IBB Prepared Abacha To Take Over Before June 12 Annulment – Gen Ishola

General Ishola Williams (rtd), a senior military officer during the military era, claims that the former military general prepared the late General Sani Abacha to succeed him before his contentious annulment on June 12, 1993, contrary to what was revealed in a recently published book by former head of state, Gen. Ibrahim Babangida.

Former Chief of Defense Training and Planning, Gen. Williams, was a guest on Channels Television’s Friday edition of Inside Sources with Laolu Akande.

Gen Williams was one of the people mentioned in Babangida’s 420-page memoir, “A Journey in Service: An Autobiography of Ibrahim Babangida,” which was released at a well-attended event in Abuja on February 20, 2025.

The late philanthropist and democracy hero Moshood Kashimawo Olawale (MKO) Abiola was credited for the first time in his memoir, which has now attracted a slew of knocks and kudos.

IBB accepted responsibility for the annulment, but he also held Abacha accountable for causing the vote’s cancellation without his consent.

IBB wrote, “Within the military leadership, there was palpable outrage,” on page 296 of the book, while describing the wave of reactions that followed the election’s annulment, which was deemed the freest and fairest in Nigeria’s history. Colonel Abubakar Dangiwa Umar threatened to resign, just like Lieutenant-General Salihu Ibrahim and Major-General Ishola Williams, who were among the best of us.

Gen Williams traveled through time to offer perspectives on what transpired. Before he canceled the election, IBB claimed Abacha had been chosen to take his place. The transition government, led by the late businessman Ernest Sonekan, was portrayed as a ruse, according to Gen Williams. After the annulment on June 12, Major Williams claimed to have resigned.

The plan was hatched at a general meeting where Gen. Williams claimed to have been present along with IBB and Abacha.

Gen Williams said, “Gen Babangida forgot to mention that Gen Abacha was encouraging Gen Abacha to succeed him when he used to refer to him as the Khalipha.”

And in some ways, in my conversation with Gen. Babangida, he was unable to respond to my question, “Did you have a blood oath with Abacha that he would succeed you?” I asked him to respond, but he said no. One-on-one instruction at the Presidential Guest House in Minna.

A group of civilian governors in his regime visited him and advised him against handing over. When they left, I asked him the question and said to him, “Let him leave. “

In a letter to IBB in August 1993, Gen. Williams claimed that the best thing for the military to do is to hand over to civilian rule.

After he left, I informed him that we were getting ready to meet him in Minna with full military honors. And I succeeded. At the time, I served as Minna commander. He and his wife moved to Minnesota. He was accompanied by numerous police. These officers were aware of his resignation, but they pressed him to appoint a new chief of defense staff and service leaders.

“He (IBB) appointed new service chiefs, and when those people came to tell me, I said, “You are not going to last very long,” Gen Abacha flew in, met with Gen Babangida in his home, and when he came out, he changed all of them (service chiefs).

“A meeting of officers from the Brigadier General and the Armed Forces members took place before the interim government,” the Villa’s. The meeting was attended by only one person, the late Attorney General (Clement) Akpamgbo.

What are we discussing, I asked myself when the discussion first started on June 12? I believed we were discussing the handover procedure. Gen Diya sat in my right hand corner while Gen Abacha sat in my right. Ishola don’t talk like that, but Gen Abacha and I should talk about handing over, not annulment. What criteria will be used to invalidate the election? But no one responded.

“Gen Ikonne was the only one who supported me,” he said. The election had already taken place, but it had not yet been canceled.

A decree for a transition period was created at the meeting, according to Gen Williams.

The transitional government was ruled out of the equation after I claimed it was not necessary. He claimed that Abacha could take control of the entire decree because it was planned.

Read more about Babangida’s claim that MKO Abiola won the June 12 election results in a “U-turn” 32 Years Later.

Long Walk to the Fourth Republic

Following a number of events, some violent and undesirable, Nigeria’s return to democracy in 1999 came about. The 1993 presidential election and the coup against General Muhammadu Buhari, the coup against Babangida, who seized power in 1985 in a coup against him, paved the way for civil society. In the wake of the protests and unrest that followed, he would later resign and cancel the election.

With businessman Ernest Sonekan serving as president and Sani Abacha as the chief of the defense staff and defense minister, Babangida established an interim government.

Abacha threw Sonekan in a palace coup on November 18, 1993, three months into his rule.

Protests and unrest erupted all over the country after the Social Democratic Party’s (SDP) candidate’s primary opponent, Bashir Tofa of the National Republican Convention, was canceled on June 12, 1993.

Abiola declared himself president after being bolstered by uncontestable evidence of his electoral victory. He was denied his mandate, and Sani Abacha, Babangida’s chief of defense staff, Sani Abacha, the military regime, put him in jail as a result.

On July 7, 1998, the political colossus passed away in a troubling and eminently suspect detention setting. He was a 60-year-old man. On June 4, 1996, one of his wives, Kudirat, was brutally murdered.

A former head of state Obasanjo won the presidency on the Peoples Democratic Party’s (PDP) platform, enlarging the democratic era known as the Fourth Republic, after the death of Abacha.

Source: Channels TV