I’m Not The ‘Evil Genius’ Many Think I Am + I Never Stole $12.8bn. —- IBB Speaks At 75

Gen Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida (retd), who attained the age of 75 today in his characteristic way of marking his birthday, had a session with members of the Correspondent Chapel of the Nigeria Union of Journalists, Minna, Niger State where he answered questions on prominent issues that marked his life in public service.

He among other issues spoke on how he nearly experienced plane crash, the Nigeria Civil war, how he met and married his late wife.

IBB said “Being a military officer was more challenging than being a military President. As a military officer, you are leading men into danger, your life and their lives very much depend on you as the Commander. I see it as more challenging than being the President”.

“As a military President, you still have to seek people’s advice, you interact, you discuss based on the prevailing situation you find yourself but being the military officer and you are the only one with the troops you are commanding.

“Their hopes are on you and if you read a situation wrongly, you will put everyone in danger. If they have faith in you, they will also protect you so I consider the military as more challenging than the political leadership.

Speaking on Life at 75, IBB said “I feel old because what I was able to do 25 years ago, I am not able to do it physically now but I thank God for sparing my life to attain this age.

Continuing, IBB said “I am not the evil that quite a lot of people consider me to be. I had a very excellent background and by training, we have to love one another.

However, I can understand their feeling. But by virtue of the job I was doing, I was bound to be misconstrued and people will take it like that but I consider it as an opinion as long as I am not what you think I was, I feel satisfied.

I read somewhere some time ago that they said I stole N12.8 billion and I said if I stole such amount, I had no business staying in the country but those are the type of things that one has to live with. I hope the younger generation will carry out a research about leadership, people, individual and what role they played in the development of the nation and come up with a different conclusion from what is on the ground now.