Premium Times
Aretired Nigerian Army general, Haldu Hananiya, has detailed why President Muhammadu Buhari hurriedly enacted the infamous Public Officers Protection Against False Accusation law, popularly known as ‘Decree 4’ in 1984.
Mr Buhari, the then head of the military regime in 1984, had pencilled down Mr Hananiya’s name and seven other top military officers for posting as ambassadors.
But in an exclusive report, the Guardian Newspaper of Nigeria exposed how the Buhari-led junta made efforts to reshuffle the ambassadorial lists – which angered the regime.
To punish the two Guardian journalists – Nduka Irabor and Tunde Thompson – who authored the story, the regime hurriedly packaged Decree 4 and applied it retroactively against the journalists.
The regime arrested the two men, tried and jailed them under the Draconian law.
Mr Hananiya, 80, in his new book, ‘All Eyes on Me,’ says, “There was indeed an attempt to replace my name with Haruna’s (another army General) as the High Commissioner to the UK.”
“But for the (Guardian) publication, I would probably have been posted to another country, with (IBM) Haruna sent to the UK as High Commissioner,” Mr Hananiya said.
In the book, Mr Hananiya explained that the Buhari-led military regime was “embarrassed that their plan (to make changes) leaked…
