Osoba: IBB was held hostage by Abacha, others

A former governor of Ogun state, Olusegun Osoba, has claimed that ex-military president, General Ibrahim Babangida (rtd), was held hostage by the military junta who helped him overthrow his predecessor, Muhammadu Buhari.

IBB overthrew Buhari as a military leader in 1985. Late Sani Abacha, Aliyu Gusau, and others were involved in the coup that ousted Buhari from power.

However, speaking with THISDAY, Osoba, who is a chieftain of the All Progressives Congress (APC), said Osoba said as a journalist, he and some of his colleagues had confronted IBB to tell him many things that his regime was getting wrong.

According to him, Babangida told them that he had no choice but to listen to his fellow coupists.

The former Ogun governor said: “You see, even under the military, I always tell you people that you should praise us that we were able to produce papers that were still sellable under military dictatorship.

“You people operate under a civilian government. You don’t know what it was. The truth is that those military people knew that in-house. I will tell them the home truth.

“I remember one incident when Felix Peter, myself, and one or two other people met Babangida when he was military president.

“We bluntly told him a lot of things that were wrong with him and his government.

“It was so devastating that Gen. Babangida said, ‘Let me tell you boys, I am hostage to those who staged the coup and those who put me here.

“And if I didn’t listen to what they wanted, they would get me out in seconds. And that there are no absolute powers.

“So, you see, behind closed doors, we told them the home truth. So when we wrote stories, they already knew that we had told them the truth. And then tolerated us.”