Former military head of state has revisited the death of the acclaimed winner of the June 12, 1993 presidential election, Moshood Abiola saying the politician who was held in detention died after falling ill.
Recall that Abiola died unexpectedly on July 8, 1998 the day he was due to be released.
While meeting a group of American diplomats including Thomas Pickering and Susan Rice at a government guesthouse in Abuja, Abiola fell ill and died.
Rice, it was reported, had served tea to Abiola shortly before his collapsed and subsequent died.
The official autopsy stated that Abiola died of a heart attack, but Major Hamza al-Mustapha, chief security officer to the late head of state, Gen. Sani Abacha, alleged that Abiola was killed.
Speaking in a live interview on Trust TV in Kaduna, Abubakar, who succeeded Abacha as head of state, denied that the late politician was poisoned.
Narrating how the detainee died, Abubakar said: “Well, I smile because there were lots of allegations here and there that we killed Abiola. As always, when I am talking about the late Abiola, I still thank God for directing me on things to do when he gave me the leadership of this country.
“On the day Moshood Abiola passed away, may he rest in peace, two to three things make me always say I thank my God for the guidance He gave me.
“One was, I received a delegation from America headed by Pickering, who was then, I think, the Secretary of State or so. In his team I remember very well, was Susan Rice. I remember her very well because of the role she played later.
“So after the normal courtesy and discussion we had, when they were leaving my office, Pickering said Your Excellency, we made a request to see Moshood Abiola, but we were denied. So, I said, why were you denied? Who denied you?
“There and then, I made a decision, I said look, you will see Moshood definitely; I overruled whoever said you couldn’t see him. So, I now called my chief security officer; I said, please make arrangement for this team to see Abiola, that is one point,” he said.
He also stated that when Abiola was in incarceration, no member of his family visited him but he (Abubakar reversed that when he took over from Abacha.
“Now, during the incarceration of Moshood Abiola, except his personal doctor, to my knowledge, no member of his family saw him. So, when I became head of state, based on consultation and interaction together with Ambassador Babagana Kingibe, I gave the family a date that they could come and see him.
“So, a day before he died, his family came to Abuja to see him. For one reason or the other, the whole family could not see him at the same time, so it was agreed that when this group of his family will see him today, tomorrow the next team will see him. So they saw him like yesterday, now this team from U.S. came to see me and I said they could see him.
“Normally, it was in the evenings the family go and see him. So because I had authorised the American team to see him, the other part of the family was waiting to see him.”
“It was at this meeting when the American team was meeting Abiola that he fell sick and suddenly the security officers called the medical team to come and attend to him, and when they saw the situation, they said it was severe and needed to take him to the medical centre. So, it was the medical team plus the American team that took him to the medical centre, unfortunately, at the medical centre he gave up.
“Then my security chief called and said ‘I have bad news for you.’ I asked what it was, he said ‘Abiola is dead.’
“I was shocked. He told me he was there with the American team, at that time I was staying in the barracks, I had not moved to the villa, so I said okay, let him take the American team to my house, I will meet them at the house; so I closed from the office, and went there.
“The issue now was how do I break the news to Abiola’s family and how do we tell the world Abiola had passed on? I must be thankful to God and again to Ambassador Kingibe because we called on him and asked him to bring the family of Abiola. So when they came, I broke the news, that unfortunately this is what has happened,” he added.
