‘Nigerians living in fear’, ‘A re-enactment of Abacha era’– five things Obasanjo told Buhari

Former President Olusegun Obasanjo dropped another bomb on Friday, five months after he accused President Muhammadu Buhari of incompetence.

In a statement issued on his behalf by Kehinde Akinyemi, his spokesman, Obasanjo accused Buhari’s government of plotting to hang a crime on him.

He said he learnt from credible sources that his name has been placed on the watch list of different security organisations, and that the federal government is plotting to hound him.

The elder statesman, who said he has a divine mandate to protect Nigerians, vowed not to be intimidated.

Below are five highlights from Obasanjo’s statement:

‘I WON’T ABANDON MY DIVINE MANDATE’

Obasanjo claimed there is a plot by the federal government to seize his international passport and “clamp” him into detention indefinitely.

The statement said this “will be a re-enactment of the Abacha era in which Chief Obasanjo was one of the principal victims”

“Since Chief Olusegun Obasanjo declared in his State-of-the-Nation special statement on January 23, 2018, the desperation to frustrate, intimidate and blackmail him into abandoning his divine mandate to protect the rights of the people to better life and living continued unabated and has even taken a bizarre dimension,” the statement read.

SARAKI, DOGARA FACING THREAT

Obasanjo also said Senate President Bukola Saraki and Yakubu Dogara, speaker of the house of representatives, are being threatened by the current administration.

Saraki currently has two cases against him with the police, one of which is that he allegedly has connection with the armed robbers that killed at least 30 people in Offa, Kwara state.

Obasanjo said: “We are currently in a nation where the number three citizen is currently being harangued and the number four citizen is facing similar threat within the same Government they serve.”

NIGERIANS LIVING IN FEAR

The former president also said many Nigerians are currently living in fear ahead of the 2019 elections.

He said with the “worrisome” dimension things have taken, citizens fear they could be hounded “or even killed”

Buhari is seeking re-election.

According to him, “there is a groundswell of our nationals that live in fear that they could be hounded, harassed, maimed or even killed as the battle for 2019 takes this worrisome dimension.”

BUHARI COWING OPPOSITION

Obasanjo accused Buhari’s government of using various means to cow the opposition in the country.

He said dissent is a fundamental principle on which liberal democracy is predicated, and “a true democrat must be ready to live with and accommodate dissent and opposition.”

“While it is regrettable how the government has sunk in its shameless desperation to cow opposition, a resort to blackmail, despotism and gestapo-tactics being employed by the goons of this Government would not hold water. And no government ever remains in power forever,” he added.

‘READY TO FACE PROBE BUT ON ONE CONDITION’

The former president also reiterated his readiness to face probe over allegations that he mismanaged $16 billion electricity funds.

He, however, said investigation into the allegation must be by an independent and credible panel.

He said: “For the record, Chief Obasanjo reiterates his readiness to face probe again after that of the house of representatives, the senate, the ICPC, and the EFCC, but before an independent, objective and credible panel of enquiry to account for his stewardship in government and beyond.”