“(Umaru Musa) Yar’Adua was a northern Muslim and the president. He took over from a southern Christian, Obasanjo, who ruled for eight years. So definitely, the northern Muslims wanted Yar’Adua to at least do eight years before he could come back to the south for another, probably a Christian to take over.
”But, well, the health issue came up, and it was the problem. And that is why even to allow me to act was an issue. When Yar’Adua was going for the medical checkup, actually, a letter was written. The Constitution says that for the Vice President to act, the President will send a letter to the Senate and the House of Representatives informing them.
“That letter was written but the person who the letter was handed over to, I will not mention the name to you now, who was one of the aides of Yar’Adua, refused to submit the letter to the National Assembly.
“Yar’Adua became so ill that he had no control of issues. So we had a country where the President was not available and there was no Acting President. Yes, as a vice president, you can take over some responsibilities of the president.
“The president of Nigeria has two major responsibilities, firstly, you are the chief executive of the country, just like the Prime Minister of the country. The Vice President can assume they don’t need any transfer. And I was doing that because we are having Executive Council meetings, we were approving memos from ministers. So the government was going on, but there was no Commander-in-Chief.
“Everyday I was hearing about coup, coup, coup. I remember one day a friend of mine came, and he said Vice-President, you don’t have to sleep here, you have to come and sleep in my guest house, but I said, no.
“I will stay in the State House and if anybody wants to kill me it is better you kill me in the State House so that Nigerians will know that they assassinated me in the State House and that I did not commit any offence. If I had decided to go and stay in a guest house and wherever I went, security people would know and if people go and kill me there, they would now say Indian girls brought apple to kill me and I wouldn’t want that kind story.
“So, it was better I died in the State House than being assassinated outside the State House because all kinds of stories would have come out. That was how tense it was and to me, I was not bothered.”
VIDEO: Yar'Adua wanted me to oversee the country — but one presidential aide refused to submit his letter to n'assembly, says Jonathan pic.twitter.com/gVnRshwdNj
— TheCable (@thecableng) June 28, 2025
