We asserted in the first part of this outing published last week on this platform that the sacking of the town of Odi in Bayelsa State by soldiers on the orders of former President Olusegun Obasanjo in 1989 was an act of self-inflicted curse that he must do something now to lift it off himself and his country before he passes away. We are returning to a conclusion of this discourse today because some of the points that needed to be made in that first part were not made therein and they are so essential they must of necessity be mentioned.
Without variableness, God’s command to us his human creatures that ‘’Thou Shall not kill’’ (under whatever circumstances except approved under law) has not changed. And that is a major statement about the sacredness of human life. The point must be made that to take one life or two accidentally is not acceptable to God. But to then go ahead and take several lives deliberately and wickedly, requires repentance and even restitution to be at peace with God.
We also said in that piece that that Odi pogrom set a pattern for the subsequent gruesome murder on a large scale of citizens of Nigeria and God’s children which we have kept seeing in our country till date. We said that the killing in Odi was unacceptable because it was an incident in which a president of a country set a dangerous precedent that human lives are not worth anything. For me a preacher of the sacredness of human life, any time a substantial number of Nigerians are killed in so-called farmers-herders clashes, bandits’ attacks, communal clashes or any such acts of wickedness, my mind always goes back to that killing in Odi. After Odi, I believe, we have become inured to death on a large scale. Death on a large scale, I believe, no longer shocks us as even when one death ought to shock us.
To be sure, decimation of a section of humans in Nigeria did not start with Odi. It, in fact, actually started during the civil war days when then Colonel Murtala Mohammed and the troops he led were reportedly said to have gathered simple male villagers in Okpanam, Maryam Babangida’s village, in present day Delta State, to the village square and fire was opened on them, wiping away a generation of innocent fellow Nigerians allegedly because they were said to be Ibos and also because Okpanam is the birth area of Major Kaduna Nzeogwu the acknowledged leader of the 1966 coup .
But the difference between Okpanam and Odi is quite clear. In one, the incidence was a part of a fought war where many damned foolish things happen. In the other, a sitting president of a country gave orders for the execution of the bestial act against a people he swore on oath to protect and provide for.
But Odi does not stand alone against Obasano. I will therefore add to Odi and to the account of Obasanjo, the killings in Zaki-Biam, Benue State, on the orders of the same irate General. Obasanjo should also apologise for the killings he ordered of coup plotters that killed Murtala Mohammed and many other prominent and not so prominent military personnel in 1976. If I remember correctly, 33 lives were taken.
I know there is a military law that says that if you take part in a coup and it fails you pay for your failure with your life. But for me, coup plotters who carried out their plot against a man or men who acceded to power via a coup should not be killed. That is why I recommend that Obasanjo should repent of the killings of Bissala, Dimka and co.
Since Muhammadu Buhari, Obasanjo’s successor is no longer with us, I will also add to Obasanjo the charge that should have be laid at the doorsteps of Buhari. It was the killing of about 1500 Shiites Muslims in Zaria. The very negative value Obasanjo and Babangida and Muhammadu Buhari added to Nigerian governance is what I like to call military justice. And when God calls these remaining two men to himself, may the military justice that has become a norm in our society today be buried permanently with them and the generation of soldiers that they indoctrinated into this savage form of justice. Amen.
What makes their own form of deterrent vengeance on coup plotters intolerable is that these men acceded to power through a coup. They were not elected civilian leaders who were to be toppled by soldiers.
For all these atrocities against many innocent souls in Nigeria, the time has come for one significant somebody to step forward boldly and apologise for himself and on behalf of others who have done similar things so that the curse of murder can be lifted on our country.
And there is no one better placed than Obasanjo to step forward boldly and say ‘’I am sorry’’. I repent of the acts mentioned against me. I ordered all of them but what happened was not what I had in mind’’. Let the former president do it. It will not reduce his person. Rather, it will increase his honour and respect. He has created so may orphans and dependents in Odi and in Zaki-Biam.
Obasanjo, I have said here, should not only repent of those crimes against humanity, he should go ahead to do restitution. He should go forward and create a foundation for the mentoring of young men and women in Odi to acquire skills to become very useful citizens of Nigeria. He should feel responsible and proud to empower many people to come out from Odi to surpass in greatness and impact the number of people his order had killed in that town.
From what I can see of Baba Obasanjo his major sin is the sin of anger. His public tearing of his PDP membership card, the illegalities and indignities visited on Ayo Fayose, Rasheed Ladoja and many prominent politicians he had cause to disagree with, all emanated from extreme anger. A man in such strategic leadership position such as he occupied must tamper his anger with great restraint or else he ends up behaving like Ogun the Yoruba god of iron.
By apologizing and repenting of his crimes against humanity and committing to restorative justice, he will be seen as a true statesman, an honour he rightly deserves.
Concluded.
