By Raheem Adedoyin
In recent times, I have been reeling from the death of close friends, acquaintances and compatriots. Now, the addition of His Excellency, Muhammadu Buhari (GCFR) to that list is more agonizing.
I was not a fan (in fact, I was an antagonist) of General Muhammadu Buhari (GMB) when he was Nigeria’s military Head of the State. I was in the final year at the University of Lagos when he seized power in 1984. I was not an activist but the Aluta Continua spirit drove me to be against his regime. The dislike was heightened by his regime’s draconian decrees (especially Decree 4 of 1984) that resulted in the jailing of journalists.
But by divine favour, GMB got transformed into a statesman of immense national value. He became a national icon for his spartan lifestyle and a folk hero for losing presidential elections.
Then, the unthinkable happened: the talismanic Bola Ahmed Tinubu cobbled together a coalition that defeated an entrenched ruling party – and its sitting president – and made Buhari the President.
I was a delegate from Kwara State at the 2014 national convention that produced Buhari as the presidential flag bearer of the new party, the All-Progressives Congress (APC). It was a night of long knives, of hot horse trading. But Buhari prevailed.
The Convention ground in Lagos was the second time I would see and meet GMB physically. The first was also in Lagos during the wedding of the son of Alh. Lai Mohammed where I took this accompanying picture with him.
I was the Coordinator of the National Committee for Buhari Support Group (NCBSG) in Kwara State which campaigned strongly for his re-election in 2019. The Group was self-funded. A major opportunity for a federal appointment under Buhari was lost to local Kwara politics as I was removed from the list of Federal Board Chairmen from Kwara on the order of the then party leader in Kwara State.
But I remain eternally grateful to my two colleagues and friends who served in the Buhari Presidency – Mr. Femi Adesina and Mallam Garba Shehu – for their wonderful support for my international professional pursuits.
I hold as a trophy, President Buhari’s Congratulatory messages to me (broadcast on the network of the Nigerian Television Authority, NTA, and published widely in national and international media) on the two occasions that mattered to me in 2021: My 60th Birthday in July and my election in Vienna, Austria in September into the executive board of the International Press Institute (IPI) representing Nigeria and Africa. My election was witnessed by a federal government representative sent specifically for that purpose from Nigeria.
May Allah grant President Buhari Aljanah Firdaus. Ameen.
