Posted by By Yemi Banjo, Kaduna on
Safiya, widow of a former Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Maj.-Gen. Mamman Vatsa, on Monday dismissed the presidential ambition of former military President, Gen. Ibrahim Babangida.
Safiya, widow of a former Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Maj.-Gen. Mamman Vatsa, on Monday dismissed the presidential ambition of former military President, Gen. Ibrahim Babangida.
The widow, whose husband was executed in 1986 for allegedly masterminding a coup against the Babangida regime, also dared the former president to make public the documents he claimed he possessed to prove her husband's guilt.
She told newsmen in Kaduna on Monday that she would also release documents to prove her husband's innocence and to incriminate Babangida.
She was reacting to Babangida's comments, published by some newspapers on Monday, in which he said he had no regrets over the execution of Vatsa.
She said, 'Yes, I know Babangida so much and very very well. He knows that I know him very well.That was why he killed my husband because he knew him very well. I have already said a little, about him earlier.
'But let him come out and say something else, then I will now come out and tell him that I have so much documents about him and his past.
'He has created a lot of problems in Nigeria. Enough is enough. Let him come out with whatever documents he said he has, then I will now tell him that he is a joker. I have more than what he thinks."
She insisted that her husband did not plot any coup against Babangida, adding that Babangida murdered him because he knew a lot about the former president.
Vatsa also said her crusade was aimed at getting justice for her late husband, saying she had tabled the matter before the Oputa panel before.
She said at the appropriate time she would release to the public the documents relating to alleged atrocities which the Babangida regime committed.
Earlier in his speech, a Kaduna-based human rights activist, Mallam Shehu Sani, who led a group of members of the human rights community in the state on a solidarity visit to the widow, said that the execution of Vatsa and other military officers was one of the injustices perpetrated by the Babangida regime.
He said, 'Our presence here is more than a mere visit. It is a solidarity visit for bravery, patience and courage. Your demand, to us, is a just one. Your quest for justice, to us, is also in a right direction."