VERDICT OF THE REVIEWS: IBB’S LIES FAR OUTSRIP ANYTHING ELSE HE SAID IN HIS NEW BOOK

By Maik Ortserga

Within the last few days, Nigerians have flooded social and conventional media spaces with comments and reviews of former President Ibrahim Badamosi Babangida’s memoir which he launched on 20th February 2025.

An appraisal of these comments and reviews demonstrates that the book written by Babangida who was Nigeria’s president from 1985 – 1993 failed to add any value to the progress of the nation because of the numerous inconsistencies in it.

For Richard Akinnola, General Ibrahim Babangida, in his book, told many lies. Akinnola in a review titled “IBB LIED” said, “I can understand the denial of General Ibrahim Babangida of his innocence over the murder of Dele Giwa. It is expected. Have you seen an armed robbery suspect charged to court pleading guilty in court? It’s a matter of self-preservation.”

Akinnola maintained that IBB “made two major false assertions regarding the letter bomb murder of Dele Giwa, founding Editor-in-Chief of Newswatch.”

Although IBB noted in his book that “…the Supreme court’s suggestion that Newswatch lawyer, Chief Gani Fawehinmi could take on the case as a private prosecutor did not receive a positive response,”

the truth as noted by Akinnola was that Fawehinmi actually filed an application at the Lagos High court, seeking for an order of Mandamus to compel the State’s DPP to either prosecute IBB’s two security chiefs, Col. Halilu Akilu and Lt-Col. A.K. Togun, for the murder of late Dele Giwa or he be given the fiat to do so. Based on this, the matter was assigned to Justice Olusola Thomas, who, on Thursday, January 21, 1988 who made an order.
Pursuant to this order, Gani Fawehinmi sent a letter to the DPP, accompanied it with the court’s ruling. Based on this, the Solicitor-General wrote to Gani Fawehinmi that the State was ready to prosecute the suspects.

Akinnola revealed further that “On the basis of this, the murder information was filed and it came before Justice Eniola Longe, in the case of The State v. Col. Halilu Akilu and Lt. Col. Kunle Togun. (Charge no. ID/4c/88).The prosecutor was Mrs Eniola Fadayomi, the Attorney-General of Lagos, while Chief Rotimi Williams, SAN, was counsel to the accused persons, who were not in court. Williams raised a preliminary objection to the trial, which was agreed with by the prosecutor. Subsequently, the charges were quashed and the accused persons freed.”

This was what prompted Gani Fawehinmi’s submission that if he had been granted the fiat to privately prosecute, he would have loved to put Babangida in the witness box. “I have 420 questions for Babangida. Let him stand in the witness box and answer those questions. Then, we will all know who killed Dele Giwa.”

Another inconsistency discovered in the book on Dele Giwa’s case, is General Babangida’s remark that “When the Obasanjo civilian administration reopened the Giwa case at the Oputa panel on Human and Civil Rights, one expected that the police and lawyers would come forward with new evidence as to their findings on the Giwa murder over the years. Nothing of such happened”.

The truth remains that when an Invitation was extended to Babangida by the Oputa panel, he shunned it. Babangida was also wrong to state that the police and lawyers didn’t come up with a new thing at the Oputa panel. Perhaps, he forgot that at the Oputa panel, Abubakar Tsav, Commissioner of Police(rtd) gave evidence on oath that he was assigned to investigate the case and at the end of his investigation, his findings pointed to the Babangida government, and that he submitted his findings to DIG Chris Omeben.

Also, contrary to what IBB said in his book that no fresh evidence came up, the issue of Gloria Okon came up during the hearing.

Having provided these evidences, Akinnola concluded that “it’s either those who wrote the book for him didn’t get their facts right or that General Babangida was being mischievous in what he wrote in the book regarding the murder of Dele Giwa.”

IBB’s response in his book about the controversial June 12 presidential annulment has also come under scrutiny. By providing the jaded news that MKO won the election, he did not take many by surprise as they believe that this is no longer news.

It is what Nigerians have always known. The question however is why was he not declared the president? IBB’s feeble argument that the emirs and northern generals didn’t want MKO did not hold any water.

Adesola Ayo who came into journalism in 1988 at the peak of IBB’s dictatorship said his professional journey was nearly truncated on account of IBB’s ruthless war against the media—the southwest media, to be precise. He noted that “When The PUNCH, alongside other vocal media, was shut down in the aftermath of the media outcry that greeted the annulment of the June 12, 1993 presidential election won by MKO Abiola, it was a dark period in our national history as Nigerians quickly latched on to the foreign media, especially the CNN and BBC, for News about their country.”

Ifesinachi Madu, in his comment on IBB’s new book said that “The only positive thing I have seen from the book so far is that he made it clear that there was nothing like “Igbo coup” a simple truth the likes of Reno Omokri refused to accept till today. The propaganda against ndi Igbo is deep rooted.”

However, as noted by Adesola Ayo “Many people more responsible, more credible than Babangida have made the case quite convincingly that the January 1966 coup was not an “Igbo” coup. This narcissist could have cleared the air from 1966 to this week, no he waited for over half a century and for self-serving reasons he announces what we have already known.”

Also, Nigerian poet, journalist and critic Chiedu Ezeana who described IBB’s new book as the General’s “fictional masterpiece” said “You believe this, you’ll believe anything and everything he has said… That’s his way of giving every child in the room something sweet to make them grateful to him for”.

Ezeana finds it strange that the General who has built his whole career on bigotry against certain groups at different times in his life is suddenly charitable to everyone.

Vaya Con Dios, on his part, described the book as a treatise by a revisionist. Faulting IBB on the execution of Mamman Vatsa, he said “The saddest part was Domkat Bali’s confession years later, that the evidence against Vatsa was too weak, to stand the test of scrutiny, and he really should not have been executed, if one relied on the evidence. That tells me a lot more about IBB, than anything ever could.”

Vaya wondered how IBB thought he could convince people like him who lived through the IBB years, and were already adults by then. “We were eye witnesses to the history that occurred at that time. So, if we read this book and are confronted by bare faced lies, it would only add to our poor view of the man.”

Similarly, the family of former head of stste, late Gen. Sanni Abacha and that of Lt. Col. Musa Bitiyong (executed by IBB) came out to refute what they called “the false narrative of Ibrahim Badamosi Babangida,”

The Abacha family finds it worrisome that IBB, who was the one calling the shots as the Commander-in-Chief will now be passing the buck to Gen. Sani Abacha as the one who never wanted Abiola.

As for the Bitiyong family, a statement signed by Amina Zemo neè Bitiyong said “IBB’s statement that my father late Lt. Col. Musa Bitiyong “had previously been involved in other controversial coup stories” is a fallacy from the pits of hell and is more of an apt description of IBB’s infamous forage into our national life. Questions need to be asked, how 10 very intelligent, decorated officers who were not in command of any troops could plan to overthrow a government successfully? And how the much-touted N50,000.00 (before it was N10,000.00), could be adequate to execute said coup? IBB, being an experienced coup plotter, should explain how one can successfully carry out a coup with N50,000.00!”

Even, when at the book launch, Senior Citizen Atiku Abubakar commended IBB for midwifing Nigeria’s privatization process, many people saw it as “good talk;” except that the privatized public entities were bought by people in government with public money. And because the owners are more powerful than the State, no one could challenge the poor but expensive service they render, and the nation has so far been the worse for it.

Ploughing through the ever-increasing maze of opinions about IBB’s “A Journey in Service” it is astonishing that IBB could brazenly seek to rewrite history in his feeble days, and by so doing, join the league of those who have trashed Nigerian literature for money.

As it stands, many Nigerians are not happy with the content of the book. The general feeling is best captured by the satiric comment of popular writer and critic, Ikhide Ikheloa, that, instead of buying IBB’s expensive book, you should by good books and read about Nigeria’s history, or rather “drink catfish peppersoup with your money. Na poor you poor, you no kee person!”