Following
the sudden death of Sultan Ibrahim Dasuki which plunged the north into
mourning, Jafaar Jafaar has given an insight into the man's life.
Alhaji Ibrahim Dasuki
On April 20, 1996, a small chartered aircraft carrying some key
Sokoto figures landed on the tarmac of Sultan Sadiq Abubakar III
Airport, Sokoto.
Aboard the aircraft on that Saturday afternoon were Sarkin Sudan
Shehu Malami, the late Ibrahim Gusau, and a former governor of Sokoto
State and Abacha ally, Attahiru Bafarawa.
Shortly after the arrival of the aircraft, the then governor of
Sokoto State, Col. Yakubu Muazu, clearly acting on a script, summoned
Sultan Ibrahim Dasuki, alongside the commissioner of police and director
of SSS, to an “emergency meeting” in the Government House.
Moments after Sultan left his palace to attend the “emergency
meeting”, with a coterie of aides and array of palace courtiers, a
detachment of mobile policemen took over the palace.
On reaching the military administor’s office, all the aides were
waylaid and locked in a hall, while the Sultan’s briefcase (containing
his hypertension drugs) was seized, and his flowing coat (alkyabba)
stripped.
Before he could protest, the bewildered Sultan, then 70, was led into the military administrator’s office.
After a brief meeting, which saw to the end of his eight-year rule,
the Sultan was ushered out of the governor’s office by the then
Commissioner of Police, Abubakar Tsav and led by armed policemen into a
waiting grey-coloured Peugeot 505.
The vehicle zoomed off toward the airport around 1:30pm, from where he was taken to Yola, and later on to Zing in Taraba State.
Dasuki was subsequently accused by the military government of
unauthorised travels, interference in government affairs, invitation of
foreign dignitaries without permission, the lack of respect for
government, misappropriation of funds, among others.
There have been different accounts on why the late Sultan was
deposed by the Abacha regime. While some attributed his ouster to the
implication of some of his companies in the fraud unraveled in the
financial sector by Abacha’s Failed Banks Tribunal, others believed
Dasuki’s alleged “interference and lack of respect for Abacha” cost him
the most influential throne in Northern Nigeria.
But an equally deposed traditional ruler, the Emir of Gwandu,
Mustapha Jokolo, had a different belief expressed in a 2006 interview
with the Sun newspaper.
“Aliyu Dasuki, his (the late Sultan Dasuki’s) nephew and
son-in-law who is married to his daughter was classmate to General
Abacha in Kano,” Jokolo said.
“I don’t know whether primary or secondary. They were
classmates and friends. It was Abacha who introduced Aliyu to General
Babangida. And through him, Aliyu was getting contracts, military
contracts. He was a businessman. Now, Aliyu was very close to Abacha.
“Only God knows what went on between the two of them. So, any
business that was going on, Aliyu was the front. So, Aliyu became sick,
terminal illness, he eventually died. Abacha came to claim that there
was some money that Aliyu was keeping for him in a Swiss account. Sultan
Dasuki was then the Sultan of Sokoto. Sultan Dasuki told him that if it
was true that he had any money with Aliyu, he should swear to an oath,
then he would arrange for them to get the money. That is the Qu’aranic
injunction, that if a person dies and you want to make any claim out of
his possession, you have to swear an oath. Sultan Dasuki was justified
in that.
“But Abacha felt this was business between two friends which
was an illegal business which did not require oath. They did not swear
to any oath because it violates the Qu’aranic injunction. If you did
business, you should record it in writing, but they did not. There was
no evidence for Sultan Dasuki to give this money to Abacha.”
After his banishment to Zing in Taraba State, the late Sultan was
kept incommunicado in a three bedroom bungalow for months without access
to his family. He remained there until the military regime of
Abdulsalami Abubakar set him free after the death of Abacha.
Born on December 31, 1923, in Dogon Daji village of Sokoto, Dasuki
had early Quranic and elementary school education in this village. He
rose to become the private secretary to the late Premier Sir Ahmadu
Bello, the Resident Officer of Jos Province, a diplomat, permanent
secretary and later after retirement, a business tycoon with a wide
network of friends within and outside the country.
The emergence of Dasuki as the 18th Sultan of Sokoto after the
death of Sultan Abubakar III on November 1, 1988 came as a rude shock to
the people of Sokoto State and sparked violent riots in the seat of the
caliphate. This, perhaps, was largely because his predecessor had many
brothers, 52 children, and dozens of direct cousins who were closer to
the succession line than he was.
According to a chapter dedicated to Sultan Dasuki in a book titled
Sultans of Sokoto: Biographical History Since 1804, the succession
battle was largely fought among six contenders, although over 20 princes
qualified to vie for the throne. Late Dasuki emerged the favoured,
beating Almustafa Attahiru, Muazu Lamido, Muhammadu Maccido, Muhammadu
Zayyanu and Shehu Malami.
After the tension that greeted his ascension died down and several
peace meetings with the ruling houses of Abdullahi and Aliyu, Dasuki’s
coronation ceremony took place on March 15, 1990.
Dasuki’s reign from 1988 to 1996, saw to sweeping changes and
remodelling of the architectural design of the Sultanate. Perhaps
because of his wealth and influence, Dasuki rose from a relatively
obscure ruling house of Buhari to become one of the most powerful
Sultans in the history of Sokoto Caliphate.
Aged 93, Dasuki died on Monday in Abuja after a protracted illness.
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- Written by Jaafar Jaafar, a public affairs analyst and media practitioner, from Abuja.
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