President Muhammadu Buhari’s replacement of May 29 with June 12 as Democracy Day confirms the aphorism that no matter how fast falsehood runs, truth will eventually catch up with it one day. For over 19 years, successive governments in the country had lived in denial by observing May 29 as Democracy Day. But we all know this was not the case; we know that June 12 is more significant in the country’s political history. That was a day that over 14 million Nigerians set aside all the primordial sentiments that hitherto had become ready tools in the hands of our ruling elite to polarise Nigerians. They went to the polls called by the then military junta, headed by General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida (retd), but which he, characteristically and ‘maradonically’ (permit me the use of that word) attempted to stop, through all means possible, including the judicial process.
But for the courage of the chairman of the then National Electoral Commission (NEC), Prof Humphrey Nwosu, and the resoluteness of Nigerians who had come to realise that Babangida was merely playing chess with his very expensive transition programme designed to transit to nowhere, Babangida would have halted the electoral process, thus aborting an election that has come to be recognised worldwide as the freest and fairest in the country’s history. Thus, the election went ahead on June 12, 1993, in defiance of a kangaroo court order procured by the Association for Better Nigeria (ABN), one of Babangida’s contraptions to scuttle the transition programme, asking NEC not to go ahead with the election.
President Buhari captured the developments succinctly in a statement on Wednesday: “For the past 18 years, Nigerians have been celebrating May 29th, as Democracy Day. That was the date when for the second time in our history, an elected civilian administration took over from a military government. The first time this happened was on October 1st, 1979. But in the view of Nigerians, as shared by this Administration, June 12th, 1993, was far more symbolic of democracy in the Nigerian context than May 29th or even the October 1st.”
Buhari did not stop here. He also bestowed the highest national honour in the land, the Grand Commander of the Federal Republic (GCFR) on the acclaimed winner of the election, Bashorun Moshood Kashimawo Abiola, popularly referred to as MKO. Abiola’s running mate, Ambassador Babagana Kingibe is also to be given the second highest honour of Grand Commander of the Order of the Niger (GCON). In the same vein, Chief Gani Fawehinmi was honoured for his heroic role in the struggle to revalidate the June 12 election result. Although some people have argued that Kingibe does not merit the honour because he, rather than stay with Abiola to fight for the revalidation of the election result, decided to pitch his tent with the Sani Abacha government that succeeded the Interim National Government (ING) which Babangida hurriedly put in place to succeed him, after seeing that the seat of power was becoming too hot for comfort due to the protests that followed his annulment of the election.
Babangida’s annulment of the election result was as dramatic as his final exit from power. Bouncing like an over-bloated tyre, and in a manner suggestive he was being propelled by something from within, Babangida, on June 23, 1993, announced the annulment of that election.
Of course, for a few years after, the country was in political turmoil, with neither the bird that perched on a rope nor the rope itself feeling comfortable. The annulment led to a string of events in the country. As stated above, it was the beginning of the end of the Babangida regime which it finally consumed, with Babangida, contrary to his earlier boast not to be stampeded out of office, hurrying out of Aso Rock when he stepped aside on August 27, 1993. The ING, led by Chief Ernest Shonekan, was itself unable to take firm control of the country, such that it was only a matter of about three months for General Sani Abacha to sweep it aside. Abacha himself, again, like Abiola, died in mysterious circumstances on June 8, 1998. Abiola died precisely a month after, on July 7, 1998, while in detention.
Suffice it to say that President Buhari’s decision on June 12 is not just the reversal of an injustice against Nigerians but the undoing of a grievous harm done the entire nation by a cabal that was determined to keep Babangida in power by other means, or, at best prevent Abiola from being sworn in as president because Abiola’s mandate, as freely given on June 12, 1993 was pan-Nigeria. It had no tribal colour; no religious fragrance. Abiola’s running mate, Kingibe,was also a Muslim, just like Abiola. But that did not deter the voters who, for once, ignored such primordial sentiments at the polling booths. Of course, when Nigerians decided to be orderly at the polls, it was because they had realised Babangida’s antics. They knew he was not prepared to leave office and that he was only looking for the slightest excuse to make a mess of the election. Babangida was so disappointed because all his calculations, either that the elections would not be peaceful, or that Abiola’s challenger, Alhaji Bashir Tofa of the National Republican Convention (NRC), would defeat Abiola at the polls, fell flat on his face. Abiola contested on the platform of the Social Democratic Party (SDP). It is impossible to chronicle the course of the events that trailed that singular decision by the Babangida government in a few pages.
Expectedly, some people have interpreted President Buhari’s gesture in many ways. Some say given the fact that Buhari has not been known as an advocate of June 12, his sudden reversal of Democracy Day to that date was a political palliative meant to woo the civil society groups and the southwestern part of the country. Some even say it is an attempt by the Buhari government to shore up what they call its waning influence and popularity due to its inability to deliver on its electoral promises. Everyone is entitled to his or her own opinion; for me, what is important is that the Buhari government has the courage to do what its predecessors could not do.
It is heartwarming that the Senate and, by and large, the House of Representatives too have seen the good in the president’s gesture. This is the way it should be, devoid of undue politicking. Many of those in both houses were living witnesses to Babangida’s unending transition programme during which he banned and unbanned politicians from participating in the programme at will.
We must say never again to the idea of some people waking up from the wrong side of the bed to toy with our future. The kind of impunity that made Babangida and his cohorts to annul the result of the election and still be walking our streets free should not be allowed again.
However, without any attempt to ethnicise the matter, because that was one major thing that June 12 debunked about Nigerians, it is important to also honour the then electoral commission boss, Nwosu. If he had not ignored the court order procured in the night to stop the election, it would not have been possible to celebrate the mandate that we are celebrating today. There is no way we can talk of June 12 without talking of Nwosu. He braved the odds; at grave risks to his life and perhaps those of his close family members. He defied the court, even when it was obvious that cancellation of the poll was what Babangida and his co-travellers in infamy wanted.
We do not have to forget the ordinary Nigerians who also died in the course of actualising the June 12 mandate, including those killed in Lagos and elsewhere by the Abacha regime. They are part of the real heroes of the democracy that we enjoy today. Without them, it might have been impossible to send the soldiers to the barracks when we did in 1999. As I have said several times on this page, majority of those who have benefited from the return to democracy did not lift a finger to bring it into fruition. That is part of the reasons they do not know how to manage it. That is why they want to live like oil sheikhs even when the country is in dire economic crisis and minimum wage remains at a paltry N18,000 per month.
President Buhari should begin the process of doing the needful to give legal teeth to his action where necessary to make the decision endure. He should also initiate the process of paying the entitlements of those honoured. By looking away from June 12 all these years successive governments had only demonstrated the insincerity that has characterised governance and hobbled the country’s development. Without doubt, Buhari’s decision is significant one way or the other for all, irrespective of whether you stand or sit on June 12.