June 12, 1993, presidential election is arguably one of the most important events in Nigeria in our lifetime. I always have this conviction that though history can be mad at times, history is made all the time. There’s practically no Nigerian that has not heard about June 12. The importance and popularity of that date came alive again on February 20, 2025, when General Ibrahim Babangida launched his autobiography, Journey in Service, in which he laboured, rather very weakly, to explain inaccurately and in a dribbling style his role in the annulment of the June 12 presidential election won by MKO Abiola. At the end of the whole saga, Babangida, yet again, scored an own goal against himself and left the dark wounds of June 12 unhealed. He indeed added insult to the injury. Maybe the gap toothed General will realise, after all these years, that it’s only the truth that genuinely heals and in the absence of the truth, silence would have been a more preferred destination.
I was an eye witness to the events of June 12. I do not need to read anybody’s version to tell the correct version of the story of June 12. The summary of the whole episode is that Babangida, as Commander-in- Chief of the Armed Forces, established a fake transition to civil rule programme in which he never intended to hand over power to anyone and at the end of the day, annulled his fake transition to civil rule and was forced to step aside by a country that became tired of his unending insincere transition to nowhere.
Babangida assumed power on 27 August, 1985 in a bloodless coup that overthrew the “holier-than-thou” Muhammadu Buhari, whom he and Abacha brought into power on 31st December, 1983, after removing Alhaji Shehu Shagari, the first executive President of Nigeria, thereby ending the second republic. Almost on that same day, Babangida promised the whole world that he was going to hand over power to a democratically elected government by 1990. Along the line, he kept modifying the programme and shifting the dates until Nigerians concluded that he had a hidden agenda.
For the avoidance of doubt, Babangida established the political bureau that advised him on the political journey he undertook. Against all democratic norms, he established two political parties, the Social Democratic Party (SDP) and the National Republican Convention (NRC) and commanded all politicians who wanted to contest elections to join any of them. He wrote their constitutions and manifestos. He built their secretariats in all the local governments in Nigeria. He scheduled the timetable for elections. He banned the people he didn’t want from contesting and called the resultant remnants “new breed.” Indeed he owned the transition. It’s instructive that when he did all these things, he didn’t say that he was intimidated, induced, coerced, or influenced by any human being to do such. He was 100 percent in charge and was in power. Of course, he was a military dictator who governed through decrees. His word was law.He conducted the gubernatorial election in 1991 and shifted the presidential election to 1992 just to gain two more years for himself. He effectively enthroned the undesirable diarchy in which the country didn’t know whether they were governed by decrees or laws. By 1992, Babangida organised the presidential election primaries for the two political parties won by Gen Shehu Musa Yar’Adua of the SDP and Adamu Ciroma of the NRC. After concluding that the primary elections were rigged, he cancelled them and cunningly shifted the election to 1993 and decided that 27th August, the eighth anniversary of his regime will be the handover date for his transition after the presidential election fixed for June 12, 1993. At this stage, nobody assisted him in annulling the elections and shifting the date. In Nigeria, as at then, nobody, including Abacha, believed that Babangida was serious about handing over power.
The political parties, surprisingly, according to Babangida, conducted a peaceful, hitch free presidential primary elections, adopting option A4, in which Bashorun MKO Abiola of the SDP and Alhaji Bashir Tofa of the NRC emerged as the presidential candidates. Things were moving very well towards June 12. However, an organisation called Association for Better Nigeria (ABN) led by Arthur Nzeribe, sprung up from nowhere and endorsed Babangida to govern for the next four years. IBB himself, inadvertently, in his book endorsed this request. Hear him, “amid the fierce opposition we faced then from civil society, any sign of ‘approval’ from even a seemingly suspicious quarter was a relief! If we didn’t stop the torrent of abuse and opposition to us, why should we stop the only ray of ‘approval’ that came our way?”(P 284). As noted by IBB, he refused to stop ABN from trying to persuade Nigerians that IBB should annul the transition and continue in power in perpetuity which the civil society organizations opposed.
On June 10th, 1993, Justice Bassey Ikpeme issued an injunction stopping the election of June 12. Babangida summoned a meeting to feel the pulse of his followers, to understand the decision to take. Ordinarily, if Babangida wasn’t part of the plot to abort the transition, he needed not summon any meeting because he made the Decree 13 that ousted the jurisdiction of any court to make such order. He would have just ordered Prof Humphrey Nwosu to proceed with the election. At the meeting, Nwosu overwhelmed them with superior argument which left Babangida with no other choice than to issue the order to the Prof that he should proceed with the election. His order however proved that whatever IBB wanted done was done irrespective of who was opposed to it and no matter whose ox was gored, whether it was a court or NEC chairman or an Abacha whom IBB admitted was in that meeting when he made the order.
There was only one excuse Babangida and his anti-transition lieutenants waited for to annul the election. Allegations of rigging and violent elections. Unfortunately, the politicians denied him the opportunity. Hear Babangida, “On Saturday, June 12, 1993, the Presidential elections took place as planned. To my surprise, the polls were not just peaceful but very peaceful indeed!” (P 274) Why would Babangida be surprised if he expected the election to be peaceful? He was surprised because contrary to his expectation of a rowdy election which would have given him the excuse to annul the election, he disappointingly saw a peaceful election which denied him the opportunity of an excuse to annul the election. A non-desperate leader would have known that his time was up at this time and allowed the election to be completed and handed over to the winner. But IBB was so desperate to remain in power that he suspended the announcement of the results and went ahead to annul the election.
IBB himself noted thus: “Voting took place in all the 110,000 polling stations in the country, and in keeping with the Modified Open Ballot System (MOBS) as stipulated in Decree 13, counting took place flawlessly in the open, followed almost simultaneously with an open collation that allowed for final results to be attained quickly. Using a giant board in front of its Abuja offices, NEC started, as early as June 13, as stipulated by the Electoral law, to display already released results from all 30 State Headquarters of NEC before the Resident Electoral Commissioners brought them to Abuja for final ratification. That process of public display of results, which had now covered 14 states, continued until June 14. And then, on June 16, without my knowledge or prior approval, NEC Chairman, Professor Nwosu, announced the suspension of the June 12 election results ‘until further notice’. I knew instantly that certain fifth columnists were at work and that there was a need for extra care!.” (P 274)
IBB, rather than standing with the Prof to conclude the election, ran to Minna and made himself incommunicado. He admitted that within this interregnum, the option of annulment was agreed by all of them. Hear IBB: “Yes, during the stalemate that followed the termination of the results announcement, the possibility of annulment that could lead to fresh elections was loosely broached in passing. But annulment was only a component of a series of other options.” (P 275)
Despite his claim that he wasn’t aware of the preliminary announcement of the annulment of the election by Nduka Irabor, the Press Secretary of his second-in-command, Admiral Aikhomu, on June 23, obviously to test the waters and prepare for his own announcement, he went ahead personally on 26 June to officially put his seal of authority on the annulment by announcing it publicly in a broadcast, claiming that the election was rigged, and obviously contradicting himself that the election was peaceful and hitch free. (P 277)
Babangida, and Babangida alone annulled the June 12 election because he didn’t want to leave power. His utterance, “These nefarious ‘inside’ forces opposed to the elections have outflanked me!’ I would later find out that the ‘forces’ led by General Sani Abacha annulled the elections” (P 275) was patently false. IBB was too smart to be outflanked. Indeed IBB disrespected himself and displayed cowardice by insinuating that his junior officers persuaded him, against his will, to annul the election which he knew was free, fair, and credible.
Does this imply that Abacha was innocent in the annulment of the transition to civil rule? There were various interests in the June 12 debacle. The Babangida interest, Abacha interest, Dangiwa interest, and Abiola interest. Abacha was central to every party to the transition. He understood the genuine desire of all of them and utilised the opportunity to achieve his own interest. Abacha wanted to be Head of State and bid his time to achieve that purpose. He had been a professional coup plotter and knew the best time to strike. His strategy was simple, play along with every party with the impression that he will help each party realise each party’s interest and dump the party after using the party to actualize his own interest which was to become the Head of State.
Abacha knew that Babangida didn’t want to leave power but also understood that if Babangida allowed the transition to be successful, he wouldn’t be Head of State. He created the impression to Babangida that he will support him if he annulled the election and Babangida fell for it. After the annulment, he withdrew support from Babangida and his regime collapsed. Babangida alluded indirectly to this in his book. Hear him, “But it’s also correct that he (Abacha) was a complex character. He was capable of bottling up a lot inside without giving a hint of where he was. And then, suddenly, the bottle bursts, and we begin to see a different person. I obviously didn’t know everything about him! For instance, I was alarmed to discover that he and a handful of others mobilised negative opinions against me within the military, portraying me as the problem. That campaign was geared towards a violent military coup to remove me as President forcefully.” (P 278)
Babangida was right here. Unknown to Babangida, at the same time Abacha was supporting him to annul the election, he was mobilising the Dangiwa group against Babangida, creating the impression to them that Babangida wasn’t sincere with his transition and didn’t want to leave power. Abacha knew that the Dangiwa group was the sincere group who was ashamed of the military reneging on its promise to hand over power to civilians and wanted to redeem the image of the military by all means even if it meant taking out Babangida. When Babangida stepped aside, Abacha turned against the Dangiwa group and retired them out of the army because he knew that they will be an obstacle to his ascendancy to become Head of State.
Abiola interest was the revalidation of his mandate. Abacha understood the magnitude of this mandate and the unyielding resolve of the Nigerian civil society in the revalidation of the mandate. He created the impression to MKO that he should just be patient and allow him to take over power to revalidate the mandate. MKO believed him and started praising him openly and telling people that he is a General in love with democracy and will do the right thing at the slightest opportunity. Meanwhile, Abacha actually loathed Abiola. (P279).
The Interim National Government led by Shonekan was declared illegal by the courts and Shonekan resigned, obviously by the subtle push from Abacha, supported by the Abiola group. Abacha assumed power as Head of State and Abiola was one of the earliest callers to show solidarity with him obviously hoping that Abacha will put all the necessary arrangements to revalidate June 12. Abacha beamed the visit to the whole world and created the impression that his taking over power was accepted by all. The observation Babangida made about Abacha, “And then, suddenly, the bottle bursts, and we begin to see a different person,” perfectly reflects what happened.
Abacha quickly consolidated himself in power and retired all known officers loyal to IBB or professional coup plotters, or sympathetic to the June 12 struggle. Before Abiola realised it, it was late. In frustration, Abiola declared himself President. Abacha arrested him and threw him into jail. It was in Abacha’s interest that Abiola remained alive but in jail. He understood that if Abiola remained alive, no other politician will be interested in being a democratically elected President because no politician will be able to have power to deal with the crises of June 12 annulment. Indeed, no notable politician genuinely aspired to succeed Abacha in his lifetime. Even when Abacha orchestrated a transition to civil rule, all the five political parties, which Bola Ige described as the five fingers of a leprous hand, adopted Abacha as their unanimous choice for President until he suddenly died. About one month later, Abiola also, in similar circumstances, died under the regime of Gen Abdulsalami Abubakar, paving way for the transition to the fourth republic, which we have today.
Source : Sunday Sun
