Benin High Chief commends Buhari over June 12 democracy day, blasts PDP

MORE reactions have continued to trail the recent decision by President Muhammadu Buhari to honour the popularly acclaimed winner of the June 12, 1993, presidential election, Chief Moshood Abiola of the defunct Social Democratic Party (PDP).

The Esogban of Benin Chief David Edebiri who spoke in Benin at the weekend said that the PDP which was in power between 1999 and 2915 refused to recognised June 12 as Democracy Day because the party was founded and funded by the military.

Edebiri, who hailed Buhari’s honour for Abiola almost 25 years after the annulment of the watershed election by the former military president, Gen. Ibrahim Babangida, said the decision was the best gift for Nigerians.

The high chief said that Buhari’s action would end the grief of those who felt injured by what Babaginda did by annulling the election adjudged to be the freest and most credible in the annals of Nigeria political history.

He said: “The unfortunate thing about our country is that when we left the military regime, the party that took over power and ruled this country for 16 years was an offshoot of the military.”

Continuing, the old politician said that the move was wise and could not have come at a better time than now irrespective of whatever political meanings some politicians were reading to the action.

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He queried: “How can they come to say they want to undo what they have done wrong? You cannot expect them to do it because they were part and parcel of what happened to Abiola.”

According to Edebiri, the decision meets the yearnings and aspirations of a vast majority of Nigerians who knew what happened and who appreciated the sacrifices made by Nigerians for the actualisation of June 12 after it was annulled by the military.

“I want to further appeal to Buhari to immortalise the name of Chief Anthony Enahoro. First as a nationalist who sacrificed his entire life for this country. Enahoro as a young man went to jail several times because of Nigeria. When the question of Abiola came, he was among the vanguard that fought for the restoration of democracy. A man like that should not be forgotten.”