A Former Nigerian President, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, has recounted an alleged plot during the late General Sani Abacha regime to ensure that he, businessman and politician Moshood Kashimawo Olawale (MKO) Abiola, and Shehu Musa Yar’Adua never left detention alive.


Obasanjo made the revelation in an interview featured in the Inspire African Series podcast, where he recalled his experience in detention under the Abacha military regime.


According to Obasanjo, Abacha had allegedly told some people that the three prominent detainees would not survive their imprisonment. He further claimed that Yar’Adua was deliberately infected with a virus, while Abiola was poisoned.


Obasanjo said a similar attempt was allegedly made to target him while he was in detention. He recalled that a military doctor approached him under the pretext of collecting his blood for a medical test.


However, Obasanjo said he became suspicious and refused to allow the military doctor to take his blood. Instead, he insisted that a doctor he trusted should collect the sample.


According to him, the doctor he trusted eventually took his blood and handed the sample over to the military doctor. Obasanjo said the medical result was never returned to him.


He suggested that the incident raised serious concerns about what might have been intended with the blood sample, particularly against the backdrop of the fate of other prominent detainees under the Abacha regime.


The account adds another disturbing dimension to the history of Nigeria's military rule in the 1990s, when several prominent political figures and pro-democracy activists were detained following the annulment of the June 12, 1993 presidential election.


Obasanjo, who was detained in 1995 after being convicted of an alleged coup plot, was eventually released in 1998 following the death of Abacha. Abacha's death on June 8, 1998, brought his regime to an end and preceded the transition to civilian rule in 1999.