A former senator representing Kaduna central,Shehu Sani said,he saved ex-president of Nigeria,Gen.Olusegun Obasanjo from being assaulted and humiliated by Inmates of KiriKiri Prison in 1995.
Sani stated while speaking to newsmen on Thursday during a lecture in Abuja FCT.
Sani was among pro-democracy activists and dissidents who were rounded up and jailed by the military junta led by Sani Abacha, who was president from 1993 to 1998.
9News Nigeria recalls that, Ex-president, Chief Olusegun Matthew Okikiola Ogunboye Aremu Obasanjo (GCFR) born 5th March,1937 is a Nigerian general and statesman who served as Nigeria’s head of state from 1976 to 1979 and later as its president from 1999 to 2007. Ideologically a Nigerian Nationalist,he was a member of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) from 1998 to 2015, and since 2018.
Sani spoke in Abuja at the second edition of the Nigeria’s lecture and Award Event themed,“25 Years of Unbroken Democracy: Challenges, Prospects, and Possibilities.”
He said,”In 1995, Policemen, Military,DSS invaded my house in Kaduna,they arrested me and took me to Lagos with the late General Shehu Musa Yar’Adua from the airport, we were led to the DSS headquarters, where we met President Olusegun Obasanjo.
I Shehu Sani was the deputy chairman of the Campaign for Democracy.
We were then allocated our cells. When the armed robbers there saw Obasanjo, they started shouting and insulting him. Naturally, for those of us who were human rights activists, we were popular with inmates. I told him, ‘You are a commander outside, but this is where I command’. I then talked to the inmates to calm down, that no matter their grievances with Obasanjo, he was now an inmate.
“I got 15 years, Obasanjo got 15 years, Yar’Adua got life imprisonment. Those of us from the north were sent to southern prisons and those from the south were sent to northern prisons. That was how I found myself in Port Harcourt prison.
Terribly I witnessed our very own brother,Ken Saro-Wiwa been Hanged,I watched tearfully from the window.
Wiwa’s hanging to me still rings a bell,may he rest in peace..
Our Journey Began and ended in four (4) years,OBJ was lucky that I saved him from the inmates,if not he would have been dealt with this is my story,Shehu Sani said!