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Buhari’s presidency suggests Bola Ige killed by Obasanjo’s government
BY KAZIE UKO
Nigerian Presidency, led by President Muhammadu Buhari, has insinuated that a former Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Chief Bola Ige, was killed by the government of former President Olusegun Obasanjo.
Ige, a former governor of Oyo State, served under Obasanjo, first as Minister of Power (1999-2000) and later as Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, between 2000-2001.
He was murdered in cold blood on December 23, 2001, in his home in Ibadan, capital of Oyo State, in circumstances that have remained unresolved.
Obasanjo was president between 1999-2007, on the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) platform while Ige was a member of one of the opposition parties, Alliance for Democracy (AD). Ige had contested for AD presidential ticket, but lost to Chief Olu Falae, who eventually became the AD candidate and lost to Obasanjo in the 1999 presidential election.
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Speaking Friday on Channels Television breakfast programme, Sunrise Daily, the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Mallam Garba Shehu, suggested that Chief Ige was killed by the Obasanjo government. He did not specifically mentioned names but his reference to the historic event was very vivid and apt to the Bola Ige killing.
Shehu was reacting to issues of insecurity in the country and how the government of President Buhari has not done enough to arrest it, raised by Dr Hakeem Baba-Ahmed, Director of Publicity and Advocacy of the Northern Elders Forum (NEF).
He said: “Dr Baba-Ahmed was a very strong actor in a government in this country that was executing opponents. In fact, Minister of Justice and Attorney General was executed by state actors. This government is not killing people.
“Some of these (opposition voices and group agitators for self-determination) are charlatans. They are sponsored in order to come and bully, threaten the President, thinking that the President will panic, his hands will shake and then he will take the wrong decisions.”
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But Baba-Ahmed who said the Buhari Presidency was always in the habit of distracting from serious issues when confronted with them, waved aside Shehu’s allegation as one of those.
“I have no idea what Mallam Garba is talking about. I don’t know which Minister was executed. I was part of many governments; I was Permanent Secretary for 10 years. I served under many presidents, I have no idea what Mallam Garba is talking about,” Baba-Ahmed, apparently bemused by Shehu’s comment, responded.
He said hearing Shehu speak in the manner the presidential spokesman did, he became more depressed than when he just got to the television studio.
“He (Shehu) says people are being arrested and prosecuted, why are we not seeing them. Kidnappings have grown into a big industry under Buhari.
“Listening to Mallam Garba, to be honest with you, I just think the Presidency has run out of ideas. When they are confronted with a very serious challenge, they go round looking for all sorts of diversions and excuses,” Baba-Ahmed said.
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