Hafsat Abiola-Costello, daughter of the late MKO Abiola,
says her family is grateful to Rauf Aregbesola, minister of interior, for the
role he played in seeing to it that her father was honoured.
In June 2018, President Muhammadu Buhari conferred on
Abiola, the presumed winner of the June 12, 1993 presidential election, the
title of Grand Commander of the Federal Republic (GCFR).
Buhari also declared June 12 as the new Democracy Day, in
place of May 29.
Abiola-Costello, however, said long before Buhari became
president, Aregbesola, who was then the governor of Osun state, had embarked on
what she described as a one-man campaign for the recognition of Abiola as the
winner of the election.
Speaking from Brussels, Belgium, during a virtual colloquium
tagged ‘Africa: Interrogating the Leadership Question’, Abiola-Costello said
Aregbesola raised the issues with ex-President Goodluck Jonathan.
According to her, Jonathan expressed fears that there might
be a backlash if he recognised Abiola.
“There was a story that one of my siblings told me. You know
that recently President Muhammadu Buhari honoured MKO but Ogbeni had been
working on it. He had a one-man campaign on this issue for a very long time.
And well before President Buhari was President, when we had President Jonathan,
Ogbeni also approached Jonathan to make an appeal that MKO be honoured,”
Abiola-Costello said.
“I cannot remember which of my siblings told me this, but
the sibling told me that they sat with President Jonathan and President
Jonathan asked: “what do you think should be done and how do you think it
should be done?” And Ogbeni offered his thoughts and President Jonathan said do
you think it is possible because he had some concerns about backlash. So, it
was not something that was carried out eventually.”
She said Aregbesola also saw to the naming of a road in
Ikeja after Kudirat Abiola, her late mother.
“I want to thank Ogbeni for neither forgetting my Dad and
also my mother. You know that road, the Kudirat Abiola Road, Oregun in Ikeja.
He was the Commissioner for Works in Lagos State that was responsible for that
road. And this time around, I remember which of my siblings told me this story.
It was Jamiu (Abiola) who told me that he (Aregbesola) would go to that road
around midnight and find Ogbeni there with the workers getting the road fixed
and ready. So, I just want to thank Ogbeni for the many steps he has taken to
honour MKO and Kudirat Abiola,” she said.
“Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola is one of my favourite people. I
like his simplicity because when he was governor of Osun, I used to visit him
and I observed that his life had some simplicity about it. And his wife, Alhaja
Sherifat Aregbesola would tease me saying it was because she was raised in the
North.”
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