Chief M. K.O. Abiola on June 12, 1994 declared himself President based on the June 12, 1993 presidential election which he won fair and square.
He was arrested by the military junta of General Sani Abacha and charged with treasonable felony at the Federal High Court Chief Abiola was subjected to horrendous psychological and mental torture while he was held incommunicado in a military custody for 4 years. Despite Chief Abiola’s serious health challenges, the maximum dictator denied him medical care.
Archbishop Desmond Tutu who visited Nigeria at the instance of President Nelson Mandela and met with the imprisoned Chief Abiola confirmed his parlous meical state on April 27, 1998. The revered priest said that Abiola’s health and living conditions were rapidly deteriorating and called for his release immediately so he could tend to his failing health. The military regime ignored the call.
After the controversial death of Abacha on June 8, 1998, he was succeeded by his Chief of Defense Staff, General Abdusalami Abubakar as Head of State and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Nigeria. The new military junta ordered the immediate release of all political prisoners from prison custody including General Obasanjo (rtd) and other convicted coup plotters. However, Abubakar did not release the detained Abiola on the ground that he refused to renounce his claim to the presidency. Nigerians were shocked when the American delegation announced that Abiola died during a short meeting with him on July 7, 1998.
The death of Chief Abiola was investigated by the Chukwudifu Oputa Panel instituted by the President Olusegun Obasanjo administration to probe the egregious human rights abuse which defined military rule in Nigeria. Abubakar refused the request of the Oputa Panel to explain his role in the entire saga as he did not want to be subjected to cross examination by lawyers. In his autobiography, “Call of Duty,” the former military ruler, about 28 years later, dismissed claims that Abiola was poisoned, insisting that an autopsy conducted by foreign pathologists had attributed his death to natural causes.
Abubakar did not counter the evidence given to the Oputa Panel that some poisons are undetectable by autopsy when dismissing the allegation that Chief Abiola was poisoned. In washing off his hands like Pontius Pilate, Abubakar said, “As far back as 1994 when he was arrested by the Abacha Administration for declaring himself President, it was public knowledge that Abiola was managing certain medical conditions which could seriously affect the quality of life of any human being.”
Abubakar also used as a source the transcript of the press conference of Thomas Pickering and the report of Susan Rice in her memoir, “Tough Love: My Story of the Things Worth Fighting For.” She denied that Abiola had been poisoned but admitted that he had been neglected medically. She said she noticed that “Abiola’s ankles were swollen and that about five minutes into their conversation, Abiola started to cough, at first mildly and intermittently, and then wrackingly with consistency.”
Abubakar also referred to a radiological report dated September 28, 1994, by Colonel (Dr) O. Awofeso, then Chief Consultant Radiologist at the Nigerian Army Defense Hospital, Sokoto, which said Abiola’s heart was enlarged with “right ventricular preponderance” consistent with hypertensive cardiac disease. Abubakar therefore contended that, “it was public knowledge that Abiola was managing certain medical conditions which could seriously affect the quality of life of any human being.”
Notwithstanding the fact that General Abubakar knew that Chief Abiola’s health was endangered during his 4-year dehumanizing incarceration by the maximum ruler, Abacha, he deliberately refused to accede to the request to allow him to attend to his health. Equally refused was the request of Abiola’s personal physician, Dr. Ore Falomo, to come see him. Abubakar also subjected Abiola to undeserved mental torture to make him dump his claim to the presidency, as if that was not enough.
After fruitless meetings between Abiola and the service Chiefs on the mandate, Abubakar decided to involve the so-called international community in resolving the political logjam. The then Secretary General of the United Nations, Mr. Kofi Annan, and the Secretary General of the Commonwealth of Nations, Chief Emeka Anyaoku, were flown in to pressure Abiola to renounce his mandate. In their separate meetings with Chief Abiola, they requested him to trade off the June 12 mandate for his release from custody.
Both diplomats, despite rejecting the offer of conditional release, implied in their press statements that he had agreed to give up the mandate. In a letter dated July 6 1998, addressed to Chief Gani Fawehinmi SAN, Abiola denied the claim of both diplomats. “True, both Annan and Anyaoku (apparently working together, although I saw them separately), wanted me to sign a statement that I will not, once again, demand my mandate, once released… he said, Both diplomats talked of arranging my UNCONDITIONAL release. With the demand for such a statement which would make me ‘a deserter’ Any release obtained on that basis would be the worst form of ‘capitulation.’ “
He added that he reviewed “the history of June 12, I told them that right at the beginning, Obasanjo in July 1994 came to me with 26 traditional rulers to seek a similar statement. After I had explained that the issue is one of God versus a few ‘powerful elements’, he was given a stern telling off in the presence of the retinue of traditional fathers. “The voice of the people is the voice of God, ‘Vox Populi Vox Dei’ a well-known saying long before Jesus Christ came along.”
Note that the Americans were invited by Abubakar after the aborted efforts of Annan and Anyaoku to persuade Chief Abiola to give up his mandate. In view of the facts and circumstances of the suspicious death of Abiola, Abubakar could not explain while permitting the American delegation to violate the prison regulations of both Nigeria and the United States during the visit.
In the United States, visitors are absolutely forbidden to bring any food or beverages, including tea, into prisons under the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) and state equivalents. The purpose of the rule is to stop the smuggling of contraband, narcotics and poisons to prisons. Thus, all meals and drinks within correctional facilities are provided only by the institution or purchased thru the secure prison commissary.
Visitors in Nigeria are allowed to bring outside food or water to inmates or detainees in police stations, correctional centers and other detention facilities. But visitors are absolutely required to taste the food or water in front of the officers on duty before serving it to the prisoners or detainees. Visitors must taste the food or water to ensure that it is not poisoned or adulterated to harm the prison inmates or detainees in the custody of the government.
In the United States, visitors are strictly forbidden to bring, serve, or pass any outside food or beverages—including tea—to prisoners. However, the Abubakar military junta allowed that American visitors, who visited Abiola on July 7, 1998, to bring a tea flask to the detention facility. And in total violation of the rules of correctional centers in Nigeria, a member of the delegation, Susan Rice, who served the tea did not taste it before passing it on to the detainee.
ACP Zadok who had guarded Chief Abiola from 1996-1998, testified before the Chukwudifu Oputa Panel. The police officer testified that he tasted the food, water or tea prepared for Abiola in strict compliance with prison regulations before passing same to the detainee. But on the fateful day Zadok said he was removed from his duty post by Major A. S. Aliyu, the Chief Security Officer to the head of the military junta.
Aliyu had abandoned his own primary duty of protecting the head of state to attend to the American delegation. In his oral testimony before the Oputa Panel, Major Aliyu confirmed that Susan Rice did not taste the tea before serving it to Abiola. This was the first and the only occasion on which a foreign visitor was permitted to serve tea to a detainee in the custody of the government, Zadok agreed.
Major Aliyu turned round to say that the tea in question was prepared by a villa staff but he could not name the staff during his highly misleading testimony. At the close of his the proceedings, it was crystal clear that Aliyu had set out to cover up the actual cause of Abiola’s death. So he could not tell why Zadok was ejected from the Akinola Aguda house and why he assumed charge of Chief Abiola’s security when the American delegation visited him.
In his memoir, “Interventions (A Life in War and Peace)”, the late Kofi Annan revealed that he told Abubakar, “Abiola had to be released if he was to gain international goodwill and mine. At this Abubakar wavered a little. He said he was ready to release Abiola right away but only if he did not try to take back the presidency.”
Mr. Kofi Annan equally said that although the foreign pathologists had established that “it was the result of heart condition, and there was no foul play- other than the fact, I thot that Abiola had been denied adequate medical care throughout his incarceration. Either way he was just another victim of the systematic violations of a whole host of human rights which are inevitable under personalized and oppressive regimes.
Before then, the Oputa Panel had, after a critical review of the evidence presented before it, stated thus, “In the case of Chief Moshood Abiola, we are of the view that the government of the day knows much more than it has admitted. We believe that the denial of Chief Moshood Abiola’s mandate was a breach of the rights of Nigerians to choose their leaders freely. We view this as a serious infringement.”
Thus, the Oputa Panel concluded that, “Chief Moshood Abiola’s death was the result of his incarceration and the denial of access to adequate medical attention. The evidence of the Chief Security Officer to the then Head of State, General Abdulsalami Abubakar, was full of contradictions. The evidence before us indicates that Chief Abiola died under suspicious circumstances. The Commission therefore recommends that a thorough investigation be carried out to shed light and inform the Nigerian people on what killed Chief Moshood Abiola.
Given the denial by Abubakar and the members of the American delegation of any involvement in the suspicious death of Abiola, the Federal Government should, without any further delay, reopen investigation into the case. As the Oputa Panel noted, the new probe will “throw light to and inform the Nigerian people on what killed Chief Moshood Abiola” while in the custody of the Abubakar military junta.
