FOrmer President Olusegun Obasanjo said on Wednesday that he chose the
late former President Umaru Yar' Adua as his successor because the
others who wanted the post were corrupt.
Obasanjo said one of the people who wanted to
succeed him in 2007 was "stinkingly corrupt" and
that the only way he (Obasanjo) could justify himself before man and
God was to go for Yar'Adua, who, he said, was the only one among the
contenders then who was not corrupt.
The former President, who spoke in an interview with a private
television station, Channels Television, in Abeokuta, did not mention
the 'corrupt' Yar'Adua rivals.
Among the prominent presidential hopefuls in the Peoples Democratic
Party in 2007 were Obasanjo's deputy, Abubakar Atiku; and ex- Governor
of Rivers State, Peter Odili.
Atuku later abandoned the PDP to contest the presidential election on
the platform of the defunct Action Congress while Odili's ambition
fizzled out with the nomination of Yar'Adua.
The AC later metamorphosed into the Action Congress of Nigeria, which
later merged with the Congress for Progressive Change and the All
Nigeria Peoples Party to form the now ruling All Progressives
Congress.
Obasanjo's choice of successor died on May 5, 2010 from heart-related
ailments. Many condemned Obasanjo for choosing a man who was
manifestly sick to lead the country.
But in the Channels interview, Obasanjo said he only acted based on
the information made available to him.
He said, "Even if you take your son as your successor, you are not
sure of what he will do when he gets there. Don't ever kid yourself.
"What do I know about any successor? What he presents. When he gets
there, he presents it
differently.
"We did our best, but if you say our best is not good enough, I will
say, when it comes to your turn, do better.
"With all the people that are available for successor, what we came up
with was about the best that we could think of at that time.
"One of those who wanted to do the job came to me and said, 'Sir, I
like your job, but I cannot do it the way you are doing it.' Now, if
he had told me that, should I then come and say, 'okay, come, let me
give you the job?' He had told me that, 'I like your job, but look,
the way you are doing it, I haven't got the stamina to do it that
way.' Then, what do you expect me to do?
"Or the one that I know that, oh!, this one, before he gets the job,
he's stinkingly corrupt. Now will I be able to defend myself before
God and man if with what I know I give this job or I encourage the man
to have this job?"
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