By Austin Ogwuda
FORMER Military President, General Ibrahim Babangida, popularly called IBB has revealed that military interference did a great harm by denying this country the practice of true federalism.
He has assured therefore that the era of military dabbling into politics has come to an end because Nigerians have become more interested in becoming a truly democratic nation.
IBB who stated this while speaking in an exclusive interview with Channels Television on Friday night also revealed how he tried severally to make the late legal icon and renowned social critic, Chief Gani Fawehinmi his friend but rejected.
Hear him, “I think that is (failure to achieve true federalism) one of the effects of the aberration that the military regime, it countered the democratic process.
“I believe in restructuring, devolution of powers to the States to give the more powers and that means you are going to give them more resources to run their own affairs so that we run a federal government the way federation is run all over the world”.
Describing Fawehinmi as a good critic because of his valued and insightful comments on national issues, Babangida recalled that during his time in office, “If we come up with a policy, my first question to my staff was: What would Gani Fawehinmi say? I like listening to him. I made it a point to become his friend.
“He (Fawehinmi) was very friendly with one of my former Ministers, the late Alex Akinyele. They were very good friends, and he (Alex) tried to make us very good friends.
“Fawehinmi was a good critic, and he didn’t want to be seen with someone that people already perceived as an evil genius”, said IBB.
