By Patrick Dele Cole

GENERAL Shehu Yar’adua was a wonderful man who was cut down in his prime. I have no doubt that he would have made an excellent President of Nigeria. He died a true martyr for Nigeria.

He was a thoroughly  detribalised  man, who never  forgot to remind all who came to him and spoke Hausa he would reply to such people in English and remind them that there were  other non-Hausa speaking people around.

This he specially did when Yoruba or Igbo or people from any other ethnic group who think that by speaking Hausa to him they somehow ingratiated themselves to him at the expense of those who did not speak the language.

He would be extraordinary blunt but mostly he was polite even when he was blunt. He was a born peacemaker, the ultimate politician, always looking for the common ground, the compromise. Even so, those compromises never for once tarnished his integrity or principle. He was a bundle of contradiction, tough as nails but amiable and full of jokes

Shehu  was so eager to learn and he understood the complexities of Nigeria like no other.  At the time Chief Obafemi Awolowo had almost no Northerner speaking to him; Shehu understood not only the political giant and patriot that Awolowo was but also his genius, economic planner and administrator.

Shehu sought him out and drank deeply from that fountain of Awolowo’s wisdom. Shehu understood that all Nigerians came from somewhere and these preconditions may colour or distort their perception but there was an underlying goodness in men, an underlying meaning as a Nigerian which ought to be recognised, respected, nurtured and exploited. This was the core of his belief which he translated to the first political association he had founded: neither East nor West, neither North nor South.

Shehu was an extremely successful businessman and through all the years I knew him I did not see him behave in any way other than trustworthy and transparent. In the bank of which he was Chairman, Habib Bank, he left the professionals to get  on with the business without interference. Bello, one-time Managing Director, MD, several times wanted to go but Shehu would not agree and Bello stayed even beyond his welcome.

M.K.O Abiola and Shehu Yar’adua set up the African Shipping line and made Raymond Dokpesi the General Manager (G.M).  As  usual, they left the company to be run by professionals, but unfortunately, under Raymond, the company went belly up for reasons which need not bother us here.

There were several religious and political flare-ups during his time as Minister of Transport and Chief of Staff, Supreme Headquarters. He dealt with each crisis as cold as a cucumber, never flustered, always polite and consummately disarming.

He was the quintessence of simplicity, cool-headedness. He drove himself to work and in London, if I brought my car, he insisted on driving it. (Maybe he did not trust my driving which was sometimes hair arising and risky. He loved life too much to have his bones broken in an accident by a thoroughly unpredictable driver!!).

The general’s organisational ability was legendary. He set up the carpet factory in Katsina, now defunct. It was  that carpet  factory that produced all the original carpet at Abuja NOGA HILTON HOTEL; carpet better than any that had now subsequently replaced the original. What he did not know he asked and assimilated the knowledge. When setting up the newspaper’s presses in Abuja, he meticulously asked about the printing machines and printing processes: the editorial segments of the papers and never once did he interface in the running of the newspaper which came probably long before its time – The Reporter, The Sentinel and Tafikwabo.

He organised our first political party post after 1990 – The Patriotic Front, which metamorphosed to the People’s Democratic Movement and eventually to the PDP.  He knew that a party was as strong as the individuals who led it. He chose these  carefully and wisely.

In the SDP although he had no post in the structure, it was evident who the leader of the party was. He put around him a small coterie of trusted members, whom he knew were not going to run away when the so-called big guns joined the party, M.K.O. Abiola, Jim Nwobodo, Michael Afolabi,  Abdullahi, Sally Jambo, Abubakar Rimi, and Arthur Nzeribe, Chuba Okadigbo to name a few.

He was able to massage the egos of innumerable people and thus prevented schisms in the party. Our conventions were thoroughly planned because that was where we elected officials of the party. We used to go to these conventions with a slate of candidates for official positions within the party. Our job was to get as many as possible elected.

The only one we failed to have our man sent through was when our candidate was defeated by Sule Lamido as Executive Secretary. Even so, we worked with everybody. We recruited delegates from the grassroots and groomed them for a long time.

At conventions, we took these delegates to the convention centres; sometimes we kept them way out of the cities so that our opponents could not pinch them. Every 10 delegates had a leader; we met each delegation with his or her leader: listened to their wishes and suggestions, adapted policies where necessary. But the hold on the delegates was firm because of Shehu’s ability to inspire loyalty: if  Chief Afolabi, Tony Anenih, Abdul Azeez, Babagana Kingibe, Lawan Keita, etc were all with him.

I hardly ever showed my face at these conventions. I had a small committee to help me as the paymaster during these conventions, conferences, etc. Senator Bode Mustapha, Peter Oweredeba, Engineer Ken Emechebe, Chris Ngige and countless others helped me. At the convention, after voting, the delegates all came to express gratitude and I did same too.

In Jos, we had a crisis because our movement was threatened by some defections from the West. Shehu had been in Jos earlier and went back to Kaduna. I was staying in Ambassador Kwande’s house, in a nearby cave in the house. By 10 pm we ran into an underpass: the Western Delegation would not move. Shehu had barely reached Kaduna when we called  him on  phone  to come back. He did, arrived Jos as 3 am. We smoothened everybody’s feather before he left again for Kaduna at about 7 am or 8 am

I kept meticulous account of the money we spent, gave a full account and once in Jos we had such surplus money that it took the bank and my guys two days to count the balance which was paid back to the bank. At that time the highest denomination was N20 notes.

Let me finish by highlighting some funny scenarios which need some recognition. General Shehu led a delegation to North Korea. On arrival at Pyongyang as guests of Kim II-Sung for a North Korea – Nigeria Economic bilateral talks, the practice is that the communique for such meetings was written soon on arrival and definitely before the meeting began – since we would have sent a delegation ahead to discuss the agenda and agree on most points. Kim II-Sung is the spiritual leader of North Korea, believed to be a God sent to lead his people against those who wished to destroy them, especially the US.

The city was an example par excellence of planning decorum and syncopation. At 6 am music would blare out throughout the country for contemplation and prayers for Kim who had also devised  series of exercises for the people to keep them fit and their minds clear and relevant. No one had told us when we arrived and we were ensconced in one massive palace that we could not go out. At about 8 pm after dinner, I set out to leave the compound for a stroll.

In less than three minutes, I was surrounded by soldiers all shouting their hands off in a language I did not understand. To my utter confusion, I thought something terrible had happened – until our minder ran out to say we were not allowed to go out of the palace even for a stroll. I went back inside in an absolutely inconsolable rage.

While still boiling I went to report to Shehu whom I found with a doctor and a nurse. They were trying to take blood and urine samples and were even asking for a stool sample. I asked them why they wanted the samples and they said they had to test everyone who wanted to meet Kim ll Sung. I refused to allow them to proceed: we did not travel 8000 miles to be examined by a Korean doctor because we had a meeting with Kim ll Sung. But they already had the General’s blood sample. They stormed off and I thought I had created a diplomatic incident.

Next day we were to have a meeting with the Great Leader. In the anteroom, they gave us gloves. I thought it was again a Korean custom until our guide said the skin of Kim ll Sung was so sacrosanct no person touched his flesh, even in a handshake. I said, with the General’s permission, in that case, we won’t shake hands with him. We would stay 12 to 20 feet away, bow our heads respectfully and sit down for the meeting which was to be followed by lunch.

A flurry of activities ensued; we waited and after a few minutes we were ushered on, told we where to stand. The Great Leader himself then walked in, shook our hands and we precede to the meeting and to lunch!!!

I do not know how many of you have seen the film Zorba, the Greek. In Greece, they have a custom of eating and dancing and then throwing the plates to break up in or near the fire place, just like Russians throw glasses of empty vodka to break against the fireplace. The General and I went to a Greek restaurant.

As the evening wore on, the clientele except the general were drinking. As we drank, the music of Zorba the Greek started up and people started to dance and throw plates. The custom is that you could dance on top of the table and as the music moved you throw plates to smash on the floor and the fireplace.

I was interested to see what General would do. I had ordered for a pile of breakable plates and started to throw plates with complete abandon when suddenly, my friend, was standing up on the table and even with more abandon we throw dozens of plates while vigorously dancing on top of the table!!! It was an exhilarating experience. We need plates in Nigeria now to express our frustration.

General Abacha had called a constitutional conference and what Shehu Yar’dua did during this conference, including gaining a 13% derivation agreement for oil producing states which hitherto got 1%, although there was a 3% environment fund is well known.

During this conference, Yar’dua and I had just returned from Salah in Katsina. On arrival at the lobby of Hilton Hotel, Alhaji Abdulram told him that he did not like what he had just heard from Aso Rock. Shehu drove there immediately to find out whathad transpired. According to General Abacha, he thought there was nothing wrong only for General Shehu Yar’adua to be arrested early that morning at about 3 am from Apo village. Inuwa immediately called to inform me.

The General was detained. Later on, he was sent to Enugu. I tried to get a permit to see him from the Ministry of Internal Affairs, I was denied. He was moved from prison to prison until he arrived at Port Harcourt where as usual the General organised the prisoners into clubs for  football and table tennis and other sports after repairs and supplies for these games. The prisoners were all better fed, the kitchen was revamped and the Warders were taken care of on the express order of the General. Fortunately, Deputy Warden was my cousin and what I could not get, i.e. permission to see the General, was made so simple. I saw him often; gave him his favourite Benson and Hedges cigarettes, spent long hours with him in the Deputy’s Warden’s office, before he was taken away somewhere else to be prisoned.