The family of the late General Mamman Vatsa has claimed that military president Ibrahim Babangida’s autobiography, which was released to the public last week, was full of lies and could only be used as a reference book for criminals.
Vatsa and Babangida, both from Niger State, were childhood friends and confidants. In 1986, Babangida, the military head of state at the time, hanged Vatsa on charges of plotting a coup to overthrow his administration.
A Supreme Military Tribunal convicted Vatsa and his co-conspirators guilty of the coup plot and sentenced him to death by firing squad, a sentence Vatsa disputed and appealed.
However, before the appeal was heard, the Babangida junta ordered Vatsa’s execution by firing squad.
The Vatsa family responded to a claim in Babangida’s book that the late Vatsa’s assassination was legitimate since there was enough evidence linking him to the coup and his death was necessary to safeguard the country’s security.
Hon. Jonathan Vatsa, the family’s spokesperson and former commissioner for Information Culture and Tourism in Niger State, addressed reporters and responded to Babangida’s statements in the book, which have sparked controversy.
The younger Vatsa portrayed Babangida as a man who has lost out on honor matters due to the numerous lies contained in his memoirs.
According to Jonathan Vatsa, he opted not to comment until he had read the book, observing that the book was full of deceptions and distorted facts. Vatsa stated that Babangida’s book could not serve as reference material for the younger generations.
“It’s a collection of distorted facts called a book written by a man without identity, which cannot serve as a reference book for the younger generation but is a good reference book for criminal-minded people,” he said.
Vatsa, who was also a former Publicity Secretary of the All Progressives Congress (APC), was almost drawn to tears while addressing the media in Minna, as he explained that ordinarily, the Vatsa family wouldn’t have joined issues with a man who, he said, “changed his identity just to belong to a certain ethnic group in the country,” emphasizing that “since Babangida has refused to allow the late General Vatsa to rest in peace after killing him, we will let him know that even in death, the late General Vatsa was a more honorable man because he had an identity and came from a home.”
Vatsa said Babangida acknowledged in his book that he changed the name Badamosi to Babangida so that people would know he came from the north, saying, “Where did he get the name Badamosi from in the first place, because northerners do not bear the name Badamosi? That name is synonymous with people from the Southwest.
“A man who denied his tribe and identity is not fit to live.”
He went on to say that the numerous lies in Babangida’s book demonstrated that “he is not the genius the Nigerian media created for him, rather, “a lily-livered” general for annulling the June 12 election and failing to retire the late General Sani Abacha for fear of being killed by the Abacha loyalists in the army, as he claimed in his book.”
“How can he lie that it was Abacha who annulled the June 12 election if he was in control as the head of state? He equally admitted that the military was heavily politicized, and because of that, he couldn’t retire Abacha for fear of being killed by Abacha loyalists in the army,” he said.
Vatsa maintained that those who advised Babangida to write what he termed “the bunch of lies and blackmails called autobiography” had further harmed his already battered image, adding that “it was better for him to have kept silent than dishing out the chunks of lies and deceit far from the truth about yourself as a human being.
“Unfortunately, the man he accused of annulling the June 12 election and all the actors in the June 12 controversy are no more today to tell their own side of the story, and that is why no serious-minded individual should take the book seriously.
“This is the man that had earlier said he would not write any book because, according to him, there are people he cannot resist abusing and that he wouldn’t want to hurt their children and grandchildren, but what has he done now? This is a lack of emotional stability.
“Even in death, Babangida has refused to allow late General Vatsa and his family to rest in peace. He is still troubling the dead man and his entire family. Well, people have seen the end of our brother, but Babangida doesn’t know how he will end.
“Our joy is that the reactions of Nigerians after the so-called book presentation show that the killing of the late General Vatsa was done out of envy, malice, and hatred. It was a case of a man with a root and identity versus someone who has no root and a second name.”
The Niger State APC Chieftain, while expressing regret for the cream of individuals that assembled for the book launch, pointed out that the country called Nigeria was a tremendous joke, “a country where people who call themselves leaders act before they think. No reasonable Nigerian who is benefiting from the current democratic system, which Abiola struggled and eventually died for, should have donated towards this revelation of evil done to Nigeria and Nigerians called an autobiography.
“This has further confirmed why some Nigerians, in their opinions, believe that this country is not worth dying for. If not, how can we as a people gather to celebrate the evil done to a nation by an individual?” Vatsa queried.
He recalled that the late General Vatsa informed the then-military tribunal that tried him that the day the Nigerian Army started mocking itself, others would join; thus, through this book, Babangida ridiculed himself, and others would join.
