Former military president, General Ibrahim Babangida (retd.), has dismissed the longtime allegation of being involved in the death of veteran journalist and Editor-in-Chief of Newswatch, Dele Giwa......CONTINUE READING THE ARTICLE FROM THE SOURCE>>>>>
Naija News recalls that Giwa, a vocal critic of Babangida’s military government, was assassinated via a parcel bomb in his home in Ikeja, Lagos State, on October 19, 1986.
Two days before the incident, a senior official of the Directorate of Military Intelligence had accused Giwa of illegally importing and stockpiling arms and ammunition to stage a socialist revolution in Nigeria.
Alarmed at the charge, Giwa quickly briefed his lawyer, Gani Fawehinmi, and the following day, a security chief, Colonel Halilu Akilu, called to reassure Giwa that the accusation had resulted from a misunderstanding, that the matter had been cleared, and the journalist should not think about it.
A few hours later, the emissary arrived, and Giwas’s son, Billy, collected the parcel and handed it to his father, who was seated at the dining table in the company of the London correspondent of Newswatch, Kayode Soyinka, who was visiting from the UK.
The envelope bore the seal of the Presidency and was marked “To be opened by addressee only.”
However, IBB, in his autobiography, “A Journey in Service,” presented in Abuja on Thursday, denied the purported involvement in Giwa’s death. He said he hoped that the truth would be uncovered one day.
He said, “The hysteria of the media did not help the investigation of the Giwa murder. As is typical of the Nigerian media, the direction was marked by an adversarial attitude towards the government, which had remained the hallmark of the Nigerian media from its colonial heyday.
“It was an attitude of ‘we versus the government’ that has remained today. It is a situation in which the government is adjudged guilty even before the evidence in a case is adduced.
“When the Obasanjo civilian administration reopened the Giwa case at the Oputa Panel on Human and Civil Rights, I expected that the police and lawyers would come forward with new evidence as to their findings on the Giwa murder over the years.
“Nothing of such happened. The Giwa, like all mysterious murders, has remained unsolved after so many years. I keep hoping it will be uncovered in our lifetime or after us. More often than not, mysterious crimes are solved long after their commission.”