Governor of old Kaduna state, Alhaji Balarabe Musa, and Labour leader, Comrade Issa Aremu, have called on President Muhammadu Buhari to go beyond recognising June 12 as Democracy Day by investigating annulment of the 1993 election.
Speaking during Democracy Day celebration at Balarabe Musa’s residence in Kaduna Friday, they said those who annulled the June 12, 1993 election were responsible for the country’s many challenges.
According to them, they should not be allowed to go scot free but instead be made to face the full wrath of the law to serve as deterrent to other anti democratic forces in the country.
Musa while commending President Buhari for surprising the nation by honouring MKO Abiola, said the president should “complete the task he started by investigating the circumstances leading to the annulment of June 12, those responsible for the annulment and punish them effectively, so that such will not happen again.”
He said, “President should complete the task he started by investigating the circumstances that lead to the annulment of June 12, those responsible for the annulment and punish them effectively, so that, it will not happen again.
“If President Muhammadu Buhari does not go further and do this, anybody can do same thing like Babangida who annulled June 12 and got away with it; up till now, he (Babangida) is getting away with it. We must make sure that does not happen.”
Aremu, in his remarks, said the public apology tendered by President Buhari to Nigerians and family of MKO Abiola over the annulment “is a verbal punishment of those who annulled the election.”
He, however, said beyond renaming a monument after MKO, Nigeria must deepen democracy he fought and died for, adding that “this year marks almost 30 years of the annulment, 21 years of uninterrupted civil rule and 60 years of independence achieved through democratic mass struggle.”
“We must democratise the public space and rescue the country from the total capture and dominance of few unaccountable self serving ruling elites. We must eradicate poverty as envisioned by Abiola. There is what I call ‘insufficiency in democratic practices’ among the politicians that is worsening the crisis of governance in the country. Security and economic challenges can only be overcome if ordinary people are involved in governance,” he said.
