Former President Olusegun Obasanjo has said given his military orientation, he has never looked for political power, having known all along that soldering and politics do not go together.
He added that despite this, it was power, which actually looked for him and found him.
Obasanjo spoke while giving his remarks during a symposium organised by the Kegite Club to celebrate his 85th birthday on Saturday evening, at the Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library (OOPL), Abeokuta.
Two renowned journalists, Dr. Yemi Farounbi, Dr. Festus Adedayo, as well as Prof. Kolawole Kazeem spoke about the theme: “Depreciating Cultural Values and Virtue in the Era of Social Media: Causes, Challenges and Solutions.”
The elder statesman, who was reacting to Farounbi’s paper, which described him as someone, who at no time ran after power, explained that while he maintained a reluctant disposition, it was power that had routinely been chasing him and not him after power.
“I was at a time, as you mentioned, reluctant to be in political power. I was trained as a soldier. One of my trainings is that soldiering and politics don’t go together and I stuck to that.
“As you rightly said, while I stuck to separation between soldiering and politics, power started chasing me and I ran, and I ran and I ran until I could not run out of the reach of power. I believed that without being immodest, the fact that I was not looking for power, power was looking for me, made a drought of business,” he said.
Farounbi said Obasanjo rejected a call for him to become the Head of State in 1976, after the coup that claimed the lives of Gen. Murtala Muhammed and other military officers.
“I also know that he did everything possible to reject becoming the candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and ultimately the president in 1999.
“I can say authoritatively because I was involved. He had no interest in pursuing power, but power was interested in pursuing him because of the much needed cultural values inherent in him.
“He was like David in the Bible. He did not want to be a king, but he had the values of a king. He had demonstrated bravery by killing a bear and lion with bare hands,” Farounbi said.
Obasanjo, who was Nigeria’s president between 1999 and 2007 on the platform of the PDP, said today, his allegiance is to Africa and Nigeria, and will not be part of anything outside them.
He said the sterling values and virtues on the continent and the country made him a Pan-Africanist and Nigerian to the core.
He expressed joy and satisfaction about the honour given to him by members of the Kigite Club, saying it would not be taken for granted.
Obasanjo advised them to strive towards unity at all time, saying their unity was part of what would be needed to make him an eternal grand patron of the Kegite Club.
“If anything that should be Nigeria is not Nigeria, I will not be part of it. Or, if anything that should be Africa is not Africa, count me out of it. I am a Pan-Africanist. I am Nigerian to the core.
“I will only be your Kegite eternal grand patron if you all bury your hatchets. So, the honour you all that are here will do me is to come together now, so that by my next birthday, we will all be together again, and that will gladden my heart,” he said.