Dasuki: Enemy Or Friend?

Dasuki Undermines Nigeria Democracy

Also, last week, Senator Babafemi Ojudu raised alarm of the plot by the President to get his tenure of office extended through the National Assembly while former President Obasanjo warned the military against taking advantage of the unsettled scenario in the political scene to return to power. There is no doubt that the next few weeks leading to the elections will be very interesting and one man who will be under focus is Dasuki, the national security adviser who many believed initiated the postponement plot.

Many had however queried the role played by Dasuki in getting the elections postponed. Sources told this magazine last week that as the NSA, the Sokoto Prince job is mere advisory and his outing at the Chatham House where he first made the suggestion for the election postponement was beyond his brief. This is more so since many Nigerians believed that the NSA has failed to live up to his assignment of protecting Nigerians.

“The country has witnessed worsening security situations under Dasuki, especially as related to the war against insurgency for instance with the kidnapping of the Chibok girls, the fake amnesty with Boko Haram, the tactical manoeuvre of our forces into Cameroun, the loss of territories said to be up to the size of Belgium, and the embarrassing bail-out of Nigeria, the giant of Africa, by our lowly neighbours, ” Waziri Adio, a publisher and columnist noted in his weekly column last Monday.

There were insinuations in political circles that Dasuki may have been propelled to act against Buhari based on the unfinished business of 1985. In that coup d’état , he, along with four other majors, namely, Abdulmumini Aminu, Lawan Gwadabe, Abubakar D. Umar and John Madaki were assigned the task of arresting Buhari, an action which was critical to the success of the coup.

Sambo is described by associates and former colleagues as academically sound, capable to deliver on whatever responsibility assigned him and humble. He was said to have emerged as one of the fiercest loyalists of Babangida and over time became very influential behind the scene.

This was said to have earned him envy of others, especially the then Chief of Army Staff, General Sani Abacha, especially after the latter learnt that Sambo was feeding the President with his activities. Abacha took opportunity of Babangida absence from the country when the former President went for medical checkup in France to post Sambo out of Dodan Barracks. An attempt to recall Sambo back to Dodan Barracks after the return of Babangida to the country was resisted by Abacha.

Eventually, both men agreed that Sambo should to go to America to do his Staff College and degree programme as a truce. After his programme, Sambo returned to the country and operated quietly in the military until he was retired alongside other military officers in September 1993 by the then Secretary of Defence, General Sani Abacha. His father, who became the 18th Sultan of Sokoto under General Babangida, was also deposed by General Abacha.

And in 1995, the government of the late Abacha declared Dasuki wanted over claims that he participated in a ‘phantom coup’, allegedly led by Col. Lawan Gwadabe. He subsequently fled to the United States and returned in 2001 following Nigeria’s return to democracy. He was appointed the Managing Director, Nigeria Security Printing and Minting Company Limited in 2002, but resigned in 2003 following the controversial privatisation of the Mint. Some analysts had insisted that Sambo whose highest political position in the Army was the ADC to President Babangida and had never commanded a division or becoming a Chief of Defence Staff was not qualified to be appointed as Nigeria’s NSA, a position that has been previously occupied by Generals.

Some sources have also accused him of power grab in the Jonathan presidency accusing him of taking over the job which naturally should be in the domain of Mohammdu Gusau, the Minister of Defence who incidentally is his in law. APC did not mince words in describing Dasuki’s action as a crude and fraudulent way of helping the President to avoid defeat. Dasuki assured last week that the elections will not be postponed beyond March 28 with a promise that the Boko Haram insurgents would be defeated within the coming six weeks with the help of a new regional cooperation involving Cameroon, Chad and Niger. “Somebody looking at it the other way would say I’m helping the APC,” the NSA who noted that most of the states where Boko Haram is very active were all opposition strongholds said in an interview with AFP.

Still, many believed that the NSA should just concentrate on his core duties. “But it wouldn’t be too much to expect the NSA, who incidentally played a major role in the August 1985 coup and ran into exile when the late General Sani Abacha wanted him as part of the Col. Lawan Gwadabe alleged coup, to concentrate more on his core remit, use available channels for his advice, and not risk being seen as part of a plot to undermine hard-won democracy”, Adio noted.