The fact that President Muhammadu Buhari-led government declared June 12, Nigeria’s Democracy Day is a testament that the results of that election should not have been annulled.
Just to put things in context, it was the day in 1993 that a presidential election was won by billionaire politician, Moshood Kashimawo Olawale Abiola. However, its results was annulled by the defunct administration of General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida.
For the first time, Nigerians defied ethnic and religious considerations as Abiola defeated Bashir Tofa, the candidate of the NRC in his home state of Kano, thereby laying a foundation for the building of a united country devoid of primordial sentiments in the political process.
Nigerians in millions expressed their democratic will in what was undisputedly the freest, fairest and most peaceful election since the country’s Independence. To many Nigerians, June 12 represents a society free from mass poverty, mass unemployment and outright eradication of hunger in the land.
Speaking about the relevance of the election annulled 29 years ago and the way forward for the country, the big players and activists of the struggle for its actualisation maintained that the annulment destroyed the foundation of the nation’s unity, saying there is urgent need for Nigerians to look inward and vote for people with impeccable character to actualise the dream of June 12.
According to a former Ogun State governor, Chief Segun Osoba, “Without June 12, do you think we will have the current democratic set up? June 12 is the mother, father figure and the foundation of this democracy. It is the fallback of June 12, the insistence by democratic forces over the June 12 situation that created the present democratic structure that allowed us to have, whether good or bad, transition from civilian to civilian from 1999 to date.
‘’It has never happened in the history of Nigeria that we have had for over 20 years now, transition from one civilian to the other. Before now, there would have been a military intervention. It was June 12 that created a situation for democratic stability in the country.
Another veteran of the struggle, Senator Femi Okurounmu says “The struggle for June 12, will be eternally relevant forever and ever. It should be one of the high points of our history of Nigeria. The history that our children should read about and learn about and always learn about in school. To that extent, it is always relevant.
‘’That one man gave his life for democracy, in spite of the fact that he was comfortable, he was wealthy, he wasn’t after any personal comfort for himself by being in government, he just believed in democracy.
‘’That every Nigerian from any ethnic group should have the right to seek the presidency, he fought and gave his life for it. That is worth remembering him forever and ever in Nigeria history.’’
