TheCable

The Afenifere Renewal Group (ARG), a socio-political organisation in the south-west, has called on President Muhammadu Buhari to publish the result of the June 12, 1993 election, won by the late MKO Abiola.

Olawale Oshun, chairman of the organisation made the demand on Saturday, saying as a “beneficiary of a ballot revolution” Buhari owed Nigerians the duty of declassifying the result of that election.

Oshun said the election which ushered in the current administration mirrored that of 1993.

“June 12 is no longer a struggle but now an obligation. The people have played their own part. It is now the obligation of the beneficiaries of that struggle to set the country on a truly democratic path by deliberately replacing every stamp of military rule on Nigeria’s nationhood, including the imposed governance structure and constitution, through democratic rights and tenets. There is no alternative way to deepen democracy in Nigeria,” Oshun said in a statement.

“Let nobody be deceived. Until the federal government takes conscious steps to restructure Nigeria, the country will continue to wobble from one crisis of nationhood to another. To continue to ignore this necessity is a tacit support by elected officials for everything that transpired during the military era and this is why military rule has transited to ‘do or die’ politics and citizens now believed they have a right to take up arms against their country.

“ARG therefore called on President Buhari to see himself as best poised to help Nigeria make this transition. This can be his best legacy and the starting point, we dare say, is to release the June 12 presidential election result and its winner appropriately recognised and honoured.”

By Sunday, it will be 23 years since that election, which was adjudged as the best in the history of the country, took place.

Ibrahim Babangida, the then military president, annulled the exercise, which led to a crisis that ended with the coup of Sani Abacha, former military dictator.

Abiola was incarcerated, and he died exactly a month after the death of Abacha, who ordered his detention.