June 12: 20 years after
• The date remains at once a watershed and
a mockery of Nigeria’s quest for democracy
It was a day that was; a day for the
history books and all the elements were in concert to hand it a landmark role
in the annals of Nigeria. June 12 was a mere presidential election date that
grew to become war song, a rallying call, a democratic ethos and a milestone
from which Nigeria’s quest for popular rule must take its bearing. June 12 must
pass for the very first affirmation that Nigeria may well be more than a
geographical expression; it was the first attestation that the entity
christened Nigeria has some chance under the blaze of the African sun to shine
forth and blossom into a preeminent giant of a country ; the pride of all
coloured peoples of the world. That is the power and symbolism of the date,
June 12, 1993.
June 12, 1993 was a culmination of an
interminable and deceitful transition programme instituted by General
Babangida, which was never meant to yield any fruit ab initio. In 1992, he had
unilaterally cancelled a presidential primary election organised by his
administration for spurious reason he called, “bad conduct” by politicians.
June 12 could be said to have literally defied Babangida’s gun boats and
tricksters, including a midnight court ruling the night before, orchestrated by
the regime to stop the election. Instead, it rode on a momentum that even a
military dictatorship could not comprehend. June 12 became Babangida’s
waterloo.
The National Electoral Commission, NEC,
headed by a certain Professor Humphrey Nwosu went ahead with the election in
spite of not-so-covert efforts to arm-twist him into calling off the election
at the last minute. Remarkably, Nwosu’s NEC adopted what it called Option A-4
which required voters to queue behind the candidate of their choice. By this
method, it was obvious that Abiola was going to win what was a free and fair
election. Already, in a clear lead after 14 states had been counted, the
military government inexplicably halted the counting, collation and
announcement of the rest of the election results and kept Prof. Nwosu under
house arrest. Ten days later, on June 23, 1993, the June 12 election was
annulled by the Babangida administration.
Addressing a bemused nation in a
long-winded speech on June 26, 1993, General Babangida said; “There were
allegations of irregularities and other acts of bad conduct levelled against
the presidential candidates but NEC went ahead and cleared them. There were
proofs as well as documented evidence of widespread use of money during the
party primaries as well as the presidential election. These were the same bad
conduct for which the party presidential primaries of 1992 were cancelled.”
It was obvious that General Babangida was
merely prevaricating and full of equivocation. Naturally, the country was set
on a tailspin as Nigerians who voted Abiola across the country and across
ethnic and religious divides continued to agitate for the election to be
brought to its logical conclusion and the results announced. Babangida had
promised to keep faith with his August 27, 1993 exit date by organising another
election. But that was not to be as the pressure from home and abroad forced
him to hurriedly flee from office on that date, leaving behind a contraption he
called Interim National Government, ING, headed by a stooge, Chief Ernest
Shonekan. On November 10, 1993, a Lagos High Court ruled the ING to be a sham and
the mess was dislodged by Babangida’s life-long shadow, General Sani Abacha on
November 17, 1993 in a ‘soft’ coup.
Abacha, the goggled ogre rolled out the
tanks against Nigerians seeking the validation of their vote; drove members of
the National Democratic Coalition (NADECO), the then symbol of mass resistance
to military rule, out of town. Many Nigerians who protested the annulment of
the election were killed and many others maimed. Abacha grabbed Chief Abiola
who kept insisting on his mandate and clamped him into detention where he died
on July 12, 1998. Before he died, his activist wife, Alhaja Kudirat Abiola had
been assassinated in broad daylight in Lagos by Abacha’s killer squad and his
businesses had floundered. Many others were killed by the squad. For four years
during which Abacha held sway, Nigeria was a pariah among the comity of
nations, was prostrate and comatose until his demise in 1998. General
Abdulsalami Abubakar mounted the saddle, organised an election which ushered in
a former General Olusegun Obasanjo, in 1999.
Sadly, the story of the June 12, 1993
debacle has become Nigeria’s narrative for two decades. Her democracy founded
on a fault line, has remained askew since then. Elections are still her very
albatross as witnessed in the crisis that has engulfed the recent Nigeria
Governors Forum, NGF, election and democracy has merely wobbled on, lacking any
roots. It is remarkable that ethno-religious crises in Nigeria which the Abiola
mandate would have curtailed are even more alive and well today, ravaging the
country now more than ever. Democratic space has continued to constrict over
these decades with successive governments ignoring the basic tenets and
conveniently neglecting to build institutions that would enhance civil rule and
orderly conduct of governance.
Perhaps most important is the fact that no
lessons have been learnt from the missed opportunity that was June 12. Some of
the chief protagonists and villains of that sad epoch, like General Babangida
and Chief Tony Anenih, to name just two, are still playing the field, oblivious
of the havoc their actions of two decades ago have brought upon the country.
Nigeria needs to make atonement for June 12
and that may begin with the key actors coming clean and telling the truth about
that election. Then, we need to properly situate that historic election,
recognise and honour the winner even post-humously. That is the way to rest the
spirit of June 12 once and for all.
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