Former President Olusegun Obasanjo has said he regrets picking Atiku Abubakar as his vice president.
Obasanjo spoke on Friday during a fireside chat with Charles Oputa, popularly known as Charly Boy, in Lagos at the unveiling of Charly Boy’s foundation and his memoir: ‘999: A Memoir in Tribute to Late Justice Chukwudifu Oputa’.
Obasanjo served two terms as Nigeria’s president alongside Atiku between 1999 and 2007. However, the relationship between the two men later became frosty during Obasanjo’s second term in office.
The former president said he was grateful to God that Atiku was never allowed to harm Nigeria under his watch.
“The man I picked as my running mate, my number two, if I had known as I came to know him later, I would not have picked him,” he said.
“I mean my vice-president. What I know about him later makes me… thank God because God did not allow his actions and reactions to overwhelm me or to divert my focus from Nigeria or to harm Nigeria.”
The former president, however, said he harboured no bitterness over what transpired between him and Atiku in the past.
“And then, there is no bitterness because he did things that he believed he should do and God did things He had to do, which made me achieve what I was able to achieve,” he said.
Atiku fired back, saying he had no regrets about standing against ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo’s third-term agenda while they were in office.
Reacting to Obasanjo’s comments in a statement issued on Saturday by Phrank Shaibu, his senior special assistant on public communication, Atiku said he watched the former president’s interview with profound sadness, not anger, “because it reflected the disposition of a man who has allowed personal resentment to cloud historical truth”.
Atiku said the roots of Obasanjo’s hostility towards him are well known to Nigerians.
“I am proud that I stood against the third-term agenda. I am proud that I stood by the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria,” he said.
“I have no apology whatsoever for frustrating every attempt to subvert our democracy for personal ambition.”
He argued that no individual is bigger than Nigeria, adding that if Obasanjo’s bitterness towards him truly stemmed from his opposition to the “unconstitutional third-term” bid, he would wear the resentment as a badge of honour.
