The memory of the June 12 presidential election lingers on. Assistant Editor LEKE SALAUDEEN examines the issues that led to its annulment and the role played by the principal actors in the saga.
Today, June 12, 2015, marks the 22nd anniversary of the 1993 presidential poll that is widely regarded as the freest and fairest election in Nigeria’s political history. Millions of Nigerians who trooped out to cast their ballots on that day demonstrated to the world that they are united. The fact that the flagbearers of the defunct Social Democratic Party (SDP), Moshood Kashimawo Olawale Abiola and Babagana Kingibe, were both Muslims did not matter to them. Their ethnic background was also not a factor during the election. The primary focus of the electorates was the programmes of their party and the personality of the candidates.
On the election day, Abiola waited patiently under the sun to vote. Unknown to him, the powerful forces within and outside the military who were not comfortable with the idea of him becoming President would annul the election. The exercise was peaceful nationwide without any hitches or disturbances. While the vote count was on, with Abiola comfortably leading, the self-styled military President, General Ibrahim Babangida, struck. He ordered the electoral body — National Electoral Commission (NEC) — to stop further announcement of the results and on June 23, 1993, he annulled the election.
This announcement was followed by spontaneous protests, mostly in the Southwest. To justify the annulment, Babangida in a nationwide broadcast claimed “there were allegations of irregularities and other acts of bad conduct leveled against the presidential candidates. But, the Prof. Humphrey Nwosu-led NEC went ahead to clear them.
Secret behind annulment
The Director-General of Centre for Democratic Studies (CDS), the late Professor Omo Omoruyi, gave an insight into why the election was annulled. He was the intermediary between Babangida and Abiola. He knew all that transpired between them before June 12, 1993 and thereafter. He reflected in his account: “I recall my meeting with our common friend, Gen. Babangida on June 21, 1993 on the June 12 issue; I remember very vividly how the General exploded ‘Professor, I cannot go on with the presidential election’. I asked why, because both of us knew before that day that our common friend, Chief Abiola had won the June 12, 1993 presidential election. I thought we should be happy. This was the first time I knew that we were in trouble.
“The General went on: If I allow Bashorun (MKO) to become the President ‘they’ will kill him and ‘they’ will kill me (IBB) and ‘they’ may not spare you (Omoruyi) because ‘they’ know you are with me now and working with me on this matter.”
According to Prof. Omoruyi, Gen. Babangida finally summoned courage and had a meeting with Chief Abiola on July 4, 1993 in the Presidential Villa. This was after the annulment. He said: “What was IBB planning to achieve then? Maybe he was planning to implement what the northern leaders told him to do, ‘offer Abiola money in lieu of the mandate’. The northern leaders actually advised IBB: ‘pay him off or as Nigerians would say, ‘settle him’. Chief Abiola told me in London on my hospital bed that he turned this down. In his words, ‘Omo, I told him, the suggestion was an insult not only to my person, but to the Nigerian people”.
Analysts say Abiola election would have led to a shift of power from the North to the South, but some persons were not comfortable with it. Most importantly it would have also led to a shift of power from the military to civilians through the ballot box.
Babangida endorsed Abiola’s candidature
Omoruyi gave two reasons why he believed Babangida endorsed Abiola for the June 12 presidential election. He said: “First, IBB saw it as a way of resolving the credibility crisis he faced in 1992 after the botched presidential primaries. Second, IBB saw it as a way of resolving the succession crisis. As a serious candidate along with other candidates, I had dealings with him and other candidates in 1993. I provided him and other serious candidates with the necessary information before and after they became the official candidates of the SDP and NRC in my official capacity as the Director General, CDS.
“Specifically on Chief Abiola, I also had occasions to discuss him with the President at various times as to his chances as our common friend. The President showed interest in his ambition and this encouraged my dealings with him.
“It was as a result of our past relationship (Abiola and I) which spilled over to our relationship with a common friend (IBB) that I got to know how passionately he (Abiola) felt about the politics of Nigeria and why he decided to seek the exalted elective office in the land. Chief Abiola from time-to-time sought my advice on whether our common friend (IBB) was actually serious with the transition programme and specifically whether there was any ‘vacancy’ in the Presidential Villa. What Chief Abiola wanted to know from me was whether General Babangida was serious or not with his decision not to transform himself into a civilian President. Of course, I told Chief Abiola, just as I told many peoples in Nigeria and in the international community, that IBB was not interested in what Washington called the West African model of democratic transition such as in Ghana, Togo etc. What I got to know was that Chief Abiola loved General Babangida very much and he would have supported him if he had wanted to transform himself into a civilian President. I knew as a fact that Chief Abiola definitely did not want to offend him. In fact, he regretted ever offending him one day when he went to the Presidential Villa with the ‘enemy’ of the junta, Barrister Aka Bashorun, who had earlier accompanied him to a Presidential Dinner Party in honour of the President of South Africa, Mr. F. W. de Klerk. Chief Abiola, like other candidates and even military officers, routinely called me on telephone to find out how IBB’s mind was working on any issue. It was therefore in order that he called me to find out if our common friend had changed his mind on the transition programme. Chief Abiola had a way of asking me the same question over and over again whenever we met in and out of the Presidential Villa. I was very definite after November 1992 when the search for credible candidates was on to solve General Babangida’s credibility crisis. I advised Abiola to think about the race and I was not therefore surprised when he decided to take the plunge in January 1993.”
Those who betrayed Abiola
Omoruyi continues: “Abiola regretted that he was misled and betrayed first by our common friend, General Babangida who assured him that he was serious with the transition programme and allowed him to plough his resources into the election. He complained about Generals Abacha and Diya who invited him to come home on the firm promise that his mandate would be enforced by the military. He complained about how our common friend made him plough back money into politics and the Presidential race with a view to according his transition program some credibility in March, 1993. This was a fact. It is also a fact that Chief Abiola was used later in May, 1993 as IBB’s instrument of resolving his succession crisis.
“MKO was very disappointed with the leadership of the Northern Elders Forum, most of them who he helped on many occasions to have medical attention abroad. He was bitter with the way he, the Deputy President of the Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs and a major financier of Islamic causes in the country was treated after the June 12 election by the then President of the Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs, the former Sultan of Sokoto.
“He regretted his blunder in not showing interest in those who became the leaders of his political party, the Social Democratic Party after he won the nomination of the party in March 1993. He lamented the dubious role of a major Yoruba traditional ruler. He wondered aloud, how impotent the military officers from the south, especially from the Yorubaland were in the military government.”
Forces behind annulment
The principal characters in the events that led to the annulment of June 12 are:
Gen. Ibrahim Babangida, Alhaji Bashir Tofa, Alhaji Babagana Kingibe, Chief Tony Anenih, Chief Tom Ikimi, Chief Ernest Shonekan. Sen. Arthur Nzeribe, Justice Bassey Ikpeme, Justice Dahiru Saleh, Abimbola Davies, the late Gen Sani Abacha and Clement Akpamgbo.
Babangida
Gen. Babangida has been a recurring feature of any discourse on June 12, 1993, presidential poll. This is primarily informed by his position as the head of the military government then, on whose desk the buck stopped. His claim that he annulled the election in the interest of the state was not acceptable to Nigerians and the international community. Against the backdrop that the Babangida regime had one of the longest political transition programmes in history made observers to conclude that the head of the military junta was not prepared to relinquish power. It was a grand design to perpetuate himself in power.
An attempt to embark on another transition programme was repudiated by the political class. When the seat became too hot for him, he had to ‘step aside’ in August 1993 and installed a lame duck interim government led by Chief Earnest Shonekan. He once described himself as ‘an evil genius’. The annulment of June 12 is a burden that he will carry for the rest of his life.
Tofa
Alhaji Bashir Tofa was the presidential candidate of the National Republican Convention (NRC). He was a dark horse until he emerged in 1993. The Kano-based businessman was, however, very wealthy and had connections with the then ruling military class. His money, connections and political clout were, however, no match to that of Abiola, who easily defeated him in his home in Kano. Ordinarily, Tofa ought to have behaved like a good loser, by conceding defeat, but he failed. He played into the hands of the military officers who did not want the election results to be upheld.
He keeps defending the annulment. He described the critics of June 12 as people that have nothing to offer in moving the country forward. He insisted that the June 12 election was marred by irregularities and that the military did the right thing in cancelling the results.
Kingibe
Ambassador Babagana Kingibe was the pioneer chairman of the SDP. He was Abiola’s running mate in the 1993 election. He got the slot through the influence of the SDP governors. With immense influence upon the SDP governors, he easily became a major factor in the run up to the SDP primaries which Abiola eventually won. The governors were nevertheless determined to foist him on Abiola as his running mate, a decision Abiola took at the expense of Atiku Abubakar who was a loyalist of the powerful Shehu Musa Yar‘Adua.
Following the annulment, Kingibe initially stood with Abiola, but he wavered in the struggle for its revalidation. The confidence in him among the pro-June 12 agitators ebbed when he accepted to serve in the Abacha administration. A Kanuri man like Abacha, Kingibe abandoned the June 12 struggle and turned his back against Abiola who languished in Abacha’s gulag for five years before he died.
Abacha
The late General Sani Abacha was the arrow head of the military officers that were opposed to June 12. The National Defence and Security Council, the highest military ruling body under Babangida’s regime was polarized by the June 12 crisis. The Council set up a committee headed by Abacha to look into the election and advise it accordingly. Members of the Committee included Brigadier David Mark (former Senate President) Murtala Nyako (former Governor of Adamawa State) General Aliyu Muhammed Gusau (former Minister Of Defence) and Col. Halilu Akilu.
Abacha threatened NEC Chairman, Professor Nwosu for disobeying court order that stopped June 12 election during the National Defence and Security Council meeting. He was the most senior military officer left behind by Babangida when he ‘stepped aside’ and put in place an interim government headed by Chief Shonekan.
Abacha sent the interim government packing and took over the reign of power. He dismantled all democratic institutions and suppressed agitations for the revalidation of June 12. Many June 12 activists were thrown into detention, some died in the process, while others fled the country. He was referred to as ‘maximum ruler’ because of the brutish style of his administration. He died in office on June 8, 1998, in mysterious circumstance.
Anenih
Tony Anenih took over the chairmanship of the SDP after Kingibe. He was a retired police officer. He became chairman through the influence of late Gen. Shehu Musa Yar’Adua, the leader of the Peoples Democratic Movement, a major bloc within the SDP.
Though Anenih led his party to victory, but soon after the results were annulled, he abandoned the cause of the party. While political leaders and rights activists were agitating for revalidation of June 12 mandate, Anenih looked the other way. Sources said he became a master strategist for the military regime that detained the flagbearer of his party.
Ikimi
Tom Ikimi was the national chairman of the NRC, the opposition party that was defeated by the SDP in the June 12 1993 election. Like his party’s presidential candidate, Tofa, he refused to concede victory and echoed the words of the military to justify the annulment of the results. He allegedly played a major role in the committee that mid-wifed the birth of the Interim Government that succeeded Babangida.
Shonekan
Chief Ernest Shonekan was a respected figure in the business community who through his successful stewardship at the UAC, one of Nigeria’s leading blue chip companies at that time had carved a name for himself. He was appointed by Babangida to head the transition cabinet at the beginning of 1993 and with the annulment he stayed on as chairman of what was named as an Interim National Government (ING), which was supposed to arrange for another presidential election.
His ING was eventually declared illegal by a Lgos High Court. This paved the way for Abacha to bare his fangs and assume full control of the country in November 1993. His acceptance to head the 32-man ING at the expense of his kinsman, Abiola, infuriated many.
Nzeribe
Arthur Nzeribe was notorious for his dubious role in the events that led to the annulment of June 12. He and some faceless Igbo politicians and businessmen carried out their nefarious activities on the platform of Association for Better Nigeria, (ABN). Nzeribe became a ready tool in the hands of the military to truncate the June 12 electoral victory. He and one Abimbola Davies and Dr Atkins mounted campaigns against June 12 poll. They created fears in the minds of the Nigerians. The unexpected happened when Nzeribe obtained a mid-night court injunction on June 10 stopping the election from holding. The court order was one of the reasons cited by Babangida to justify the annulment.
Akpamgbo
The late Clement Akpamgbo was the Attorney General and Minister of Justice during the Babangida’s regime. He held several meetings with ABN chiefs in his house. ABN’s lawyer, the late Philip Umeadi, frequented the house to hold consultations with the Attorney General. Instead of advising the military on legal matters pertaining to the election, Akpamgbo colluded with those bent on scuttling the election especially, the ABN.
Ikpeme
The late Justice Bassey Ikpeme granted a controversial ruling to stop the election from holding at odd hours. The court sat in the night on June 11. The ruling was believed to have contravened Decree No. 13 of 1993, which does not recognise the jurisdiction of the court on election date.
Saleh
An Abuja High Court, presided by Justice Dahiru Saleh ordered NEC to stop further announcements of election returns and subsequently declared the entire poll illegal on the ground that it was held in contravention of a subsisting court order. Defending his action later, Saleh said both the late Ikpeme, who first ordered NEC not to conduct the elections, and himself were only doing their job.
Nwosu
Prof Humphrey Nwosu was the Chairman of the electoral body. He ignored the court ruling stopping the election from holding. He relied on Decree 13 of 1993 which says: “Once a date has been set for the general election in Nigeria no court can stop that election”. The electorate had confidence in him that he would conduct a credible election. He was transparent in the declaration of the results until the military leaders stopped him from making further announcement of the results.
Nwosu succumbed to intimidation by the military. But, analysts said Nwosu should have released the results and declare Abiola the winner since he had all results with him.
