By Enyichukwu Enemanna
Former Nigerian military leader has debunked a social media post in which he was portrayed to have backed junta rule over civilian government.
General Ibrahim Babangida ruled the West African nation from 1985-1993 but unsuccessfully sought to govern as a civilian President after democratic governance returned in 1999.
”Our attention has been drawn to a post on a parody account on X, formerly known as twitter, which carries the handle, @General_Ibbro, in which former President Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida, GCFR, was supposed to have endorsed the virtues of military rule over democratic governance.
“This dubious account carries our principal’s picture and name and the coat of arms of the Federal Republic of Nigeria for added effect but it does not belong to him nor does the former President sanction any post appearing there”, Babangida’s media office said in a statement signed by Mahmud Abdullahi.
Babangida reiterated his commitment to democratic governance rather than military and therefore called on all Nigerians to embrace and work towards its success.
The media office recalled how the individual suspected to be behind the post made similar false social media post in the past and attributed same to the former Nigerian leader.
“In the past and more famously during the presidential elections last year, it posted a blatant falsehood that the former President had endorsed a particular presidential candidate and his party, thereby causing public confusion and some embarrassment to the Elder Statesman.
“We have just learnt that it has posted a similarly fake statement where the former President was supposed to have said that Nigeria has the best years under military, democracy made things worst.
“We want to state unequivocally that neither the twitter or X account which is essentially a parody or pretend account, nor the statement made therein ever belonged to the retired General.
“For the avoidance of doubt, General Babangida (rtd) believes that Nigeria’s democracy is resilient and has come to stay and that we must do everything we can to safeguard the process.
“As a nation, we are currently facing a number of challenges but the former president has always expressed the view that we will eventually overcome these challenges and come out a stronger, more progressive nation. The solution to our problems as he had said previously, is ‘more’ democracy, not less.
“General Babangida truly believes that the era of military intervention in Nigeria’s politics is long gone and he has said how proud he is that the Nigerian military has stood firmly behind multiple democratic governments in this country since 1999, thus giving us the longest run of civilian administration since independence.
“The user of this unfortunate parody account which we gather was traditionally supposed to be an account that imitates or at least mirror the sentiments of the original twitter or X account that it copies, has serially chosen to use the account to undermine democracy and spread stories capable of causing animosity.
“Sadly, there seems very little we can do to make the overseers of X or twitter to remove or sanction this tiresome account, so we are again obliged to advise the general public to ignore any post from this account that purportedly claims to represent my opinion,” it added further.
The statement advised media practitioners and social media users to be more discerning in future and make the necessary efforts to get confirmation before sharing messages attributed to former President Babangida on X on any social media platform.
