By Ayorinde Oluokun/Abuja
Minister of Solid Minerals Development, Dele Alake, However, has described assertion that President Bola Tinubu betrayed the struggle for actualisation of June 12, 1993 presidential election by former governor of Jigawa State, Alhaji Sule Lamido as false.
Alake, who spoke on Arise Television in response claims by Lamido that contrary to his claims, Tinubu, who was a senator at the time of the annulment of June 12 presidential election was at the vanguard for the de-annulment of the poll.
Lamido, who also spoke on Arise Television claimed that Tinubu’s mother, Hajia Abibatu Mogaji mobilised market women to support Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida who annulled the election.
However, Alake, in his response on the same television station on Sunday said Lamido’s assertions on June 12 struggle was false while alleging that the former Jigawa governor is suffering from memory loss.
He accused Lamido who was the Secretary of the Social Democratic Party, SDP, the party on which platform the late Abiola contested the election of being one of the figures who sustained the annulment of the election
“I feel very appalled at his own submissions, which I would ascribe largely to selective amnesia at best, or at the very worst, an impairment of the medulla oblongata, due to some atrophy of age, or memory loss in layman’s terms.
“Now, Sule Lamido himself was the guilty party to the sustenance of the annulment of that June 12th election. And before I go on, let me establish the basis for my authoritative submission on this issue.
“Everybody knows I was the editor of Sunday Concord, which was owned by MKO Abiola, who won the election. And what most people didn’t know, including Sule Lamido, was that the very first public statement of MKO Abiola to the entire world, of his intention to even run for office in January of 1993, I wrote it. I wrote that statement, and I advertised it in all Nigerian newspapers and all Nigerian television stations,” Alake.
Alake added that it smacked of gross revisionism for Lamido to say that Tinubu supported the annulment of the June 12 mandate.
He stressed that Tinubu was with Abiola before, during and after the June 12 election.
The Solid Minister Minister also dismissed claim that Tinubu’s mother mobilised market women to support the annulment of June 12.
He added that Lamido was only trying to cover the unenviable role he played in the June 12 saga.
Alake also stated that even when Tinubu was behind bars, he was still funding the movement against the military.
“Tinubu was one of the funders and one of the organisers, one of the planners of all the protests, July 23, 24, 25 of 1993 against the annulment. This was way before Abacha. Abacha did not come until November 17, 1993,’’ Alake maintained.
He noted that Tinubu also escorted Abiola MKO to go and see Abacha to negotiate how Abacha would relinquish office
“If Tinubu was working for Abacha, how would he be doing that? How would he be confronting Abacha frontally that he was in detention. And in fact, there was a time they issued a directive that he must be found, he must be brought in dead or alive.
“It was at that point he had to leave through the famous NADECO route. The Abacha goons were all over looking for him. And I remember that. So that was the reason that he left. So he didn’t run away,” Alake stated in his defence of the President.
Lamido’s narrative part of a political agenda from ‘Coalition of the Disgruntled’.
The Presidency had also in a statement titled ‘Setting the Record Straight’, dismissed Lamido’s comments as false, revisionist, and historically dishonest.
In the statement, presidential spokesperson, Mr Bayo Onanuga, said Lamido’s claim that Tinubu supported the annulment of the June 12, 1993, presidential election represent a distortion of history and a regrettable attempt at revisionism.
“These allegations are patently false,” Onanuga stated.
Onanuga insisted that Alhaja Mogaji never mobilised market women in support of the annulment.
“Had she done so, she would have lost her position as market leader in Lagos,” he added.
Onanuga acknowledged her relationship with Babangida but said it existed before the annulment crisis.
The Presidential aide accused Lamido of failing to defend MKO Abiola’s mandate as SDP National Secretary.
“Lamido, as SDP Secretary, failed to oppose the military’s injustice after Abiola’s election victory,” he said.
“The SDP leadership, including Lamido and Tony Anenih, shamefully surrendered the people’s mandate without resistance.
“Lamido and Anenih allied with the defeated NRC to deny Abiola his rightful mandate,” Onanuga alleged.
In contrast, Onanuga said Tinubu, who was then a senator, stood firm before Gen. Sani Abacha dissolved democratic structures on Nov. 17, 1993.
“Following Babangida’s decision to step aside on Aug. 27, 1993, Tinubu strongly opposed the annulment.
“On 19 Aug. 19, 1993, on the Senate floor, Tinubu condemned the annulment, calling it another coup d’état,” Onanuga stated.
He urged Nigerians then to resist injustice and lawlessness.
Tinubu, then representing Lagos West, said the annulment constituted another unconstitutional seizure of power.
“We cannot keep tolerating injustice and coup d’état from those funded by public money,” Tinubu warned.
Tinubu described the political crisis as self-inflicted, caused by the annulment of a free and fair election.
He said the government violated its own decree, committing a grave offence against its people.
Onanuga highlighted Tinubu’s major role in NADECO and international efforts like NALICON led by Prof. Wole Soyinka.
He said Tinubu’s backing of NADECO and other pro-democracy movements was crucial in challenging military dictatorship.
“Tinubu was a central figure in the June 12 struggle and a consistent supporter of democracy,” Onanuga added.
He said many NADECO leaders and journalists credited Tinubu for funding and sustaining the resistance.
Onanuga dismissed Lamido’s narrative as part of a political agenda from a so-called ‘Coalition of the Disgruntled’.
“The facts remain: Tinubu was — and remains — a defender of democracy, unlike Lamido, who capitulated,” Onanuga said.
