Ibrahim Babangida, former military dictator, said he coordinated the coup that removed Muhammadu Buhari and Tunde Idiagbon from office in 1985, berating his predecessor as a draconian, bad leader with a “holier-than-thou attitude.”  

In his autobiography launched on Thursday, Mr Babangida criticised Mr Buhari for sidelining other military officials and running a draconian regime that violated human rights and left the country’s economy in bad shape.  

“My predecessor in office, Major General Muhammadu Buhari, and his deputy, Brigadier Tunde Idiagbon, had separated themselves from the mainstream of the armed forces by personalising what was initially a collective leadership. They both posited a ‘holier-than-thou’ attitude, antagonising the civil populace against the military,” Mr Babangida said.  

He added, “Fundamental rights and freedoms were being routinely infringed upon and abused. As a military administration, we were now presiding over a society that was primarily frightened of us. Draconian decrees led to the abuse and severe limitation of basic freedoms as people were clamped into indefinite detention, most times for minor infractions.”  

Under Mr Buhari’s regime, Mr Babangida said, “the armed forces as a national institution came to be seen as the private personal autocracy of a stubborn few. Ordinary people were experiencing severe economic hardship. The general economic and social conditions the people lived under were worsening by the day. Essential goods and supplies were scarce. Yet arbitrary controls in all aspects of economic life and an ancient resort to barter in international trade meant that the nation’s financial woes would not end soon.”  

According to Mr Babangida, this tense atmosphere culminated in the unanimous decision of a broad spectrum of senior and middle-level officers to change the nation’s leadership. The processes associated with this change were completed without bloodshed by midnight on August 26, 1985.  

In 2016, Mr Buhari, however, told The Interview that he was removed from office by the Babangida-led coup due to his anti-corruption stance, which targeted even top military officials.  

“Well, for the question on my story versus IBB’s story, you can choose which one to believe…I found out that some officers were spending money. I asked, ‘Where did they get the money from?’ They said it was from the Military Intelligence fund. I said since it was the intelligence fund that had been used to bring somebody into power, perhaps there was no problem. Later, I learnt that General Aliyu Gusau, who was in charge of intelligence, took an import licence from the Ministry of Commerce, which was in charge of supplies, and gave it to Alhaji Mai Deribe. It was worth N100,000, a lot of money then,” Mr Buhari said.  

“When I discovered this, I confronted them and took the case to the army council. General Bali was chief of defence staff; General Babangida was chief of army staff; Tunde Idiagbon was chief of staff, Defence Headquarters, and I was the head of state. I said, if I didn’t punish Aliyu Gusau, it would create a problem for us. It’s North versus South; Majority versus Minority; Muslim versus Christian. That was what it showed. When people want to hide incompetence, they attempt to hide under religion, ethnicity, into simply political issues. So I said General Aliyu Gusau had to go. He was the chief of intelligence. That was why Babangida got some officers to remove me. Let him repeat his own story. Aliyu Gusau is still alive,” he added.