was president of UNILAG Students’ Union from 1985 to 1986. To me, I think Nigerian students can hold their own anywhere in the world. Pointedly, it was General Babangida who spoiled the Nigerian educational heritage. His pathological hatred for any organized opposition made him to move against the educational system. That was why he targeted students’ unionism.

Student union association was not voluntary during our time. So long a student was duly admitted, such a student was made to pay the union fee alongside the university tuition. Students cannot aspire to full leadership training without a rallying point like the union. The cults mushroomed because Babangida sacrificed the union.

Administrators, professors and every other component of university system are in place because students came to school. When students are denied their rights to associate, when the platform for such association, the union is destroyed, something so important for students to agitate for their interests, students become cultists. You are here in the United States; you see how Nigerian students excel. But the Babangida regime was very silly. The man systematically destroyed our schools and he destroyed our heritage as well.

But the man had his argument. He said some professors were “extremists” who were teaching what they were not paid to teach. He felt that unionism was being democratized when students had options of joining or not joining but strictly listen, learn and graduate…

He was only trying to run Nigeria like a military barrack. He could not expect to arrive at a consensus on behalf of 120 million Nigerians. He also could not assume that Nigerians, 120 million, would have consensus on an issue. That is what society is about. What is a university? The university is supposed to mould its products to have questioning minds. That is what the university system is supposed to teach, to develop minds to such a degree where they can question things.

There is no way you proffer solution to the multifarious problems of modern societies if university students do not have questioning minds. So it is mere bunkum. Universities are not supposed to be military academy where ideas have to be regimented and you have to regurgitate what your professors are teaching you. That has been the tradition. All over the world that has been the tradition of the university. Babangida and his cohorts, all these people they never attended a traditional university, so what do you expect?

They wielded out radicals like Patrick Wilmot and Festus Iyayi from what should be a natural environment.

Who should decide what university students are supposed to be taught?

You had met Abiola. You later became the president of the students’ union government of UNILAG. You have not explained what actually led to your removal from office.

There was a contemporary called Panaf (shortened form of Pan Africanism). His real name was Olajide Olakanmi. He was the president of ULSU (University of Lagos Students’ Union) in 1981. Unbeknownst to most students of University of Lagos, he was, and I think till today was an informant for the State Security Service, SSS. He was given some money; most students would not know this that is why I am disclosing this, after almost twenty years. He was parading himself at UNILAG as a radical but he was actually working for the SSS. He first brought some money when I was contesting for the presidency to assist me in order to become, purportedly, the president of the students’ union. They claimed they embezzled some union funds but my budget had not even been passed by the Student Union Senate but every right-thinking person at Unilag at that time knew they orchestrated my removal because Akin Adesola, the VC knew I was too tough for him. That was the whole
truth.

How much?

At that time, it was two thousand naira. Meanwhile, my friend, Lateef Gbadamosi, had warned me about the foggy moves of Panaf. Elsewhere, in some of the places we used to go, we had tips that Panaf had collected money from the SSS. He had assured them that he could influence political events at UNILAG. Things were usually super-charged in those days and the security service were always interested in who should become the leaders in those days. And actually, I was approached after I became president, if I was interested in becoming an operative or informant. And since I was not interested, they demanded to have a nominee from me. I gave them the name of one guy we used to call Tonee. He was my campaign manager.

Was this another payment apart from what Panaf was to pay your campaign?

Panaf had already graduated and he was actually working with UNILAG then. He read integrated social science. He served as president and graduated. Then he went back to the university as a worker. As a matter of fact, Olu Shodimu, the present Registrar of the University of Lagos, was actually a student leader, later worker for the SSS. The point is, at the University of Lagos, if you become a student union leader, the SSS would approach and try to recruit you. So there are many student leaders who the Nigerian masses often take for radicals, even activists out there. They are mostly phonies (laughs). So, Panaf Olajide Olakanmi got the money and used the money to buy himself a Citroën car. Anthony Kayode, whom I had nominated for the SSS job did not get the job because at that point, there were serious disagreements and we were sacked.

How much was involved sir?

Well, I would not know. But Panaf brought to me two thousand naira. And Alozie Ogugbuaja, the then Police Public Relations Officer told Lateef Gbadamosi and I that we used to visit Ogugbuaja, the man who accused the military of always idly drinking pepper soup and had the time to stale cups. He was removed. But because I had the information and I travelled to Bayero University Kano for NANS convention and before I came back, Panaf Olu Sodimu and the students’ union authorities colluded and removed me before I came back from Kano. This was in February 1985. That is exactly what happened.

Would you say if ULSU was an exception or was it the standard practice all over Nigeria for the SSS to aggressively recruit students’ leaders?

Hmn, I think throughout the 80’s down to the time Babangida came after Ahmadu Bello University, ABU crisis of 1986, when students were killed in Kaduna and Babangida set up a panel led by Segun Okeowo and some leaders, up till the time that the Justice Akanbi panel recommended voluntary unionism, I think they felt the need was no longer strong to compromise student leaders. Uptill my time, it was standard practice like I explained UNILAG being the cynosure of all eyes, due to its strategic location, I think that they did that in other universities, Ibadan in particular.

They say NANS president now has escort cars with sirens. Was it also like that in your time?

No. I am sure they are doing that because of politics. That was not the practice. Students’ union officials may be important to them now because of politics. And of course some of these so-called student leaders, there are other things they do now, take university girls and go and give them in Abuja. Things do not happen in Lagos anymore. It is now Abuja. And I read many heart breaking things from Nigerian news papers. But my conclusion, before I left Nigeria ten years ago was that, students’ union is dead in Nigeria.

How did you come to know so much about the August 1985, Babangida coup d’etat?

I had left university of Lagos for one year like I said. I lived in a military barrack, the Ikeja cantonment. I lived there with an uncle and that was when I started working with the Concord. I actually had three people in Ikeja cantonment at that time. I do not want to mention their names because one of them is still in active military service. One is here now in the United States, came originally as a political assylee. The other one has retired. I would not like to mention their names. But I was living with them. The Babangida coup was planned around Ikeja cantonment. I have to tell you this General Muhammadu Buhari, the then Head of State is still alive, he knew it two weeks before the coupists struck. And for the first time, Nigerians should be able to know why Babangida staged the coup, because we have heard so many stories. There have been several guesses all over the place. Of course I am not a coup plotter, but we heard the real truth because we
lived in the barracks.

My senior colleague, Dr. Taiwo Ogunade of City University of New York has been able to also disclose some of these information. Basically, what I want to say is that Chief Abiola was the one who sponsored the Babangida coup in 1985. And the reason Babangida struck was because he had been marked down by Buhari and Idiagbon for drug running. For posterity reasons, all these things should be disclosed to Nigerians. Brigadier Aliyu Mohammed, you have heard of his name. He later became a Lieutenant–General. He was brought back by Babangida to become National Security Adviser, NSA to Obasanjo. This man and Babangida were actually involved in drug running when Babangida was chief of Army Staff to Buhari regime.

Babangida has been amply rewarded as one of the arrowheads of the coup that toppled Alhaji Shehu Shagari.

The other key players in that coup were Late Tunde Idiagbon, Mamman Vatsa and late Brigadier – General Ibrahim Bako. Buhari was brought in as the head of that government as a compromise leader after Bako had been killed in the coup at the presidential palace in Abuja while attempting to arrest Shagari. Idiagbon became Chief of Staff, Supreme Headquarters for ethnic balancing. Remember? He was a Yoruba from Kwara state. The coup plotters ran into serious problems. Major Jokolo, who became the Emir of Gwandu, was one of them. He threatened them that none of them would leave Dodan Barracks alive after the takeover. Idiagbon had made a broadcast to the nation. That was 31 st of December, 1983. Buhari was then the General Officer commanding in Jos, Plateau State. They were deliberating on who would step into Bako’s shoes. Jokolo insisted…

Point of observation, sir, General Babangida, in an interview with Point Blank News/people’s magazine, said that Brigadier General Bako was never in consideration for the exalted office of Head of State.

Then who were they considering for that position? As usual, the deceptive general said Buhari was the first choice Buhari was never part of the original plotters of the coup.

He said Buhari had always been the first choice. No question. Number two, you said there was an ethnic balancing, but that was not obvious. Buhari/Idiagbon was a moslem/moslem and North/North ticket. Ilorin was in the North.

Remember I was not in the military, I am a civilian. I did not take part in their coup. But you know Ilorin people. When things are robust they claim south. When things ­twist otherwise, they claim north. The name Tunde Idiagbon, is a Yoruba name, the man wasa moslem. They put him there to look like geo-political balancing. The point is that Buhari was not one of the ring leaders of that coup.

He came in as a compromise candidate. The composition of that government was changed because Bako died at the presidential palace. I was twenty three or twenty four at that time. It wasn’t as if I knew much.

The one I knew very well the coup that Babangida himself planned. The coup was neither motivated by altruistic motive nor by patriotic motive. It was a self survival coup d’etat. That is the point I want to stress. There are different ways coups take place in third world countries. It could be to reject oppression, change a bad direction for a country or to serve patriotic purpose on how a nation should be governed. None of these reasons motivated Babangida to organize his coup.

His career was on the line. He had his back to the wall, because of his activities as a former GOC and as the Chief of Army Staff under Buhari regime.

You should also know that Obasanjo knew and subscribed to the coup that toppled Buhari. Like Babangida, Aliyu Mohammed was also a drug baron that was well known to Buhari and Idiagbon. Aliyu Mohammed was slated for retirement as well. Babangida and Mohammed were both marked down for retirement and possible trial.

Ambassador Mohammed Rafindadi was in charge of the then National Security Organization, NSO, now known as State Security Service, SSS. He, Rafindadi was an uncle to Buhari. When they came into office, a lot of things were going on and they discovered Idiagbon insisted on death penalty for drug pushers. And most of the drug peddlers and international couriers were Babangida’s boys. As a matter of fact, Babangida’s clique introduced drug-running into Nigeria. When Buhari regime uncovered the elaborate entrenched Babangida drug-running network and the rumor of his wife, Maryam’s involvement as well, they penciled him down for retirement. We shall talk about the Gloria Okon connection later.

The Babangida’s removal announcement had been scheduled for October 1, 1985. Babangida knew and staged the coup to pre-empt the calamity of October. They had the coup plans. They wanted to strike in October, but with Babangida’s pending retirement, they quickly brought the date back to August.

After they had agreed, the boys, Abubakar Umar, Abdul Aminu, Lawan Gwadabe and Anthony Ukpo went to Otta to inform Obasanjo that they wanted to remove the Buhari/Idiagbon regime. Any military coup also needed Obasanjo’s clearance. There is no coup in Nigeria, either successful or abortive that Obasanjo does not know of. You know he had this phony organization called African Leadership Forum. It was all a ruse He used that organization for anything but leadership training. He came here to the Council of Foreign Relations to collect the initial money to set up that clandestine organization. Anyway, that was the body they used to plan anti-people policies at Ota including coup planning.

Nzeogu’s coup as well?

I am talking of anything that happened after he became Head of State in 1976. He was even in the know about the coup that killed General Muritala Mohammed.

You mean he knew about the Dimka’s plot?

Yes of course. That was why he left for Abeokuta that day. The CIA has documents in the United States here about this.

But he maintained the face of the avenger of his boss’s death to all of us. Are you accusing Obasanjo of hypocrisy?

Yes. He became the Head of State and checkmated the other plotters. He knew of the 1976 coup. That is why I said he always knows about every coup plot including that of Abacha.

Well maybe because he would have access to intelligence estimates as a former leader of the nation.

We shall talk more about that. So the boys went to him in Otta. They gave him a note to know if he had a candidate in office. He did not want any obvious association, but he gave them the name of his cousin, Onaolapo Soleye who was a lecturer at the Department of Economics at the University of Ibadan to become Buhari’s Minister of Finance. Buhari drifted and his economic policies were harsh. Obasanjo tried to advice him then, they snubbed him. He was annoyed and that was why he said he would never talk to a “deaf regime”. He had a pre-existing axe to grind with the Buhari regime.

So when the IBB boys came to tell him that they wanted to remove Buhari, he asked to know who they had as Buhari’s substitute. They said Babangida. He said o.k.

He said that? Would he not have had intelligence that IBB was a drug baron?

He said o.k. I don’t know what he knew or what he did not know. He gave them his blessings. They told him they had a problem. What was the problem, he asked? They said with Buhari, it would be very easy to topple the government, but with Idiagbon, they did not want to kill anybody. How would they get Idiagbon out of the way? They want Obasanjo to call Idiagbon to lure him to go out of the country to go to Saudi Arabia on Umrah, the lesser Hajj. Obasanjo invited Tunde Idiagbon. Tunde Idiagbon came to Obasanjo’s farm at Otta. It was the first time Idiagbon smiled to journalists. He was always frowning, but he laughed for the first time in Obasanjo’s farm. Obasanjo gave him the bogey advice that it was time for Nigeria to court the economic co-operation of the Saudis and the Middle East, so that the economy of the country could be revived. It was a dummy idea of the Babangida boys to get Tunde Idiagbon out of the way. And when Tunde Idiagbon was
going, they were also afraid of Vatsa, he was in charge of the Federal Capital Territory, FCT. Vatsa was asked to go with him on Holy pilgrimage to Mecca. During the Sallah celebration, they took over power. The coup was staged on a Friday. It was at Ikeja cantonment.

The private jet that conveyed Babangida from Lagos to Minna where he went for the Sallah holiday was an Abiola personal aircraft. Abiola had travelled out of Nigeria a week before the coup which took place on 27 th of August, 1985. Abiola had walked into our newsroom at Concord to address all of us in the newsroom and that was where he told us “we should forget about this government”.

Most people did not know what was happening. I was working at Concord and was in the news room when he said it. He said that the government was gone. A week later, the coup was staged and Babangida became the Head of State.

The point I want to make was that the coup was that of a self- survival. It was not patriotically motivated. It had nothing to do with nationalistic agenda. It was selfish and that is why Babangida exhibited the kind of evil reign that we witnessed for eight years. That is the point I want to make. Buhari-Idiagbon came to rescue Nigeria from the destruction of Shehu Shagari. 22 months later, Babangida came not for any reason but for his own survival because he was about to be tried for drug-running.

It is not so obvious to the general public that IBB was a drug dealer. We heard of his wife and Gloria Okon, Dele Giwa’s connection. We do not have any fact of IBB’s direct involvement. How is it hidden from us?

No. It is not hidden. I don’t know why in Nigeria. The press is there, the newspapers are there. It is not hidden at all. All the top journalists are there and nobody is talking now because IBB is still alive. You will see them talking immediately the man is dead. He has interests in virtually all the newspapers. You know what I mean?

Let all these people talk. Segun Osoba, Farouk Mohammed, Yemi Ogunbiyi, Ajibola Ogunsola, Sam Pemu Amuka, Stanley Macebuh, Patrick Dele-Cole, Imeh Umanah, Alex Akinyele, Tony Momoh, Doyin Abiola, Felix Adenaike, Banji Kuroloja, Dan Agbese, Yakubu Mohammed, Soji Akinrinnade, Raymond Ekpu. Let all of these people open up. And they all know why Mr. Dele Giwa was killed.

Infact, the story you are talking about that Dele Giwa was killed over, these people, top journalists they have it in Nigeria. If I could have it then, I was the first person to go public with the story in September 1993 before my senior colleague; Dr. Taiwo Ogunade of CUNY now came out to corroborate it. I was the only person through Razor, who came out to stick my neck then.

Sir, that was the story?

It was Babangida who planned the death of Dele Giwa. It was Babangida that killed him. It is very obvious. Senator Florence Ita – Giwa, Dele Giwa’s former wife knew. The one they now call Mama Bakkassi was a girl friend to Aliyu Mohammed, the one I just told you was to be retired with IBB, although he later changed his name to Mohammed Gusau just to deceive Nigerians.

You sure he is the same person?

Oh sure. He is the same person because immediately Babangida became Head of State, Babangida brought him back. Gusau Mohammed was about to be gazetted by the Buhari regime. I just told you why they struck. Babangida left him with Abacha, and Gusau later became a Lt-General. He was the person whom Babangida brought back to become National Security Adviser to Obasanjo. That is why Obasanjo was governing but did not rule and Nigerians did not know for eight years. Every step that Obasanjo wanted to take Aliyu Mohammed Gusau was always there. I mean your national security adviser is your life. Don’t you know? That is why IBB foisted the guy on Obasanjo. There are a lot of things in Nigeria, that Nigerians cannot hear about now until when IBB is dead. That was why he spread his tentacles all over the newspapers. And those whose names I have mentioned are alive…

What is the deal that IBB made with those notable journalists?

Immediately Babangida came into power, he knew that any journalist who was about town had the story. The first thing he did was to make Aliyu Mohammed (Gusau) the Directorate of Military Intelligence man. He surreptitiously was Babangida’s National Security Adviser, NSA. They had to cover their past dirty stuff. The man called all the top journalists in Nigeria, all these names that I have just given you, they assembled at the DMI, there was no DMI before IBB took over. He set up the Directorate of Military Intelligence at Apapa where they took me to under Abacha (Lagos).

So he now called them and said gentlemen, we want to cultivate the friendship of the press. If there is any story that is incriminating, we want to be sharing ideas, let us know. You understand now? You know they have their press briefing, media chat. Exactly. I have told you that there are always two stories in Nigeria: the official story, which they want the people to hear and the unofficial underlying real story that they do not want you and I to know.

Are you saying, sir, that the media is guilty of mediocrity in all of this?

No. I have told you of the institutional problem of media operations and ownership. The guys who are stealing the money are the ones rich enough to set up newspapers in Nigeria. And who will pay the piper would dictate the tune. Look at all the newspapers in Nigeria. Tell me which one is not being bank-rolled by these bad guys. That was why when I set up the Razor, it became a phenomenon in Nigeria, besides being modest. If I had one of the Generals as my chairman, do you think I would be able to publish all those stories? This is the problem in Nigeria. Nigerian newspapers are owned by the same set of people who are causing the problems; they have control over all the newspapers. Tell me which paper, tell me in which paper does Babangida not have shares in Nigeria, by proxy?

After killing Dele Giwa, he told one of his guys, Mike Adenuga, to go acquire shares in Newswatch. Babangida has shares today in Newswatch. Let Ray Ekpu, Soji Akirinnade, Dan Agbese and Yakubu Mohammed come out and tell Nigerians. That is why those guys can’t do anything.

Is it Vanguard you want to tell me about? He has shares. Let Amuka come out and deny it. How much did he have when he left Olu Aboderin’s The Punch? VANGUARD was about to die. Are you listening to me? VANGUARD was about to die when Babangida came and injected funds into the place.

O.K. Is it Tony Momoh? IBB knew that Tony Momoh knew about the death of Dele Giwa, he made him Minister of Information. Is it Alex Akinyele? Akinyele was a Director on the Newswatch’s board. He also made Akinyele Minister of Information.That was why IBB said “Oh, I know Nigerians very well”.

What of Guardian? Do you know that the Dasuki family in Sokoto has shares in Guardian? I am telling you that they sit on the board. And you know the closeness of the Dasukis and the Babangidas. How would Guardian write anything? You know the owners, the Ibrus collected contracts from the Babangidas too.

Is it Ajibola Ogunsola of The Punch that would go against Babangida? There is only one news organization in Nigeria that can rattle the government, perhaps, maybe The News.

All of them. Is it The Sun? It just came out through Orji Uzor Kalu. Kalu was also a Babangida boy. The Daily Independent is owned by Ibori. James Ibori was an Abacha goon. He has not spoken up on his connection with the death of Chief Alfred Rewane. Which other one? The Nation owned by Tinubu?

Sir, Tinubu was a democracy crusader…

He said he was (laughs) He was.

You were part of the movement, how sincere was he?

There was no movement really. We were fractured. We shall get to that later. It was a loose coalition of like minds. There was no platform that we really had. Even NADECO (National Democratic Coalition) itself was a contraption. We all just felt there must be a way for us to resist the Abacha INSULT, the dictatorship. We were so disjointed. Everybody had different agenda. There was not concerted effort.

Let us go back a little bit on your allegation that prominent journalists benefitted over the death of Dele Giwa. Investigative journalists like us find it difficult to connect the dots.

What dots?

Yes, it was not so obvious that the letter bomb came from IBB. Gani Fawehinmi and many other theorists said it did come from “C-In-C”, Halilu Akilu, Col. Togun are not talking.

Let me clear that one for you. Buhari wanted to make Dele Giwa Minister of Information. Buhari actually granted his maiden interview to Dele Giwa, Ray Ekpu and Yakubu Mohammed for the Concord in February, 1984. In the interview, Buhari said “I would tamper with the press”. That was how Decree No. 4 was promulgated.

After the interview, Buhari made overtures to make Dele Giwa the Minister of Information. Buhari called M.K.O. Abiola and said “I want to make your editor the Minister of Information”, because Dele Giwa was editing Sunday Concord then. M.K.O. Abiola said Dele Giwa would not be interested. That was one of the reasons Dele Giwa left Concord. He was not consulted before Abiola determined his fate.

His fate was determined just like that?

Exactly. Meanwhile Dele Giwa was married to Florence Ita – Giwa. The one who later became a Senator. Ita – Giwa was annoyed that Abiola could not own Dele Giwa’s life even if he was working for him. She wanted him to leave and set up his own. Don’t forget the two, Dele Giwa and Florence Ita had met shortly after Dele returned to Nigeria. They met in Surulere. There was the lady called Ani Okpaku that Dele had separated with. They were in good company with Vera Ifudu. Her other sister was Dora Ifudu at the then NTA. It was Vera who had a birthday celebration party. She invited all the big guys. The late Chris Okolie was there, Sam Amuka – Pemu was there. Florence attended. She had just had a problem, frustration with her former guy here in the U.S. There at the birthday gig she met Dele Giwa and they went home and became so close and that was how they later married.

Dele Giwa only knew of what Abiola did through Florence. Florence was going out with Aliyu Mohammed. Mohammed was the one who told her that Buhari planned to make her husband Minister of Information. Florence was still a lady in town. Several of the top military brass were having a good time with her. She was generous with her endowment around then. Thank you very much, and would then get her contracts. This was one of the reasons Dele Giwa divorced her. They both could be intimate and in the heat of that moment one General or the other would be on the phone with her. Her Husband could be hearing the voice of a General underground. Dele was annoyed. But he bargained for it. They met at a party and went from there into marriage. She would tell Dele to “shut up, I have known these people before I knew you”.

When the parcel bomb that killed Dele was to be delivered, they did not know Dele Giwa’s house. Dele had moved to a new place in Opebi area in the same Ikeja. Abiola had told him to leave after he left Sunday Concord. He had a Mercedes Benz given to him by Abiola. He moved because they now believed so much in their new project, Newswatch. They did not know his new house.

Aliyu Mohammed was the one who volunteered the information that he knew his former wife, Florence. He sent for Florence and when she came, he asked for Dele Giwa’s new residential address. He knew they still saw from time to time though they were no longer married.

She described the new address to them. She pointed her former husband’s address. She did not know that they were after his life, that they wanted to kill him.

She said oh, she normally goes there but that he had moved from Adolphus Davis and that he now lived at Opebi. They said they needed to know the place that was how the babe volunteered the address at Opebi.

The lady knew a lot. That was why Aliyu Mohammed (Gusau) brought her into the strategic position of Presidential Liaison Officer in the National Assembly during Obasanjo’s regime. They were the ones who gave her money to go and contest in Akwa Ibom. Florence Ita – Giwa should speak up. Why has she kept quiet for almost twenty three years?

So this is a challenge for her to speak up?

Yes. I am throwing her that challenge. If the incident I have just narrated is a lie, let her come out and say so. But you see it is the truth. Nigerians must know. She should be able to tell us what happened to her former husband like that. Do you know, she has not granted any interview to anybody?

But she is media savvy. I am surprised she has never spoken about this, if it did happen?

Yes. The press in Nigeria will not ask her such questions (laughs). This is the tragedy of the Nigerian press. They would not ask her. They would be shouting “Mama Bakkassi” with those inconsequential questions. They should be able to ask her “what do you know about the death of your former husband”? “Why, all of a sudden, was she so close to Aliyu Mohammed? She lived far away from her home base. How did she work it and become a Senator? How did she do it and hold the position for eight years? She was in Aso Rock. Obasanjo’s Presidential Liaison Officer, National Security Matters. I have just told you how she got there. It is just to shut her mouth up. Your next question.

You said that the pro-democracy movement was not organized as such, that it was a loose coalition. Could you please explain what you are talking about?

How do I mean?

I need to be educated further, because what Nigerians saw was organized onslaught against the military.

It was an ad-hoc movement. It was an emergency set up. The arrow head was the late Papa Ajasin (Adekunle) Ajasin, who felt the stupidity of the military must be stopped. As a young Nigerian then, that was the only Nigerian that I had seen that had Nigeria’s genuine interest. He loved Nigeria as a nation. That old man was very committed. Very very incorruptible. If there was any Nigerian who lived what they preached, it was that man. He was transparently honest. There are only very few Nigerian politicians who will be placing phone call on the Inland Revenue to demand when his next pension would come. Only very few people would be chairman of a Local Government Area in Nigeria or Governor in a state without a private generating set. He did not have a generator. NEPA would take light and that was it. Baba would call for the candle to be lit. This is not what I read or because we were from the same hometown, I studied him at close range. Several times he
would be sleeping, Abacha would call. He would say that they should tell him he was sleeping. They could not wake him up. That is Baba for you. Remember that he was older than Awolowo.

Yes, he was born in 1908 and Awolowo was born in 1909.

It was Baba and Abraham Adesanya who championed the cause of NADECO. When I met Pa Adesanya in Obalende in 1994, before I left Nigeria, I told him once Abacha got one or two of you guys, that would have been the end. The people who were really committed were Ajasin, Adesanya, Dan Suleiman. The other guys who we are praising today, I don’t know where they belong because I would disclose to you today that Lt. Gen. Alani Akinrinade they are talking about, some of them I don’t know how committed they are. My picture that was taken and sent from prison to Alani Akinrinade in London eventually landed on Abacha’s desk. How that happened, how the photograph got back to Abacha, he never knew.

So you think there was a mole in the house?

That’s right. There were some photographs I took in detention insideAlagbon Prison with Major Kosoko, we were planning to send them to CNN or BBC and I sent them to Mrs. Alice Ukoko-Ugono, a Nigerian-Briton attorney in London, under diplomatic cover. Mrs. Sugono, you would recall was the founder of Women In Nigeria International, WIN, Women International of Nigeria, WIN, in London. That woman really played a great role that was heroic. There were lots of people who championed this June 12 struggle in Nigeria and we never hear of them. They were outside the country and they fought brilliantly.

She braved all odds and came to Nigeria. The pictures were smuggled to her. And she took the pictures to Lt. Gen Alani Akinrinnade. I was shocked when they showed me the photographs when I was eventually captured and kidnapped. How did the photograph that was sent to London under diplomatic cover get to Abacha and his agents? The woman told me that the only one who had custody of the pictures was Alani Akinrinnade. He was the only one they said asked to just see the picture. Well if Akinrinnade is reading this, because I am sure he must be back in Nigeria…

He was at Alausa Democracy fiesta.

That is why I am saying this. Most of these people… By the time I got to Ghana and I called Tokunbo Afikuyomi in Radio Kudirat. He was my colleague at UNILAG. I called him and I asked him what was happening, his excuse was incoherent. That is why I am saying openly now, everybody was just fighting here and there. The only movement that was solid was NALICON that was set up by Prof. Wole Soyinka.

Was that one formidable?

Oh yes, it was. The movement added fillip and energy to our struggle back home, otherwise Abacha wanted to crush all of us. It was a coalition of disparaged ideological minds.

But the story was that Senator Tinubu, who later became governor of Lagos State, did make limitless funds available for the struggle. How true is that?

Yes. Bola Tinubu was an individual. You asked me for a movement. There were more other individuals too like Prof. Banjo who used their resources. But was there any movement? There was no movement. Tinubu made some financial contributions. Other people also did. He was close to Abiola. He accompanied Abiola to Abacha’s office where they discussed that Abacha should stay for six months. And when Abacha reneged, that was how Tinubu ran away from Nigeria.

Was that deal not like a dinner with the devil?

But Abacha told them. He gave them the impression that he would stabilize the place and bring up Abiola. It was a charade.

Was Abiola naïve or he was acting in the best interest of the country?

Not an issue of naiveté. Abiola was trusting. He was an unorganized and indisciplined person, because of money. I mean for someone to live that kind of life. Can you compare between Abiola and Awolowo for instance? Abiola wasn’t organized. He wasn’t a disciplined man. But he was very trusting. We are talking of politics and power.

Do you think he was ever transformed by the betrayals of June 12?

We never knew and we would never know if he had Survived his incarceration. Prison has a way of bringing one’s real character.

How about his tenacity?

Tenacity has nothing to do with discipline. One becomes disciplined while alive.

You had your reservations about his life and you still had your weight and skills behind him?

It was a systemic change. If Obama’s election was annulled because he was black, that would have been the end of America. It is not about personality. A lot of presidential candidates came and were banned before him, nobody fought for them because there was no general election.

When did you choose to abandon intellectual war for armed struggle?

You should understand that many people died because of Babangida’s wickedness. Do you know the kind of pains Babangida inflicted on Nigerians? It appears that the man would go scot free. It should not have happened in any civilized society. That was why I left Nigeria. The annulment of June 12, we may be pretending now that things are ok.

Is that not like taking an extreme position on a matter that appears settled?

We are talking about June 12 now. Your children, mine and their children’s children would talk about the gross injustice. We may be pretending now that let us move forward, things are o.k. Things would never be o.k. in Nigeria. I know that there are forces at work, but the point is that Abiola won on June 12. It would have been alright even if they removed him after a day, one month or ten years in office. But that a man would just wake because he was military general and peremptorily annul an election, because he was a Military General, when the results were everywhere.

At what point in the debacle did you decide to float Razor?

I never knew there was going to be an annulment. What was certain was that Babangida was not ready to go. Because the election was held on 12 th of June, 1993, by March Babangida was dissolving parastatals and constituting boards and memberships. I told my colleagues in Daily Times like Bunmi Aborishade and others that the man would not go anywhere. Six months to that election, the man should have started his farewell tour. Anyone with a sense of history would see it on the horizon that this man would not go anywhere. What was the point of changing officials if he had to go in three or four months? He even made Abiola the Chairman of Nigerian Export Import Bank NEXIM. And I said what is this man IBB, doing?

I never thought of June 12. Razor was a child of circumstances.

Your publication became completely engrossed in that agitation. Didn’t you go beyond normal reportorial routine? You almost became a politician. Why that choice?

Things were abnormal. The role of the media extends beyond gate-keeping or merely informing, educating or entertaining the people. What I saw and discovered was that in any military regime, the press do not only have to become adversarial, we also have to play advocacy role. And that was what happened at that time. There were no democratic institutions. The military pocketed the country. There was no voice of dissent. Newspapers should not have to be a gate keeper only, but to go beyond the normal role of the press in any civilized society. Be advocates. That was how I saw it. We had no access to guns. We could not stage a coup. The only weapon was to wield our pen and fight.

I think the Razor and other militant publications at that time played a militant role.

You actually did more than that. Your connection with Professor Segun Banjo…

Well, you see…

Why the option of arms?

I subscribed to that notion at that time that the way Abacha was going, the man wasn’t interested in dialogue and something needed to be done. Concerning the role of the press in informing, the soul of Nigeria was at stake. I just felt that the monopoly of the military to ammunitions should be broken. There were other colleagues who felt that we would all be crushed if we stayed inside Nigeria.

We had some U.S. based professionals who would form the Peoples Liberation Army of Nigeria, PLAN. The arrangement was afoot. It was said that they were ready to help Nigeria. They would support us to go inside the bush and fight Abacha.

First and foremost, it was not planned well.

Secondly, he wanted to turn it into an exclusive movement. And besides, there was no thorough home work. Choosing Benin Republic to me was the first faulty step. Cotonou was more or less the twenty-second State of Nigeria. I mean that it was reasonable to think of bringing arms and ammunition into Nigeria and say the people should train. But where were they going to train them? There was no political contact. No link whatsoever with those who were fighting inside Nigeria. It was more or less like a one – man show.

You don’t organize a movement like a one man show.

Were you able to point out these weaknesses to him?

We had an argument in Cotonou. I said, because left to me, he has not acknowledged that I had his life and that of his wife in my palm for almost forty-eight hours. The Nigerian government, through S. Adoli the Nigerian ambassador to Republic of Benin, was ready to offer me money to betray them. And I said no.

They should not have used Cotonou or anywhere near Nigeria. These were people who had been out of Africa for a long time. They should have done their home work before importing arms and ammunition. People should have been waiting on the ground for them. Uganda should have been a place of preference. Even I could not make the mistake of choosing a place like Ghana. Ghana, Niger, Chad, Cameroon are too close for comfort to train and want to fight in Nigeria.

The man should have chosen elsewhere. It looked like the man did not have enough money. I read an interview in The Nation in Nigeria, that the man is broke. If he can come to the U.S., there is money waiting for him. He should use this occasion to know that he could contact me through you guys.

You mean there is some money waiting for him here?

Yes. For Prof. Segun Banjo and his wife Ngozika

Do you think he spent up to $4m on the struggle?

I can’t affirm or deny.

I did not see the cache of arm. But at the same time, I would not deny it. I don’t know.

Did your recruitment involve voodoo initiations?

Not necessarily voodoo. When we got to Ghana, there was the suggestion. They were suggesting that kind of stuff, for the purpose of trust and all that. I laughed, because we were not talking of General Ukunda kind of warfare in Congo. I am a Christian. I don’t need to take any concoction or voodoo. I said I would not be involved in that kind of a thing. Many were ready to do the initiation. The struggle is my life and I don’t need to go through any nonsense to be able to prove that.

The Nation said you were arrested because you had assisted the man to plan an escape. What is your story?

I was not arrested. I was kidnapped. I had been invited to Alagbon. I made up my mind after an encounter with Zakari and later Nuhu Ribadu. It was my first time of meeting him. Zakari Biu used my arrest to get Fred Ajudua. They had the idea that Ajudua was the one who was sponsoring me. Ajudua contributed to my…. I want to say it openly today that no matter what anybody may say about 419, no matter your grouse with Ajudua, the man contributed so much to the struggle.

People did not know. There are 419 in America. I don’t want to go into that one. But that man, Zakari Biu raided our office and saw some documents showing correspondence with Ajudua. Ajudua was having a quarrel with Coomasie, the then Deputy Inspector General of Police, D I-G, and Aliyu Atta, the Inspector – General of Police was a friend to Ajudua.

The man never had any respect for Ibrahim Coomasie. Coomasie stepped up after Atta had retired. Then they began to spotlight my closeness to Ajudua. They saw some documents. Ajudua was on my board. Zakari used that connection to go to Ibrahim Coomasie and that was why they arrested Ajudua.

There was the rumor in Nigeria, that I gave up Ajudua. No. They saw my correspondence with Ajudua when they raided my office, that was why they went after him.

When I left Nigeria, it was with my family from Nigeria. When I got in touch with Benin Republic, it was too close to Nigeria. There was nothing we could do. The best thing was for us to stay in Ghana until we had a country that could give us reception. Then we could continue there. But because Nigerian Security guys had already infiltrated Benin Republic, Banjo’s life was in danger. I just put my life on the line and I said I was not going to betray him. What you should know was that I was so concerned with my family, that I wrote a letter to the Beninois government concerning the activities of Mrs. Naryse Fontus. She was the Chief Protection Officer of United Nations High Commission for Refugee (UNHCR). That woman was on the payroll of the Abacha government. We had it on authority that Abacha was sleeping with the woman whenever he was in Cotonou.

Going to UNHCR was like going back to ones death because the woman would virtually betray you. So we knew. She was the one who, however, paid. She gave me money to get Segun Banjo out of Benin Republic. I had photocopies of the money she gave me. So I wrote to the Beninois government on her activities.

I told my family that the letter should be released if anything happened to me. It was that letter that saved me from being killed.

There were lots of people who showed interest in the Nigerian problem at that time. I would not deny, I would not confirm. I would not know. Maybe yes. Maybe it was exaggerated. I don’t know. I don’t know if he spent close to $4m. But on the issue of voodoo and initiation, I told him we were not running Alice Lakwema the LORD’S Resistance Army of Uganda (laughs). You know what I mean. Not the rebel army of Congo. We are educated people. If the struggle is my life, I don’t need to be used. I don’t need to take any concoction. I do not compromise my Christian fundamentals. I said I would not be involved in that kind of a thing. Many people were ready to do the thing. Even some who did not believe in my struggle, just wanted to be initiated voodooist.

It was said you travelled to Ghana with the man (Banjo) and that the reason you were arrested by the DMI was because you enabled and smuggled him to escape.

I was first arrested by FIIB, Alagbon. Zakari Biu effected my arrest to get Fred Ajudua. Biu had that idea that Ajudua was the one who was bankrolling me. Remember Ajudua contributed. No matter your grouse concerning 419 with Ajudua, that man was one of the Nigerians who were committed to the struggle. There are 419 people in the American system as well. I don’t want to go into that now. Zakari Biu ordered a raid on our office. He saw some documents between Ajudua and I which was a strong link of Ajudua with me. Remember, Ajudua was not having a good relationship with Coomasie. Aliyu Atta was a friend to Ajudua. Ajudua had no respect for Coomasie.

It was after the retirement of Atta, that Coomasie went after Ajudua. And somehow, Ajudua was connected with me. Ajudua was a director of our board. Zakari used that to demonstrate to Coomasie that the document must be used to nail Ajudua and that was why they arrested him. I want to use this forum to clear the air of the wrong information in Nigeria that I gave up Ajudua. No. It was our correspondence that they saw when they raided my office that led to his arrest. I did not give him up.

How was Ajudua your boss?

I said he was on my board. He was a member of the board of directors of my company, Razor. I also knew he gave lots of money to several pro-democracy people and leaders. Unfortunately, they have not treated him well.

So what actually happened? How and why were you arrested?

I took my family out of Nigeria. Cotonou was the first stop point. But meeting the Banjos, I knew that Cotonou was not safe. Benin Republic was very close to Nigeria. There was not much we could do. It was better for us to stay in Ghana, maybe we could eventually get a country to give us reception, the struggle would continue from there. Nigerian Security guys had already infiltrated Cotonou and they wanted to take Banjo out (kill him). I put my life on the line that I was not going to betray them. But what you should know was that I was so concerned with the safety of my family that I wrote a letter to the Beninois authorities concerning the activities of UNHCR.

I had detailed the activities of the woman, and I gave a copy of the letter to my former wife. The UNHCR boss was the one who gave me the money with which I took Banjo to Ghana. I made photocopies of the currency notes. The letter I had given to my wife on the woman’s activities became the reason why I was not killed immediately I got to DMI.

That is the story I want to tell you today. When they saw that letter, they were fooled that I could not be working with Banjo and still had a document alleging inappropriate things against the woman. Remember we heard the woman was a girlfriend of Abacha’s and that she was on the payroll of the Nigerian government then.

I was taken to Nigeria on Saturday February 15. I was kidnapped at 10 p.m. Friday February 14, 1997. On Saturday, February 15, 1997, when I got to DMI, Apapa and they were interrogating me, that letter was brought out. It was that letter that saved me when Mustapha, Omenka and all of them arrived to interrogate me. I was grilled for twelve hours. That letter that I wrote in which I said I did not cause the escape of Professor and Mrs. Banjo, and that it was the UNHCR woman that did it, that was what saved my life.

So they asked me “why did you leave Nigeria?” I said because I could not practice anything. “Did you go to join PLAN?” I said “No”. “But you said it in your paper that there was only one way to remove Abacha, and that was through Armed Struggle. So did you go to Benin Republic to give effect to what you wrote two months ago?” I kept quiet.

So they produced the letter. I had written it in English and I got a professor friend of mine at the University of Benin in Cotonouto translate it into French. Very good French. I had a copy in English. They produced it. When they read it there, they started looking at themselves. And I said this letter confirmed that I wasn’t a member of PLAN. I was very diplomatic otherwise…

But in actual fact you were a member of PLAN.

I have just told you now that I wasn’t a member because of some of the things that I disagreed with Banjo over. The idea of voodoo. There was no meticulous plan. Why smuggle arms and ammunition through Benin Republic? Only a fool and tactless person would do that. Benin is just an annex of Nigeria. Why not go to Senegal. Even to Gambia. Why not go to Congo. Or Sudan, the largest country in Africa where one could be in an enclave and no one would know. I just don’t know. PLAN was not planned well.

And I told Prof. Banjo. But that doesn’t mean that I should betray them, because they offered me money. S. Adoli, the Nigerian Ambassador sent emissaries to me that if I betrayed Banjo they would pay me, and I said no way.

How much were they offering sir?

Well, I don’t know and I did not care to know.

Were they non- specific?

No. It was that letter that I wrote. The woman left Benin Republic within 24 hours. She just vamoosed. And I found out that she is in Kenya now. They were after her life because she was collecting money from the Nigerian government. I told you that Abacha was allegedly sleeping with her. She was telling them that I was the one who caused the escape of Banjo.

I did not need to argue for myself, the letter that I wrote nailed her. I did not submit the letter to President Mathew Kerekou, it was just a back-up plan. I knew that they would come for me. They were so desperate. God inspired me to write that letter and I sold them a dummy. When Omenka and Al Mustapha saw the letter they said that it was the woman they were paying who betrayed them and not me. That was why I was not killed that night.

But they still went ahead to torture you, in spite of that?

Yes. But torture is different from killing.

I want to know what the holding cell looked like.

It was a gulag. Rodents co-habit with humans. Once you entered the place, you can’t know your way out. It was a real dungeon. An underground tunnel. I was there by myself. When I got here, to the U.S., I was still having flashbacks and nightmares. It was a harrowing experience. I’m o.k. now. It was not a pleasant experience. (Voice increasingly became pensive) I was there for two years. I was quarantined. I did not have any contact with any human being. I was thinking that they did not want to shoot me but knew a civilian would not survive the place because that was the same place they kept late Gen. Mamman Vatsa.They just wanted me to die somehow and that my body would be collected and that would be it.

Understand that one of my cousins was one of those who interrogated me. They did not know. He is still in the system. He pretended that he did not know me. That was the cousin with whom I lived when Babangida took over power. He did not torture me. He pretended that he did not know me.

So you did actually drive Professor Banjo to Ghana?

I did not drive him. I ordered a cab for them. I took them to a hotel. It was a non-descript hotel. Nobody knew that they were there. The UNHCR guy wanted me to take them out at night. I made up my mind that I would take them out in broad day light.

The Nigerian Security people didn’t know that they could come out in the afternoon. Bad things happen at night. They were waiting for them at night. We got to Benin Togo border at 11 a.m. The Nigerian goons were there from 12 midnight to 6 a.m. I hired the taxi like any other passenger. I did it through my United Nations Card.

They stopped us at the border, I flashed my card and I said I was taking U.N. Official to Ghana, they waved us on. And then I returned.

Were you indeed suspended, hanged downwards to roast gradually on a burning stove while at DMI dungeon? Was it that bad?

(Laugh) It borders on exaggeration. You know I said it in my column. It was exaggerated.

You mean that never happened?

Well, I wasn’t tortured to that level. All that fire thing, no, no.

You were only released after Abacha died?

Remember there was a fight at DMI. They were not coordinated. Sabo was the second in command to… There was a lady military officer that used to come to me at night. We were exchanging information. She could not have access to my place. She was the one who went to Bamaiyi to tell him about my case.

Remember Alima Asuku from Kogi state, a girlfriend of Abacha’s was there. She had four children for Abacha. The lady was from Okene. She was detained with us. She was very nice. She was nice to me.

Ishaya Bamaiyi was the only military officer who visited me in the underground tunnel after my case had been presented to him by the lady military officer. We spoke. Bamaiyi thought that if Abacha died, he would step into Abacha’s shoes. God had shown me that Abacha would die.

Did you tell him that?

Yes. The message was open. I told the lady as well. Omenka and all of them heard me when I said that Abacha was going to die. I started saying it in 1997. Almost a year before Abacha died. It was an open thing.

And it was not as if you had any clandestine plan with anybody?

No. Just a vision from God.

When you said that to the military intelligence people, did they accuse you of treasonable felony?

They thought I was crazy. They asked if it was going to be through a coup. I said I don’t know but that the man was going to die. And it happened like that. And I made up my mind. From there, we knew they were going to bring… Up till today, Nigerians do not know how Abacha and Abiola died and how they arranged for Obasanjo to become the President. I shall now place that information and the dots to connect it all at your disposal. It was Babangida and the northern oligarchy that planned it all. Obasanjo is just an Uncle Tom. The slave in the house. He is not in the inner caucus of anything. He is a cannon fodder.

You don’t see the names of those Hausa Fulanis who rule Nigeria on the pages of Nigerian newspapers. They do not speak Hausa. They speak Fulfulde. They speak the language of the Fulani. They traced their lineage to Othman (or Usman) Dan Fodio. They are sworn to rule Nigeria from the North until they deep their Koran inside the (ocean) and make all Nigerians to become Moslems. They are still active inside Nigeria today.

Most Yorubas, Urhobo, Edo, Ibos, Deltas, Ijaws, Efik, Ibibio and Nothern Minorities do not know what is happening. There is internal colonialism going on in Nigeria. All the talk of Adamawa, Sokoto, Bauchi is rubbish. There is only one Hausa-Fulani oligarchy.

That is why people much resist the attempt at making our children second class citizens in that country. Awolowo saw it very early in the life of the Republic. Abiola saw it too. When you have your own money, you will have a voice. The only person that they have even been able to buy over is Obasanjo. He is their errand boy.

But Obasanjo would argue to the contrary, sir.

It doesn’t matter. It is like saying there is no God. It does not remove the fact. You wake up in the morning; you see His creation, the sun and daylight…

Nigerians in my generation think we should stay inside one nation and engineer a good political culture.

For eight years that Obasanjo governed, he could not do anything. All these things you are hearing from me, if we were in Nigeria, no newspapers would carry it. This idea of Babangida’s past was what Bola Ige had when he became Attorney-General and Minister of Justice. He had all the papers on Babangida and his gang. He was coming to the U.S. to expose him and they had to kill him. Did you know that?

Not exactly. So you are saying that was why he was assassinated?

Yes. Obasanjo knows this fact. Let him speak up. He said it himself that Bola Ige did not know his left from his right. These are some of the dirty things that they needed to perpetuate. That was why Babangida brought Aliyu Mohammed (Gusau) back. The story could not come out now in Nigerian papers. It is when the man dies that Nigerian journalists would be pretending to be investigating.

Are you saying that Nigerian journalists are lazy?

The so-called Nigerian mainstream media has always been like that. That is why Babangida always says “I know Nigerians”. He has spread his tentacles and has bought into all of them.

We know credible Nigerians like Professor Wole Soyinka and even leaders from the North are talking about these things.

Why are they not saying it openly? Prof Soyinka, I respect. He has international clout, but he had one or two things to do with Babangida. Although his intentions were pure, Babangida granted him some favors in order to later arm string him and shut him up.

Do you know what those one or two things are sir?

Dr Yemi Ogunbiyi was one of Wole Soyinka’s lieutenants. Ogunbiyi’s job was on the line at the Guardian. I worked in the Guardian then. His appointment was terminated. He approached Alex Ibru that Ogunbiyi should be retained and nothing was done. He was annoyed. So Soyinka approached Babangida. And that was how Dr. Ogunbiyi became the Managing Director of Daily Times. Ogunbiyi eventually gave me a job at the Daily Times. I am confessing that. Ogunbiyi went to Daily Times and made his money. Babangida knows how to apply rude squeeze. Soyinka does not owe him anything. At least he did not collect anything directly from Babangida. I know that alright. But like I said when you do me a favor, you could expect something in return.

Even in the death of Dele Giwa, Prof. Soyinka and Dr. Ogunbiyi would have known. Remember that Ogunbiyi was the Master of Ceremony at the funeral of Dele Giwa. And he was the Director of Publicity at the Guardian.

Sully Abu, Stanley Macebuh, Andy Akporugo, Ogunbiyi were all close to Dele Giwa. They knew why IBB killed their friend. Nobody wants to talk. They are all still alive. That’s why I am talking from the U.S. now. This is a challenge to them.

Andy Akporugo is dead. Segun Osoba is still alive. They should come out and tell Nigerians what they know. They know why Babangida killed Dele Giwa. They all had the story that Dele Giwa had. But they can’t publish it. And I was the only one who published it. That is the truth.

Let us go back a little bit. The lady, Gloria Okon, identified as a drug courier for IBB and his wife, who was she? Is she still alive or not?

Well Dr. Taiwo Ogunade, like I said, my colleague, has already told us the whole story. What else would you want me to add?

What did he say?

He said that Gloria Okon is still alive and that she changed her name and lives in London.

You want to challenge her to come into the open and say what she knows?

Well, Dr. Ogunade said it and nobody has contradicted him. I am waiting for the day Babangida will come into the U.S. He goes everywhere and he doesn’t come here. His wife did, but we want him to come and then we shall dock him…

But he can argue that his situation is about subverting civil governance and not about being a drug baron or a murderer?

Let him come here and that issue would be … Do you know how many people he killed? Idiagbon is dead. But Buhari is still alive. He should speak up. He knows why his government was toppled. I challenge him to come out and speak out about why he was toppled.

I disagree with you on how you trump Buhari as honest and all that. He was in Abacha’s government. He served as Head of Petroleum Trust Fund. Idiagbon’s son also served with him. They were part of the looting gang…

You see, among thieves, there is honor. Tell me who doesn’t steal in Nigeria. When I say I respect him, Local Government Chairmen, they all steal. But you cannot compare between how Buhari would steal with Abacha’s voracious hunger for money, power, women and all of that. In the company of thieves, there is always a little bit of honor.

Like Babangida and Abacha, these are sophisticated highway armed robbers. They are rapacious looters. Their level of corruption you cannot compare with that of Buhari. That is what I am saying. Abacha, Obasanjo, Babangida are international highway robbers.

You can’t redeem Obasanjo and Babangida.

How did your family cope during your incarceration?

I have acknowledged my gratitude to a lot of people. Dr. kayode Fayemi, Prof. Wole Soyinka, people in the pro–democracy fold. People in Republic of Benin – especially the Yoruba speaking area. The West African Journalists Association, my friend, Bunmi Aborishade, Mr. Amikal Kabrah in Ghana,… Reporters Without Borders, Committee for the Protection of Journalists.

You haven’t gone back to Nigeria since you came in 1999.

Yes. And I am never going to go back. I am a U.S. citizen forever.

But you can be told that your struggle has culminated in democratic rule?

No. Which democracy in which Babangida still rules by proxy? In which David Mark who once said that telephone is not for the poor is leading the senate? Mark who stole the telecommunications sector dry is ruling again in our time. You say that is democracy? You know Muktar, one of the Babangida boys is now at the NSA. The same set of deceptive characters is ruling.

Which democracy? The one in which election results are ready before people go to cast their votes?

What should we do to earn the respect of the world?

There is no leadership in Nigeria. It is an organized chaotic place. The followership should push for complete reorganization of the country. Northerners demonstrated on June 12 that they cannot release people from servitude voluntarily. They are still in control. I don’t know why we suffer from collective amnesia. Everybody is suffering from attention deficit disorder (ADD). They merely brought Obasanjo to assuage the injustice. Obasanjo was governing but he was not in power. He thanked them for the eight years they gave to him and they said “thank you boy”. That’s all they did (laughs).

If you own a house, you go into any room. You tell your tenants where they have as their own place. You don’t jump anyhow. They collected the keys from Obasanjo. That’s what they did. The Southerners are tenants in Nigeria, the Northerners are the landlords.

So they gave it to Obasanjo, supposedly on behalf of the Yorubas because of the death of Abiola. And then everybody started shouting and said eh! Look at the man who midwife the so-called democracy. Abdulsalami Abubakar, it was Babangida who planted him there. He wanted to retire, Babangida said don’t leave, you will still do one thing for me (laughs). And then Babangida called all the Generals and said they no longer needed to stage coup anymore.

We know who they would want to give power to because results were ready even before elections. That’s because the media is owned by the big guys. Most of the guys in the media are hungry. How much do they pay them? Once you lose your job that’s it. You saw how Godwin Agthey treated Godwin Agbroko. No insurance, nothing. Your family would just suffer. It is just struggle for survival in Nigeria, that’s all.

How many Nigerian newspaper houses have insurance for their workers? Is there any culture of insurance ever in Nigeria? The question is that how many of the journalists are even being paid what they are worth? Everybody is just doing it to put food on the table. Take your children to the school. Everybody is in survival mode. So which media? That’s why they carry same headline all the time (laughs).

Do they even have the money to look for stories? That is why they have myriads of awards. “Governor of the Year”. It’s all rubbish (Laughs). How many of them have the money to investigate stories? Is it Compass that is owned by Gbenga Daniel? People are suffering. Unless you are in government, you have to steal. It is that bad.

That is why I asked why my friend Dr. Fayemi should go and stay in Nigeria. There is no newspaper in Nigeria. Look at the way you guys are serializing the Biography of M.K.O. Abiola. I issued the challenge to Nigerian newspapers to serialize it free. None of them has been able to take up the challenge. Nigeria is a failure. That is why I am one hundred percent behind the Movement for the Emancipation of Niger Delta (MEND). I don’t hide it. That is what we need in Nigeria. Until the landlord/tenant relationship between the north and south stops, the problem would continue. The North wants to corner power for life, that is not a nation, even if it happens like that in America, people will fight. You remember how the blacks rejected slavery here.

MEND may be accused of anarchy and brigandage…

No. The brigands are in Abuja. Those leaders in Abuja are the brigands. MEND is what Nigeria deserves. Those who make peaceful change impossible make violent change inevitable. Should you and I be outside Nigeria if we have good leaders and good governance? If not for divine intervention do you know what Abacha was planning for Nigeria? When I published it that Abacha had stolen three billion were they not calling Razor junk publication?

All the stories that we are just hearing now, do you know that I carried them almost twenty years ago, while the so-called mainstream press were blackmailing me that my stories were junk. If Abacha did not die, would we have known that he coveted 7 billion out of Nigeria? That was a man who spent just five years. Do you know how much Babangida stole in eight years? Do you know how much Obasanjo stole in eight years? Plus the one he stole when he first came? How much were they paying him in the military that could make him own that Otta farm? So we know those who were stealing in Nigeria.

Just give me the opportunity and I would release the list of Nigerians and how much they own in their foreign accounts. When I published it in Razor in 1994, were they not blackmailing me?

All those stories that later came out at Oputa Panel in Nigeria, I was the first to publish them.

This disclosure after years of the fire-bombing of Dele Giwa, I was the only one who carried it in Nigeria. The so called established press, even his friends and partners were scared to touch it. They only wanted money to take care of their families. None of them could come out to say “ah why? Why did you have to kill our colleague?” The worst that could happen would be to go into exile. Must they practice in Nigeria? But because of money. And Babangida had the audacity to go to Newswatch and buy shares and they allowed him. That is how you know that most of Nigerian journalists are stupid. They cannot fight for anything. They are only interested in money. That’s all. There is no one who is interested in honest leadership in Nigeria.

Why would you consider it fair to pin all the mis-governance on Hausa/Fulani area. You know other individuals from other tribes and parts of Nigeria are guilty as well…

People who are students of history, especially those who have studied the Hausa/Fulani oligarchy, if you have read a book by J.F.A. Ade – Ajayi, Africa in the Nineteenth Century, it is about the history, explained the history of Hausa State, talks of the arrival of one Baya Jida from the Middle East who married the Queen of Daura. I think from the present Katsina State.

And between them they had seven Hausa sons who are called the Banza Bakwai. And then there were seven other illegitimate sons of same man. The seven illegitimate sons later formed the fourteen Hausa States. Daura, Katsina, Zau Zau (Zaria), Kano, Rano and Biram, Gwandu

The Fulanis arrived in the Northern area and conquered the Hausas. Hausas and Fulani had historically been separate people. I studied African History at the graduate level and learned from respectable and unbiased professors; the best in the field. It is important that people understand this story, and eventually, the Fulani legitimized their power over the Hausas and imposed their religion and ways of life on the Hausas. Historically, Hausas were not Moslems; their religion was what they called Maigazuya or Maigazurra kind of religion. This comprised magic, witchcraft and all the rest, mixed with Islam. The Fulanis came and emasculated the Hausas, changed their religion and even their ways of life. Today, these Fulanis who speak Fulfude are in Northern Nigeria. They became Hausa-Fulani and are determined to turn Nigeria into an Islamic enclave. This is the war that Chief Obafemi Awolowo fought to resist; we are still fighting it today in Nigeria.
People do not know what is happening and that is why I said those who are ruling Nigeria, who are destroying that nation, you can count them, a handful of them. What they do is that they believe that political, religious and economic powers in Nigeria belong to them. They see others as second-class citizens, they are full of hubris. The way they operate is to plant Emirs in even non-Moslem and non-Hausa-Fulani towns and villages. Can you believe that Lafia in Nassarawa State with just a handful of Hausa-Fulani should be governed by an Emir? I served in Ilorin, Kwara State during my NYSC and could count the number of Hausa-Fulani resident in that city yet they are ruled by an Emir.

While we, in the South are running after money, not yet able to put our acts together, these people have perfected how they are going to rule Nigeria forever. Yorubas, Ibos,Ibibios, Efik, Benin, Kalabaris, Itshekiri and the rest in the South should wake up otherwise our children and grandchildren will curse us in our graves after we have gone. They will ask just as my children are asking me now in America; Daddy, what did you do? Are you just watching?. There is discrimination in Nigeria to the level that since the 1960’s no person outside the Hausa – Fulani oligarchy has ruled Nigeria. The two periods under southern leadership was more or less accidental.

The death, the assassination of Muritala Mohammed paved the way for Obasanjo to rule in the 1976 and after a democratically acclaimed election was held in 1993, the only person who could represent the genuine aspirations of Nigerians, M.K.O. Abiola was stopped by the oligarchy. They brought their man, Olusegun Obasanjo, to rule again. Between 1976-1979, Obasanjo was not even ruling; the power really was in the hands of the late General Shehu Musa Yar’Adua, the elder brother of the one there now; Umaru. The late General Olufemi Olutoye once narrated a story in his autobiography where he said, immediately Obasanjo was sworn into office in 1976 following Muritala Muhammed’s death, he came to Doddan Barracks and explained the situation of other ethnic tribes to him in federal appointments and the need to redress anomaly. He left after his discussions with Obasanjo and few hours later, Obasanjo set for him. The late Gen. Musa Yar’Adua, the then Chuef
of Staff Supreme Headquarters was already waiting and in the latter’s presence, Obasanjo asked him to repeat what he had just said few hours earlier. He, Olutoye repeated what he told Obasanjo. The following morning, Olutoye’s retirement was announced on the FRCN. It was so bad in the 1970s down till the 1990s that some Southerners in the Nigerian Military had to change their names to Mohammed, Umaru and even converted into Islam to get promotion. I knew those Southerners who left the Nigerian Army out of frustration because of this nonsense. The fact of the matter is there is no Nigerian Army, what we have is Northern Nigerian Army. We cannot continue like this as a people, Southerners must assert their legitimate rights in their own fatherland or we go our separate ways, period.

Do you know I have more rights as a Nigerian-American here in the United States than my native land Nigeria?

So look at Nigerian history, by next year, we shall be fifty years old as a nation. No non-Northerner has always earned a genuine mandate for the aspirations of our people. They control the military; this is the reality, the internal colonization of the country that I am talking about.

The southerners must sit down and organize and say that it is either they are accepted as equals or everybody must go his own way.

What is the real legitimate reason for the annulment of June 12 elections? What do you know in view of the fact that some people claim IBB had intelligence, almost incontrovertible that Abiola was a CIA operative?

Some analysts say Babangida was pressurized, this and that, in annulling that election. That was hogwash. A person, a rogue, a coup plotter like Babangida, a former drug baron like Babangida, could not be pushed by anybody. They even said what they wanted you journalists to believe that some officers in the military put a gun to his head. That did not happen. Which officer could do that so that he could annul the election? These are the rubbish they are feeding Nigerians. It is so sad that those who called themselves leaders appear on television and lie barefaced to Nigerians and we believe them. These are not men and women of honor, I tell you. They lie, they steal and they kill. Since 1960, the act of governance, administration has always been in secrecy. There are two stories to every government decision and policy in Nigeria as I have pointed out to you. Two levels of information exist in Nigeria, to create a façade and avoid public
scrutiny. Political actors give us two stories, the official story and the unofficial story. And the Nigerian press goes with the official story. They are part and parcel of the official. That organized conspiracy was elevated to official pastime during the disastrous years called the IBB years. You know they always appeared on television or during their media chats with these ludicrous epithets; “We do not run our government on the pages of newspapers.” Remember?

Even the so-called Obasanjo “elected government, you hear them telling Nigerians “oh this government is not run on the pages of newspapers”.

Why should government not be run on the pages of newspapers? In a democracy? That is why you will know that there are two versions of stories. The truth, which only few people would be privy to are the official stories that they use the media to push out to the Nigerian Public. That was what happened on June 12.

We all know that June 12 is the ultimate culmination of the 1985 coup of survival which Babangida staged for self – preservation.

Let us be frank, the man did not want to leave the place. He was coming out with the idea of diarchy. He sent people like Mukoro Tony Nyiam to study the idea in Egypt, Santiago in Chile, and an admixture of civilian and military leadership. That was what the man was planning until Abiola decided to contest. Of course you know the story of how Abiola emerged as the candidate of the then Social Democratic Party S.D.P. Abiola was able to emerge as the presidential flag bearer as the SDP in Jos as late Major – General Shehu Musa Yar’ Adua discovered that, Ambassador Baba Gana Kingibe was pealing away votes from Atiku Abubakar for Abiola.

The forces of Atiku and Abiola teamed up and worked for Abiola’s victory. What they did was that six people met at the residence of Ambassador Yaya Kwade on Ibrahim Taiwo Avenue in Jos, M.K.O. Abiola, his first son, Kola, Dr. Jonathan Zwingina (later became a senator), Major General Shehu Musa Yar’ Adua himself, Atiku Abubakar and Yaya Kwande. And they agreed, and Abiola himself appended his signature that the forces of Atiku Abubakar will co-operate and that when Abiola emerged as the flag bearer that he would make Atiku Abubakar his running mate. Abiola agreed. He became the flag bearer of the SDP.

While they were there, because we have to be frank, it was not actually a primary, for those of us who were there, Abiola bought the ticket, because of his money power. Where Ambassador Kingibe was spending N500, N2, 000 to buy delegates, Abiola upped the stakes to N10, 000, N20, 000 per delegate. Unknown to Abiola, Babangida’s agents were filming everything live. They captured everything on tape. For example, Abiola gave N10m cash to Lamidi Adedibu. And the late Adedibu was captured on tape with wads of Naira notes shouting to Oyo State delegates “Eyin ara Ibadan, Owo Abiola ti de”, meaning “Folks from Ibadan, Abiola’s cash has landed” (laughs) openly. You know the man was a political jobber, half-illiterate. And suddenly, delegates for Atiku and Kingibe moved and switched to Abiola. Abiola instructed Kola to increase the stakes to N20, 000 against N500 from the others. It was cash and carry for Abiola. They were all caught on tape
and that was the tape that Babangida sent to the State Department here in the United States to justify the annulment among other reasons

So all the trips to Abuja where he allegedly accused Abiola of operating for CIA….

No. He did not even give that reason. It was his crony, Sani Abacha, I am coming back to that issue, and it was Obasanjo who prompted Sani Abacha to stage the November 24, 1993 coup.

There were basically three reasons Babangida annulled the election.

First, the man didn’t just want to go. He wanted diarchy. That was why Olumilua, Adeleke, Ebri, Osoba, Otedola ruled with him for two years.

Secondly, there were deep – seated animosities between him and Abiola. Most Nigerians do not want to hear this that the money kept in Abiola’s account through an arrangement brokered by Babangida was one of the reasons that caused the problem. And of course when Maryam Babangida went to Beijing in China, there were reports that Abiola slept with the woman, which no one knew. Whether it was a lie, it was going to be a lie. These were the personal reasons. Babangida’s personal self entrenchment and the betrayal of each other over Sergeant Samuel Kanyon Doe’s money.

Doe was looking for where to keep the money he had stolen from the Liberian economy. He was looking for a place to keep the money for his wife Nancy and his children. So he approached Babangida. And Babangida told him “hey, I’m president here and I don’t want to put the money in my account. We have a friend who we can use”.

That was how he suggested Abiola and of course, Abiola had investment in Liberia. So the money was paid into Abiola’s Swiss Account.

After Doe died, Nancy, his wife came all the way from London to Nigeria. No Nigerian newspaper, most editors knew, but did not want to carry it. None of them could carry the story, the plan was for…. Babangida had suggested to Doe to go on exile at the thick of the Liberian war. He felt he could go to Saudi Arabia. The late Idi Amin also came to Nigeria and stayed in Sheraton Hotel during that period. Idi Amin called and advised Doe not to go on exile, that with timing, the war may eventually favor Doe. Idi Amin was the one who told him not to go on exile.

The Saudi authorities were ready to take Doe. As it eventually turned out, Doe was killed by Yormie Johnson’s soldiers. So his family, Doe’s families were now in need and they came to Nigeria to ask for what their bread winner had kept for them. Babangida welcomed them, and then he sent for Abiola. Abiola replied that, well the money was paid into the late Simbiat Abiola, his first wife’s account. And that he wasn’t the person holding that account, that it was Kola Abiola and that Babangida should call his first son, Kola. So Babangida felt insulted that this was a friend of both of them who was in need so that he could take care of his family and Abiola was saying all those kind of things. You know how I was able to authenticate the story? Through the late Shehu Musa Yar ‘Adua, because Chris Mamman, who eventually became Chief Press Secretary to former Vice President Atiku Abubakar took me to General Yar’ Adua’s office in Victoria
Island. Nancy Doe, the wife of late Samuel Doe of Liberia is in London, you guys should track her down for an interview. Nigerian newspapers don’t have the resources in the first place to pursue that kind of story and secondly, no editor in Nigeria will dare venture to publish such a story. I told you that Babangida has corrupted virtually all of them either directly or indirectly. It’s just so bad that most editors are on the payroll of the SSS while some are moles in the newsroom. Some editors have to be looking over their shoulders when they are planning stories because you just don’t know who would betray you to the soldiers in power. I doubt whether that culture has changed much. As I have said, we have the finest and the best journalists in the world but the institutional obstacles in media houses are formidable. Nigerian Journalists are poorly paid, there is no insurance and the tools are not there for them to work.

Was Mr. Mamman there during this conversation?

Yes. It was General Yar’ Adua who gave us the story. And he also said it that when Abiola ran into trouble, that he said, that he, Yar’ Adua had warned Abiola that “are you sure”, he was telling Chris Mamman that he told Abiola “are you sure that our friend Ibrahim was ready to leave?” That was what he said he asked him when he wanted to run for the presidency. “I wanted to be president too, the man banned me. Are you sure you would not be banned?” That even if you win the election, are you sure that Babangida was ready to go?” All that with the Doe offer…” and Abiola assured him that he too had done a lot of favors for Babangida in the past, he was the one who gave him money when he struck in 1985, that the two of them had extended favors to each other, and that he did not see a reason why Babangida would not want him to succeed him. This was from the mouth of Shehu Musa Yar’ Adua in the presence of Chris Mamman. But
most newspapers would not carry this story in Nigeria.

Babangida had been saying that Abiola would not last more than sixty days, ninety days. No soldier, no person put any gun on his head.

Have you met Babangida in person before?

I wouldn’t say that I met him one on one. The first time I saw him was in 1985, while I worked with Concord. One of Abiola’s wives had a baby and they were having the naming ceremony. Virtually all the top editors of Concord titles were in Abiola’s house that night at Moshood Abiola crescent at Ikeja; that was the first time I saw Babangida afar. In fact it was at that ceremony, the naming ceremony, that the details of the August 27, 1985 coup were fine tuned. That was where they planned everything. That was where Abiola released the money for the boys…

How much?

Ten million U.S. dollars cash. They wanted money. Babangida and his boys never knew whether the coup would succeed or not. And they needed money. There was no other safe meeting point were Babangida and Abiola would have a conversation. Rafindadi, the National Security Organization, NSO’s boss, had already bugged Babangida’s telephone lines. They used the innocent child’s naming ceremony as a cover – up. Duro Onabule was there that day. I think it was Ebenezer Obey that entertained, there were lots of musicians. I think Sikiru Ayinde Barrister also played that night. So while guests were in front of Abiola’s house, the military guys who came with Babangida, Abubakar Umar and the others retired to the back of Abiola’s house. It was in that place that they struck. They had chosen October 1 st, 1985 as I told you before but acted faster. Buhari is still alive; he should confirm or deny what I am saying… They knew the details. I
am issuing that challenge. Up till today Buhari has not spoken on why he was toppled. He should speak out. Top editors can corroborate what I am telling you now. They know it. May be they’re waiting for Babangida to die and then they would come out with their “exclusive.”

You promised me you would reveal the story behind Abacha’s coup and how and the way he died.

Oh yes. Not only that, let me also tell you how Abiola died. When Babangida was chased out, his tail between his legs, or whatever he chose to call it, “stepping aside”, he had lost the initiative, right? They put up the contraption called ING (Interim National Government). He knew that his friend, the Chief of Army Staff and the Defense Minister, Sani Abacha would stage the coup. There were some young Army Officers led by Col. Bello Fadile, who wanted to stage a coup, to pre-empt Abacha’s take over. Those guys went to Ota farm to inform Obasanjo. Are you listening to me? Those guys were between the ranks of majors and colonels. They were young guys who wanted to stage a coup and remove Shonekan. We don’t know whether they were planning to revalidate June 12. They went to Obasanjo at Ota Farm, Ogun State to tell him and when they left, Obasanjo wrote a personal letter to Abacha. When Obasanjo saw that the boys, he knew they were
radicals. He knew that if those guys succeeded in their coup, there would be a lot of things that would happen in Nigeria which he did not like. So he wrote a personal letter to Abacha to do something about it. And that was more or less a coded way of telling Abacha to stage a coup. It was that letter that Abacha used to rope Obasanjo into the coup saga later on when Obasanjo snubbed Abacha. That letter got him in jail.

Abacha had also sworn to have his day against Obasanjo for spiting him by declining a ride in the presidential plane with him to Mandela’s inauguration in South Africa. He invited Obasanjo for a ride. Obasanjo said he would not be going. When Abacha staged his own coup in November 17, 1993 because of the personal letter of instigation from Obasanjo, Obasanjo refused the presidential ride. When Abacha got to South Africa, he saw Obasanjo and he said “ha ha”. When he came back, he had this attitude like Idi Amin that “if you are not my friend, you must be my enemy. And if you are my enemy, you must die”. (Laughs) So he got the message that this guy was trying to avoid him and that was why he did not ride with him to South Africa. That Obasanjo’s snobbery was what landed him in trouble. He was double-dealing. Consulted for Abacha in secret and avoided and distanced himself in public. For Shehu Musa Yar’Adua, he got into trouble for
sponsoring a motion calling for return-to-civil rule in 1998 at the so-called Constitutional Conference set up by Abacha. He went to the NUJ Lighthouse to address a press conference and later that day, as Abacha’s hit men were after him, he jetted out of the country to Saudi Arabia. Three weeks later when he returned to Nigeria, Abacha ordered he should be picked up and you know the rest of the story.

So, how did Abacha die?

Remember there are two story lines to events in Nigeria. The official one that they dish out to you journalists which they use to hide the real truth, and the unofficial one which is the real thing but which would not be published in the newspapers. That is the real story which is usually unofficial. It still happens today. Remember how they desperately denied your story that Yar’ Adua was sick? You see that the man still looks very sickly. You cannot rely on government spokesmen or their ubiquitous press releases.

They want Nigerians and the international community to think that Abacha died in the hands of two Indian prostitutes. It is a lie. I was kidnapped and kept by the Directorate of Military Intelligence, DMI, at that time. You know being detained by DMI allows one has a peep into the real happenings in Nigeria. That is the secret of government. The DMI is where most intelligence stories come out.

This is the way Abacha died. Abacha was eliminated by the Hausa/Fulani oligarchy. There were three reasons why they took him out. When he came into power and removed the ING and refused to revalidate June 12 election, the Northerners were happy. While he was clamping the NADECO people and was hounding most of us in the radical media and threatened to destroy and kill people in Lagos, the oligarchy and followers were happy and cheering him.

But when Abacha decided to attack Yar’ Adua by administering toxic injection on him and the man was killed inside Abakaliki prison, killing the head of the Kaduna Mafia like that, the Northerners now knew too late that Abacha was not fighting for the oligarchy. It was the death of Musa Yar’ Adua that opened their eyes; that this so called Abacha had a personal agenda.

You know they were hiding his real identity. They were shielding his background that he was not originally from Nigeria. He was not Hausa/Fulani. He was Kanuri. They were not part of the Hausa/Fulani oligarchy. Although he adopted Kano as his home town he was originally from Chad. His family migrated from Chad. There are many of them in the North who joined the military at that time. There is no serious journalist in Nigeria who has been able to trace this guy’s background at least to three of four generations. If you go to Owo or Akure today, at least I would know the Abitogun family. Right. I would be able to tell the world that your great grandfather was a king of Ijebu – Owo… Nobody has been able to do that concerning the Abachas. In Nigeria, nobody is interested in all these kinds of things.

So the man…

Have you done that yourself?

That is why I am telling you that the man was not a Nigerian. If a child’s father died… I lost my father early in life, but when you hear, you know that there are only two Fayemiwos in Yoruba land. One family in Ilesha and our own in Owo. And then the Ogedengbe Yoruba intra tribal war happened, and was displaced.

But in the case of this man, Abacha was not a Nigerian. The Nigerian army was anything goes. When Yar’ Adua was killed by Abacha’s agent, if there was any godfather of the Hausa/Fulani, it was Shehu Musa Yar’ Adua. He was the head of the Kaduna Mafia. He was instrumental in advancing and placing many Northerners in the civil service. The current president Umaru and the former Chief of Supreme Headquarters, Shehu, were both born by the same man, Musa Yar’ Adua who was the first Minister of Lagos during Balewa regime under the Northern People’s Congress Government.

Shehu Musa Yar’ Adua was the only Nigerian Military officer promoted from a colonel to major general. He was never a brigadier.

The man was powerful and killing him because of political differences was an eye opener. And they said Abacha himself must go.

Abacha was planning to achieve three things by October 1, 1998. He was planning to remove the Emir of Kano, Ado Bayero, because Ado Bayero did not come to Aso Rock to commiserate with him over the death of Ibrahim Abacha, his controversial first son who died in the plane crash. That was another story on its own.

Abacha wrote it down.

Secondly, he was to move and arrest Babangida on October 1, 1998, as he would have been sworn in as civilian president. Babangida was to join Obasanjo and Abiola in prison.

Thirdly, he was planning to remove Abubakar Abdul Salam as Minister of Defense. These were the three things on his list of things to do. He wrote it down and it was on his table.

The people leaked out the information. His Chief Security Officer, CSO, Major Hamzat Al – Mustapha saw the information and went to Kano to leak the information to Ado Bayero. Brigadier Sabo who was in DMI came to Abuja to brief Abacha and he saw the information. Abacha had excused himself in the middle of a discussion with Sabo. He looked at what Abacha wrote down that Babangida would be arrested on October 1, 1998. Sabo was afraid. It was Babangida who helped him into his position. Immediately, he left Aso Rock Presidential Villa, in Abjua, Sabo went to Babangida in Minna and told him what Abacha was planning to do. So the mafia went to work. The mafia and Babangida pulled resources together. They made up their mind that Abacha must be removed as early as January 1998. They were planning how to remove him. Babangida knew him very well that he loved women.

So that man did not die in the hands of two Indian women. That was a lie. It was a Nigerian who was used. His estranged girlfriend. Babangida and Abacha did not talk; they were not on speaking terms in the last two years of the regime. I knew that as far back as 1996, Babangida and Abacha were not on speaking terms. So when Sabo took the story to Minna, that this was what Abacha was planning, to arrest Babangida before October 1 st, Babangida and the oligarchy teamed up, a coalition of forces. They knew that if they had acted earlier, that Diya would likely become the Head of State, so they waited and removed Diya, who was pro Abiola first before striking against Abacha. Do you understand the story of Nigeria now? They knew Diya was pro June 12 and they had to frame him up and discredit him thoroughly so that he could not succeed Abacha…

Are you saying that Al – Mustapha’s tale about Diya’s cowardice was more baloney?

Al – Mustapha spoke within the limits of what was immediately open and obvious to him. He himself did not know the complexity of the situation of what we are talking about. Mustapha who came from Kano only knew that Abacha wanted to remove his Emir and told the Emir, so that, perhaps that one could initiate reconciliation. Babangida knew Abacha very well.

There were no two Indian prostitutes. They found the old girlfriend of Abacha and they gave her spiked Viagra.

Following the script crafted by Babangida, the lady went to Jeremiah Timbuktu Useni and told him that she wanted to settle the lingering squabble with her boyfriend, Abacha. Useni brought the girl and genuinely thought she actually came to make up with Abacha.

He took her to Abacha’s guest house, and from what I gathered, the lady was probably a friend to Useni’s daughter. Useni has a daughter; his first daughter, Hadiza who graduated from the University of Jos and she was a friend to Abacha’s girlfriend that the Babangida group used. Useni may not be aware that the lady and his first daughter Hadiza were friends. These guys are dirty, I tell you. They sleep with their friends’ wives and their daughters. And you can understand Abacha’s sexual escapades if you have read Dr. Taiwo Ogunade’s interview. Usually by one or two pm, Abacha would have left the office. The man would just go to his guest house and then the easy virtue ladies would be taking a queue. The man had high libido. So when Jerry Useni brought this lady, she apologized, and she made up with Abacha. So Abacha said it has been a long time they did it and that he wanted to do it from the anus. Abacha liked sodomizing his women.
Then the lady said if he wanted to do it that way and for her to enjoy it, Abacha needed to use Viagra. Are you following me now? It was the lady who gave Abacha Viagra. These are stories that no Nigerian newspapers would publish but had relied on Abdusalam Abubakar version.

May be they don’t know about it?

I don’t know what is wrong with them. It is an international story, but they won’t publish this kind of story. Besides, if anyone gave it to them, they would be afraid and lamentably, they don’t have the resources to investigate. They would give you the official story that is the story everybody would run away with “oh two Indian prostitutes”. Where are the Indian ladies? It’s all rubbish. So once you are given spiked Viagra, you can’t survive it. Immediately Abacha started jerking, the lady just vamoosed. The security details came and wondered what was happening. Abacha died before 12 midnight. They brought him to Aso Rock around 11 pm. They didn’t know what to do.

Meanwhile, Useni had gone home after delivering the lethal lady to Abacha. He had gone his way after delivering the cargo. The man did not know what happened. He too was a useless man. He’s alive. Let him corroborate what I am saying.

Jeremiah Useni is still alive. Let him tell Nigerians what happened that night. No Indian prostitutes. Nothing happened. Abacha died in the evening. We heard about his death very early in DMI. The three guys who would have been president were Omenka, (please emphasize this place) Abubakar Abdulsalami would not have been Head of State. Al – Mustapha, Omenka and Sabo were the three guys. They would have seized power. Abacha actually died inside his private car in the guest house. He was foaming. He was very loose during that period. He was always moving about in unmarked 504 without any security detail. You would think he was an ordinary person in the tainted glass car. He was very loose. The Peoples Liberation Army of Nigeria was able to tail his movement in Abuja. They knew where the man was going; they knew everything that was happening. Of course, Prof. Banjo can corroborate what I am saying. The man was very loose and not very
security conscious, even at night.

When his remains were brought to Aso Rock, Al – Mustapha completely took charge. He allowed Sabo and Omenka to come in around one or two a.m.

Babangida called from Minna, because he knew what he had done, the call was so coincidental because Mrs. Maryam Abacha took the call, not knowing what had transpired, broke the news to Babangida. And Babangida landed at Aso Rock that night. And Babangida took over Aso Rock. He was the one who allowed Abubakar Abdulsalami inside the Dome. Abubakar Abdulsalam was completely oblivious of what had happened to Abacha. Babangida entered Ask Rock before Abubakar. Omenka is in Brazil with his wife, you guys should call him and let’s see if he will talk. Al-Mustapha is in detention and I hope the young man will regain his freedom so he can talk.

In the hierarchy of military seniority, Useni should have become Head of State immediately Abacha died but be was not allowed in until around 7 a.m. He wanted to come in but Babangida said he should be disallowed. Maryam Abacha was annoyed with Useni, because she saw him as the enabler, who was teaching her husband all the bad things. Useni was really loose when it came to women. Useni did not know what was happening. He came to Aso Rock with the mind to enter, Babangida was inside. So it was Babangida who now proclaimed Abubakar the new ruler.

Babangida had told Abdulsalami few months earlier not to retire because he still had one more thing to do for him (Babangida), in other words, I’m going to “remove Abacha, remove Diya and I would bring you in”. That was how Abubakar Abdulsalami became head of state.

Is there a way to know this Abacha’s alleged girl friend?

I don’t know. There are lots of mysteries happening in that country. There is no Indian prostitute. Women are so many in Nigeria, that Abacha would least think of any expatriate prostitute. You too should think about it. No Indian prostitute (laughs). They had already made up their mind that this was the story they want to sell us.

The same thing about Abiola, Babangida knew that if Abiola survived, Abiola would possibly put him on trial. Abiola would have tried Babangida. Babangida could have been killed or put in prison. Immediately after Abacha’s death, they made up their mind that they had to kill Abiola. That is why Babangida is infecting a lot of people. So after his death only few people would be able to talk. If I were to be in Nigeria, I would not be able to say all this but I would probably have published it anyway. The man has done a lot of damage to that country. I am telling you, a lot of people have died in the hands of IBB. He is trying to cover it all up. Do you know how Gen. Tunde Idiagbon died? Obasanjo called Idiagbon in Ilorin and hinted that he was considering him as new Chief of Army Staff in 1999 immediately he was sworn in. Babangida advised against it and his Man Friday, Aliyu Muhammad Gusau objected against it. Obasanjo was hell bent and
invited Idiagbon to Aso Rock. The poor man was served the same tea Abiola was served and Idiagbon returned to his home at Adeleye Crescent in Ilorin. About 21 days later, the man died; no sickness, no headache, no illness. Babangida was afraid of Idiagbon becoming COAS under Obasanjo. Throughout the time Idiagbon was in detention after they were toppled in 1985, in all the letters he wrote to his wife in Ilorin from detention, his pleading was that his wife should not fly aircraft or travel out because some people were planning to put hard drugs in her luggage in order to blackmail her. When I was serving in the NYSC, I lived in the next street to Idiagbon’s house and I used to visit the family regularly after leaving Gen. David Jemibewon’s house on Umar Audi Road, G.R.A. along Take Road, Ilorin.

It was because Bola Ige wanted to expose Babangida’s drug activities that they killed him. The man was coming here to take up appointment at the United Nations and he had some files with him incriminating Babangida and some of his cocaine boys but you see, they had to use Deoba Omisore as a cover. Obasanjo himself was cautious during the 8-years he was in Aso Rock, I am sure he looked the other way and that was why he castigated Bola Ige that the man didn’t know his right from his left. In other words, Bola Ige was naïve, you know, Obasanjo is a survivalist, a very wily and dubious man. He knows how to dine with the devil and come out unscathed.

They also killed Haruna Elewi, the former Minister for State for Communications. They used him to bring the boys who killed Bola Ige, because he knew Bola Ige’s house. They killed Bola Ige and removed the file. And after accomplishing their objective, they also got rid of Elewi. They killed Haruna Elewi himself.

Why didn’t Nigerian journalists hear of Justice Ubahomu Commission of Enquiry? Did you hear of it? That was the commission Buhari set up to try drug pushers. Immediately Babangida staged his coup, we heard no more of the commission. There are stories in Nigeria; there are lots of cover ups. Babangida scrapped the commission. And I don’t know if the man is still alive. A lot of people died to cover him up. He was there for eight years, and he is still covering up. Maybe when he is dead all these things that I am telling you, would be blown open. When I was publishing Razor in Nigeria, all those stories of Justice Chukwudifu Oputa panel, I had already published them and were not new. They described them as junk when we were publishing them. But all the stories have been confirmed.

How was your detention experience in Alagbon before you escaped to Benin Republic?

There were the other people I was detained with, Dr. Wale Babalakin, Dr. Femi Adekanye of defunct Commerce Bank, Ralph Osayemeh, Polycarp Nwite, Duro Emmanuel, Machan Zoaka, Chuma Nzeribe, Chief Femi Ajayi, Mr. Arigbe, Hasan Sani Kotagora, Kola Abiola. I was the one who gave Kola a mattress to sleep when they brought him to Alagbon. Kola Abioa was a very useless guy, very stupid, an ingrate. I was the secretary-general of Alagbon Detainees Association at FIIB, Alagbon, Bisket, Bisi Okeowo, then Bisi Shaba now Mrs Dan Musa and the late Kudirat Abiola.

Mrs Kudirat Abiola told me to watch out for her when she was brought to FIIB. She said “Ah Moshood, this is where they kept you?” “Why didn’t you send your wife to me?” And I said “auntie I don’t want to disturb you”. She gave me some inside stories too when I was publishing Razor. I would come to her house and I was always sending my wife to her, my former wife.

Besides what we have heard and read, what was the real reason Abacha ordered her assassination?

When Abiola was arrested and taken to Abuja in 1995, Abiola requested that he wanted one of his wives to come and cook for him for the Ramadan fast and he made the proposition to Abacha in the spirit of Islamic brotherhood and Abacha said “ok, which one would you want?” And Abiola said Kudirat Olayinka. So Abacha said fine.

So they gave Kudirat the message from Abacha to tell Abiola to drop his mandate. Kudirat herself told me that she replied to them that she would try to convince Abiola. Are you following me? She said she went there, cooked for Abiola and of course they had sex. You know what the security guys did; they captured everything on tape, ok?

After 1995 when the Ramadan fast was over, Kudirat left Abuja and returned to Lagos. The journalists were after her. What happened? Instead of her to say that she had access to Abiola and that things were being worked out between Abacha and Abiola just as agreed with Abacha, the woman was her principled self. And Abacha was expecting her to say that Abiola had renounced his mandate, the woman said no and told us that the man was committed to his mandate more than any other thing.

Abacha got mad that this was not the agreement. So he now sent words to Kudirat to apologize for all press interviews. He wanted Kudirat to apologize to him for what she said to journalists. Abacha called the late Oba Oyebade Lipede, the then Alake of Egba. Abacha instructed the Oba to personally bring Kudirat to Aso Rock to apologize for the public disgrace. Haven’t you seen the Nigerian constitution? A monarch virtually has no power. A Local Government Chairman can remove a king. So Abacha was so audacious and wanted Alake of Egba to do a police job. They had no power under Abacha. Abacha arrogated absolute power to himself. That is why he was able to steal. If you became an ordinary governor in Nigeria, you would never be poor. There were no check and balances. Very lawless.

So Alake now sent for Kudirat to come to Abeokuta and when she got to the palace, Alake now told her that this is what Abacha said “you have caused problem again oh, Abacha said I must bring you to Aso Rock”.

Kudirat said “over my dead body. I would prefer to die than going to see him to apologize”.

Oba Lipede relayed the message back to Abacha. Abacha now sent words back to Kudirat through Oba Lipede that was what she would get… that she would die. This is the story as Kudirat told me during the few minutes we were able to talk in Alagbon.

She was planning to go to Canada on exile. I met the Canadian High Commissioner to Nigeria; Dr. Gerald Olsen before I left Nigeria. Olsen was one big guy like this. I asked what he felt the Canadian High Commission could do for me and it was the man who gave me a note to the Canadian High Commission in Ghana, that there was nothing they could do from Lagos that I should look at the pathetic case of Kudirat. She came the same way I came, expressed her fears that she feared for Abacha’s plan to kill her. Olsen said Canada was willing to risk her relations with Nigeria to help her out because she was afraid of what happened between her and Abacha. The man has since been posted away from Nigeria. Dr. Gerald Olsen. She came to see him a week before she was killed. He was telling me that I had to first escape from Nigeria to get any assistance. He gave me a note to their office in Ghana.

Hassan Sani Kotagora was generally believed to be a hate theorist for the cabal and the oligarchy. How did he end up being detained with you?

Thank you very much. There were several Igbos too. Several bankers were clamped into jail thinking they were the ones giving us money. What Abacha was doing to the South was what Hitler did to the Jews. He thought they were funneling money to us in the trenches. I told you that Abacha and Babangida had that animosity in the last two years of the administration. I got to know in Alagbon while I was there.

Hassan Sanni Kotagora owed some money, about N76m. He was arrested for owing that much. Some Northern leaders intervened on his behalf, Abacha refused saying he had to cough out what he owed.

So the leaders were now sent to Babangida to assist in talking to Abacha. And Babangida allegedly said he had not been talking to Abacha and that he would prefer to pay the money. He sent the check and the money was paid. And that was the ransom for Hassan Sanni Kotagora’s release. He did their dirty job and that still did not save him from their anger.

That is the tragedy.

Now to current events; do you think President Obama will ever visit Nigeria?

What are you and I here for? You think we’ll be watching? Why am I in Chicago? Both in his first and second terms, Obama will never go to Nigeria. Are you even sure there will be a country called Nigeria by 2016 when Obama would have finished his second term?

Why did you say so? What will happen?

You wait and see. Events will happen at such a dizzying speed that Nigerians themselves will be so shocked and surprised that they won’t believe what is happening. Let me tell you, a nation doesn’t fall and disintegrate at once, it first begins to crack and all of a sudden, it’s no more. Leave through history and review how nations fell and eventually disintegrated. Those who are still holding Nigeria together as a nation are not more than a handful, praying for that nation; Adeboye, Ukpai, Okonkwo, Oritsejafor, Akinola, Abiara, Makinde, Oyedepo and others. That is why that country is still intact; I am talking to you spiritually now. That grace will soon be removed and you wait and see.

Do you mean the Niger Delta crisis? You think it will not be contained?

A more deadly crisis is in the offing, in fact, there will soon be series of crises that those who are milking Nigeria will be taken aback. That country will soon divide, mark my words. I want you to go and note this interview. It shan’t be long.

Are you saying there is nothing that can be done to reposition Nigeria?

Not in the current situation, not the way the few cabal destroying that country is burring its head in the sand like the proverbial ostrich pretending all is well. The nucleus and life wire of Nigeria is oil; very soon, that spigot won’t pump oil any more. Meanwhile, people in the Western world will not need oil anymore. You live here in the United States and you know what I am talking about. Nigeria is not the giant of Africa. I don’t know where we got this funny idea from, at best, Nigeria is a big for nothing country. If population is what a nation needs to become a world leader, China and India should have been world leaders. Nigeria swaggers on the world stage as the giant of Africa because oil is a powerful tool in international political power equation. Those days will soon be over and by the time the leaders have nothing to steal any more, the party will soon be over. If those curmudgeons in Nigeria have senses, they should read and read the
speech President Obama delivered in Accra, Ghana last week.

Do you think General Ibrahim Babangida will ever be brought to book?

As long as he stays in Nigeria, fly to Monaco where most of his loot is hidden and Switzerland. But we are waiting for him in America. All the houses he and Abacha and their cronies bought in Arizona, Washington DC, Texas and Virginia through fronts are under watch. We are waiting for him to step into the US soil. There are tons of documents we have on him and we’re waiting for the day he will enter America. Don’t ask me who are the “they.” I won’t say more than that.

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REPUBLICREPORT…standing between civilization and anarchy…