Information reaching Kossyderrickent has it that Nigerian politician, Arthur Nzeribe, has been laid to rest. His funeral ceremony was held today, Saturday, May 21, 2022.
According to the source, Nzeribe was declared dead at a foreign hospital following an undisclosed ailment.
“He died this morning in a hospital abroad. The family will soon release a statement,” the source said.
In 2017, the photograph of ageing and possibly sick Nzeribe, sitting languidly, with medics around him went viral on social media.
He was elected a Senator to represent Orlu first in 1999 but in November 2002, the then-Senate President Anyim Pius Anyim suspended Nzeribe indefinitely over an allegation of N22 million fraud.
Also, in April 2006, the Orlu People’s Consultative Assembly, sponsored by the then Governor of Imo State, Achike Udenwa, staged what it called a “One million march” to drum support for Nzeribe’s recall from the Senate. Due to popular demand, in December 2006, Nzeribe was defeated by Osita Izunaso during the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) primaries for the 2007 Senatorial election.
When Arthur Nzeribe died on May 5 at the age of 83, tributes appeared in many newspapers recalling momentous events in the colourful life of the politician.
The most notable of these events was the pivotal role he played through the Associations for Better Nigeria (ABN) in contriving the political impasse of 1993.
Nigeria did not recover from that impasse until the eventual chief beneficiary, General Sani Abacha, died in June 1998 and his successor instituted the Fourth Republic 11 months later.
Almost 30 years after the events, Mr Nzeribe’s chief lieutenant in the ABN, Abimbola Davis, has narrated how the Oguta, Imo State-born maverick politician was recruited into the hidden agenda of Mr Babangida and how they set the stage for the annulment of the June 12, 1993, presidential election and the chaos that followed.
Mr Davis also narrated how he advised the winner of the election, Moshood Abiola, on how to stop the court injunction of June 10, 1993, and how Mr Abiola waved aside his advice, because of his trust in his friendship with Mr Babangida.
Ibrahim Babangida, Former Nigerian dictator
Ibrahim Babangida, Former Nigerian head of state
The election was to be the final step in the long transition programme that had already produced state governors and legislators at the federal and state levels. But two days before the poll, the ABN got an injunction from the Abuja High Court of Justice Bassey Ikpeme restraining the electoral commission from conducting it.
Perhaps momentarily ruffled by the condemnation of the injunction, especially by the international community, Mr Babangida allowed the election to hold but annulled it 11 days later, after forcing the electoral commission to suspend the final tallying of the returns.
According to Mr Davis, the seed of that confusion was sowed months earlier when Mr Babangida got Mr Nzeribe to work for him on his “hidden agenda.”
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