The first title of this write up is Babangida writes a book. After a critica look at that, I shook my head, as I know fully well that Babangida cannot write a book. Not that he is illitrate or anything like that. No. It is just for the simple fact that he is not a writer. A singer, sings. A dancer, dances. A drummer, drums and a writer writes. It is as simple as that. Babangida is not a writer. Obasanjo?, well, yes. At least he writes letters. Although pondrous and boringly repetitive, yet a writing none the less. When one mentions writing amongst the military cadre of Nigeria, the likes of Mammam Vatsa comes to mind. A man, whose story will be reserved for another day in the story of Ibrahim Babangiga’s tale of his service to whomever.
Of course that a lot of Nigerians have adamantly refused to glorify this book with even a glance, much less read it, is overt. This writeup looks at Babangida who joyfully branded himself the Evil genius, in the heat of his machavillian days. If really not that one needs to maintain certain decorum in situations such as this, I would have loved to remove the maca, and keep the rest of the letters. This launching brings to recollection the book launching of his dearly departed wife, also in the heat of the Better Life days. To delve into that will constitute a distraction. In all honesty will be disrestectful to the dead. That, we will not dare.
Why now, did this man who did not complain, but revelled in it when Nigerians described him as Maradonna. Who dribbles and scores goals with both his hands and feet.
One feels that old Babangida, now looking down memory lane and seeing his unending list if misdeeds and adult rascality, and now staring into the unkown of the future, where he sees faces of the Vatsas, Dele Giwas, Abiolas, Dimkas and many others, friends and colleagues and assumed foes whom he directly or indirectly caused their demise staring blankly and emotionlessly at his sure and steady progress to where they are, he is hastily knocking up a package of restitution, to bribe whatever he will meet as the gateman in that unkwown that is the vacuum between there and here.
Why, after all his days in power, he did not write the story of his supposed service. The question also being, Service to who exactly? A time when his opinion would have made greater societal impact and a time when he could have done something about things that he is regojitating now that don’t mean any thing to nobody, except only to his selfish ego.
Those that bothered to muddle through the muckshit that is the supposed contents of this ill glorified write up have mentioned, issues like the 1966 Nigerian coup d’tat which was tagged the Igbo coup. The central figure in the aftermath of coup, Odumegwu Ojukwu have continously in his life time stated for any who is interested to hear that it was not an Igbo coup in any ramification. Did Babanginda raise even a sneeze to support him then? No. So why is any one in their right mind giving a whiff about his stating it now. Come to think of it, what was his rank then. What gives him the authority to make any factual statement about the coup anyways. When his superiors like Obasanjo have written books and expressed their first hand participation in that inglorious cruelty that the Nigerian military called a war they were supposed to have won.
Did Babangida mention the Gloria Okon and Captain Billy Eko saga in this tale of fantasy? That is the drug running accusations that beclouded his days of past?
Did he recount the Dele Giwa murder?
What was his explaination about the death of his buddy Mamman Vatsa?
Did he tell Nigerians about his supposed life chairmanship of the Julius Berger?
We heard he glossed over the Nigerian sad experience of June 12. Not that I bother, since it was still the same bunch playing ping pong with Nigeria. I am more concerned about the comedy of the letter Abiola wrote to him, which leaked out to the press. A piece of which entrenched the word detractors in the annals of Nigerias political diction. Who leaked that letter?
We remember with a shake of the head the role the man played in countering the ill fated Bukasuka Dimka coup. Betrayals counter betrayals.
Presently, what is Babangida, an ex head os state doing as his state, Niger is burning, Over ran by bandits and every kind of conceivable blood thirsty, gun weilding criminals.
That the man had the greed to launch the book and raise money from it, to add to the zillions he had stolen, is a glaring indication of how dark and unrepented his soul is.
Nigerians take consolation in the knowledge that all men know that there is a life after this one, in which all mortal souls will give to greater forces than ours account of their stewardship while on this side of eternity. The fear of this account rests more heavily on those who are dying slowly. It is at this stage you start seeing this sort of pathetic attempt at restitution. Writing trashy books like this one, granting every kind of of sad interviews in a desperate attempt to explain or justify their wickedness.
But the truth remains that inevitabilty waits. The unkown beckons. Ce sera sera.
