Leburah Ganago Monday, September 1, 2003 advertisement Glequinox@msn Atlanta, GA, USA ANNOUNCE THIS ARTICLE TO YOUR FRIENDS BOLA IGE: NIGERIANS MUST SEIZE THE MOMENT he murder in December 2001 of the Attorney –General of the Federation and Minister of Justice Chief Bola Ige (SAN) sent shock waves down the spine of Nigerians, both high and low. But mysterious as that murder looks, given the status of the late Bola Ige in society as not just a high profile public figure but as the number one law officer of the state, it was almost a foregone conclusion that his murder was politically motivated. The late Bola Ige, a highly principled and respected politician of the left wing was no doubt a thorn in the flesh of political opponents. However, as Nigerians and the world at large wondered aloud who could have carried out such a dastardly act as the cold blooded murder of the man affably referred to as the “Cicero of Esa –Oke,” those who are familiar with the story of the tensed political situation in his home state, Osun ,were wont to recall his travails at the palace of the Ooni of Ife on the occasion of the conferment of a chieftaincy title on Obasanjo’s wife. Tell magazine in its January 7, 2002 edition exclusively reported the ordeal of the late Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice in the hands of Iyiola Omisore and his gang of thugs at the palace of the Ooni of Ife on Saturday December 15, 2002. According to the report, apart from verbal threats issued to him, the late Chief Bola Ige was physically assaulted by Omisore’s thugs. As reported by Tell, Omisore himself later confirmed the assault on Ige this way: “ The people of Ife beat him up and he was crying like a baby as they removed his cap and his glasses. Had it been a political gathering, he would be dead by now”. Incidentally, the late Chief Bola Ige was murdered less two weeks from the date of his harassment at Ife. And when the chief suspect of that murder was officially apprehended it turned out to emerge from the direction the compass of suspicion has been pointing right from day one. Now, we are still talking of a suspect only in deference to the rule of law which says an accused is deemed innocent until the courts say otherwise. Even before Professor Wole Soyinka exposed the late Bola Ige’s letter to Obasanjo, the Tell magazine story of January 7, 2002, had given a clue which strongly suggests that the assassination of the late Attorney-general and Minister of Justice was part of the PDP’s unholy plot to conquer the South –West in the 2003 general elections. Tell had reported inter alia: “ Competent sources also reinforced the conspiracy theory with the PDP’s desperate plot to win some of the six South-West states currently under the control of AD. Tell learnt that a retired military officer from the South-West who is also a PDP chieftain was believed to be the stoker of the fire in Osun state. He collaborated with one of Obasanjo’s aides from Osun state and a prominent traditional ruler in the state. The retired officer believed that with the Akande-Omisore feud, Osun state would be the most vulnerable state in the west. As a result, he allegedly urged Omisore to keep up the fight in the hope that he would decamp and contest 2003 governorship election on the platform of the PDP…….. Tell also learnt that Omisore’s activities were funded by the “federal force”, a pseudonym for the PDP. Their plot was allegedly coordinated by another aide of the president, from the North who hated Ige” However, as also revealed in the late Minister’s letter to Obasanjo, Tell reported this way “ A tested politician, Ige had told close allies that he was putting off his ministerial to enable him concentrate on full politics. He had vowed to campaign in all the towns and villages in Yorubaland to ensure that PDP does not win a ward in the west”. Now, we must not lose sight of the fact that the prime beneficiary of the PDP’s pounding of Yorubaland in the 2003 elections after all those evil plots, is President Olusegun Obasanjo himself. He must have been congratulated by his party as having performed like a true President this time around, unlike in 1999, when he could not win even his own ward. Whereas Dr. Alex Ekwueme successfully delivered all of Igboland otherwise politically known as the South-East (It does not matter that in the real sense of the word, elections do not hold in Nigeria). That feat by Dr Ekwueme qualified him over and above Obasanjo to be the PDP presidential flag bearer in 1999, but the retired Generals gang whose looted money power ensures they continue to decide the fate of the country was hell-bent on installing one of their own to succeed General Abdulsalami Abubakar. We may also extend this argument by reasoning that the desperation by the ruling party to avoid a repeat of the 1999 humiliation of the President in Yorubaland might have led to the assassination of the late Justice Minister, Chief Bola Ige. The manner in which Iyiola Omisore emerged a Senator of the Federal Republic (winnin an election from prison when he shouldn’t have qualified to contest in the first place) and the kingly treatment he is getting from the evil government of Obasanjo leaves no one in doubt that he is an anointed agent of the government. And like this writer and many others had earlier argued, the allocation of election victory in the late Bola Ige’s home town to Iyiola Omisore is obviously a desperate attempt to demystify the sage in death. But they had misfired, for history has taught us that great men become more popular in death than they were alive, more so if their death came in questionable and controversial circumstances. The Martin Luther Kings, the Ken Saro Wiwas et al are good examples. The apparent reluctance of the Obasanjo government to try Iyiola Omisore and the somersaults characterizing the now half-hearted attempt to try him ,point ominously to the fact that it is a matter of time before he is made to escape justice. Already the grand work is being laid to set Mr. Omisore free. Earlier some key defense witnesses who made statements implicating him had turned round to recant their statements after being detained in the same cell with the chief suspect. And the police just a few days after saying that Omisore has a case to answer in the Chief Bola Ige murder trial, is now saying that neither forensic nor any other evidence exist linking Omisore to the murder case he is standing trial for. But whether the Nigeria Police is worth listening to is something else. However, the police want of evidence plea fits well into Professor Wole Soyinka’s earlier submission, as quoted by Seyi Oduyela (NigeriaWorld, August 16, 2003): “Those who are at the center of the conspiracy to kill were so confident because they knew that nothing could be traced to them”. Do we then need a soothsayer to tell us that Omisore is on his way home, a freeman?. It seems to me that the Senate seat allocated to Mr. Omisore ( in prison ) is a “ political solution” to the resolution of Chief Bola Ige’s murder. However, now that the truth of Chief Bola Ige’s murder has been exposed Nigerians must rise and demand justice. Sufficient pressure must be brought to bear on the PDP government to bring all those responsible for the murder of the late Ige to book. Nigerians must also demand justice from this government for the murder of Dr. Marshall Harry and all other victims of politically motivated assassinations that took place prior to and during the last fraudulent general elections. Nigerians must resist the criminal cover-up of the Marshall Harry assassination being orchestrated by Tafa Balogun, the Inspector-General of Police who is himself battling with massive corruption charges. As the spontaneous outrage that greeted the gruesome assassination of the late Marshall Harry overwhelmed the Nigerian government, Tafa Balogun thought he had something ingenious to showcase. He rounded-up some armed robbers, or is it “area boys” in Abuja and paraded them on national television, tried had to make us believe they were the killers of Marshall Harry. The “armed robbers” were said to have confessed to that heinous crime of murder. Their motive, we were also told, was to get the millions the ANPP purportedly handed over to him to organize the Port Harcourt convention of the party which he supposedly stacked up in his bedroom in Abuja awaiting transportation of same to Port Harcourt the following day.. However, we do know that the late Marshall Harry, a multi-millionaire businessman was no Sabo Barkin Zuwo, the late illiterate 2nd Republic Governor of Kano State who allegedly pilled up millions of Naira in his bedroom, as he was said not to trust the banks with his money. However, the rest of the civilized world is not as daft as Tafa Balogun and the government he is serving. Both Bola Ige and Marshall Harry murders signpost the wanton killings which characterize the present government in Nigeria, were high profile opposition politicians determined to stop the rampaging PDP from overrunning their political strongholds were cut down before the elections. We have earlier discussed the plot that led to Bola Ige’s elimination. Now, see Marshall Harry’s case as stated by Vanguard newspaper, Vanguard, Sunday July 14, 2002: ANTI-REELECTION MOVE: OBASANJO FIGHTS BACK WITH 15 COUNTER STRATEGIES “ President Olusegun Obasanjo overwhelmed by the opposition’s offensive and likely candidacy of former military president, General Ibrahim Babangida, his predecessor, Major- General Muhammadu Buhari and Speaker of the House of Representatives, Alhaji Umar Ghali Na’ Abba in 2003 presidential election, is fighting back. He has therefore, put in place a machinery to 0check what he considers as “major threats” to his re-election bid. Steps are also being taken by government to curtail the anti-Obasanjo sentiment from the southern part of the country by checkmating among others Governor Orji Uzor Kalu of Abia State, Dr. Marshall Harry of the All Nigeria Peoples Party ( ANPP) and the Dr. Samuel Ogbemudia group”. It has become ever glaring to us that the orgy of violence involving assassinations of political opponents was perpetrated by a desperate gang bent on holding on to power at all costs. And the gang got its way. Having intimidated and eliminated others, the gang went ahead to unleash the worst form of electoral fraud in election history and held on to power. Like Seyi Duyela again noted in his Nigeriaworld article of August 16, 2003, in the article "A chronicle of unresolved murder cases in Nigeria": “We have more murder cases in this government within a period of four years than in any government either military or civilian”. However, Nigerians must now resolve to deny political power to murderers and treasury looters. We should deny political power to those who must kill to get it. Instead, like Othman Dan Fodio would say, we should give power to those who want it not. For those who do not want power would be less likely to be desperate with power. We must demand an inquest into the past, with a view to fishing out those behind all those unresolved cases of murder and politically motivated assassinations. And those implicated must be stopped from assuming political power in future and continuing the killings. For example, Ibrahim Banbagida who is dangerously scheming to hijack political power in 2007 is having various cases of unresolved murders hanging on his neck: that of Dele Giwa among others. He connived with Obasanjo to bury the Oputa panel over the panel’s attempt to re-open the Dele Giwa murder case. Nigerians must stop Babangida before his friend Obasanjo hand over power to him in 2007. Of course, this appears to be a done deal. Already his masquerades are on the loose floating a Daniel Kanu-like Youths Earnestly Ask for Abacha campaign. They have promised to come up with a list of signatures of “prominent" Nigerians who we would be told are persuading the gap-toothed crooked retired army general to contest for the presidency in 2007. This is a huge blackmail in 0the offing. How can someone who has not only been nursing the ambition but assiduously working for that ambition of returning as civilian president be said to have been persuaded to contest for the same position? A couple of days ago I was riding in the elevator with a white guy who suddenly developed interest in me. He asked me “My friend, where are you from?” I said Nigeria. He then asked me if it is safe to visit Nigeria now. I said yea. But my interrogator retorted, “they will start killing people” I said no, the army guys who were killing are gone and the country is now operating a democratic government. But as soon as I finished speaking I got back my senses and realized how Nigerian, sorry, dishonest I have been. The killings are still going on five years into the so-called democratic administration. In fact, we have just been reminded that more people are being killed now than during the Sani Abacha and Ibrahim Babangida military dictatorship. What a record for Nigeria’s democracy? Commenting on the granting of political asylum to ousted Liberian President, Charles Taylor, Alhaji Abubakar Rimi cautioned: “We shouldn’t be seen as a country that harbours dictators who killed their people and come here to take refuge” ( ThisDay, August 23, 2003). But what else do one expect from a country with a “a nest of killers”? © 1999-2013 NIGERIAWORLD.COM Privacy | Affiliate Program | Contact
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