Former president Muhammadu Buhari has described ex-military president Abdulsalami Abubakar as the “father of Nigeria’s modern democracy.” 

In a statement Thursday by his spokesperson, Garba Shehu, wishing the ex-military ruler happy birthday, Mr Buhari called Mr Abubakar “the true father of the Fourth Republic and Nigeria’s modern day democracy.” 

Mr Abubakar, 81, was Nigeria’s military head of state from 1998 to 1999. Prior to his emergence as head of state, he served under the tyrannical rule of Sani Abacha as Chief of Defence Staff between 1997 to 1998. 

Following years of clamour by Nigerians to return the country to democratic rule, Mr Abubakar handed over power to the democratically elected government of former president Olusegun Obasanjo in 1999. 

According to Mr Buhari, Mr Abdulsalami is someone who had connected the country to its roots and led it forward in the restoration of democracy as a form of government.

Mr Buhari’s statement comes a few days after Nigerians celebrated Democracy Day on June 12.

In 2018, Mr Buhari declared June 12 Nigeria’s Democracy Day to honour the late MKO Abiola, adjudged winner of the June 12, 1993 presidential election, annulled by the military regime of Ibrahim Babangida.