FORMER Vice-President Atiku Abubakar has taken yet another swipe at
ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo, saying his former boss did not want to
relinquish power. Both men, who were in charge of the country’s affairs
between 1999 and 2007, ended their tenures on a rancorous note. They
later made peace, with Abubakar sharing a picture of him dinning at the
Hill Top residence of Obasanjo in Abeokuta, Ogun State capital, in the
build-up to the 2015 election. Back then, Atiku sought the support of
Obasanjo for the presidential ticket of the ruling All Progressives
Congress, APC, which he lost to President Muhammadu Buhari. But the
hostilities seem to have been renewed. In an interview with Zero
Tolerance, a publication of the Economic and Financial Crimes
Commission, EFCC, Abubakar revisited the disagreement he had with
Obasanjo. He said contrary to the widespread belief that Obasanjo was
seeking a third term, the elder statesman plotted to remove the aspect
of tenure limitation from the constitution so that he could be president
for life. Abubakar said his opposition to the idea was the cause of
their disagreement. “My offence was that I disagreed with him on the
amendment of the constitution to remove tenure/term limits or what was
popularly called the ‘third term agenda’,” he said. “In fact, he sent
the then Attorney- General and Prof. Jerry Gana to my office to bring
the draft amendments of the constitution. After going through them, I
found out that tenure limits had been removed. In other words, he could
be president for life. “I then asked them that ‘if I send you to the
president, can you deliver this message’? They said yes. I said ‘go and
tell him I will not support it and I will fight it.” Abubakar said this
was what prompted Obasanjo to mandate the EFCC to probe him. He also
said Nuhu Ribadu, former chairman of the anti-graft agency, initially
accused him of corruption, but later
apologised to him. “When he came to ask me for forgiveness, I said, if
you want me to forgive you Nuhu, go to the same television stations
where you said I was corrupt and say you now (have) realised that I am
not corrupt,” he said. “Then he said ‘sir, you have forgiven so many
people who have offended you publicly without them going to TV stations
to apologise to you’ and I said, ‘your case is different because first
of all, I helped to found the EFCC’. “I was instrumental to your
appointment, so, I believe I have contributed to your development and
this is how you are paying me back. In any case, he kept on apologising
and I said, ‘okay, no problem. That closed the chapter’.
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