In an interview, General Olusegun Obasanjo revealed how, when they were detained, General Sani Abacha wanted him, the late Shehu Musa Yar’Adua, and the late Moshood Abiola, the hero of June 12th, dead. He made this statement during a dinner program hosted by Christ The Redeemer’s Friends International of the Redeemed Christian Church of God, Lagos Province 39 Chapter, an interdenominational Christian organization. The former president said that Yar’Adua was poisoned by Abacha’s assassination team and that he was supposed to be the next casualty, but that he was spared by God’s providential intervention.
“Two people had earlier told me,” stated Obasanjo. Abacha pledged that none of the three of us—including me—would escape jail or custody alive. MKO Abiola and Shehu Yar Adua. Additionally, two of them perished. Given that I survived, perhaps God has a purpose. Thus, it’s okay if the goal is for me to serve the people and, in doing so, serve God. I was allegedly planning a coup by Abacha. It wasn’t me who got arrested first. I attempted to ask for Shehu’s (Yar’Adua) release after he was taken into custody. I told Abacha that the second-most powerful man in this nation could not be detained without your knowledge when he claimed he was unaware of Shehu’s detention. He then said he would go and find out.
“Abacha excluded God from his design, and as a result, it (his government) ultimately collapsed. Every single one of us and every single institution has God’s hand in it. That, in my opinion, is really credible. “I was placed in isolation for three months after being detained and brought to a home in Ikoyi, Lagos.
“In the interim, there were calls for my release from both domestic and foreign sources. Former US President Jimmy Carter was among the world leaders who visited to make this request. African leaders such as Robert Mugabe and Yoweri Museveni arrived.
I think it was due to such pressures that I was taken out of house arrest and placed in isolation in Ikoyi.
