Former President Olusegun Obasanjo has revealed what Ambassador Godknows Igali, who served as his Special Assistant on Special Duties, went through when his administration set out to reform militants in the Niger Delta region.
Speaking at a conference where Godknows Igali was the chairman, Obasanjo disclosed that when he was president, he and Igali took it upon themselves to reform Niger Delta militants. He said on multiple occasions when he sent Igali to meet with the militants, they detained him and asked him (Obasanjo) to pay ransom for his release. According to Obasanjo, every time the militants detained Igali and ask for ransom, he would tell them that he had no money and sometimes they would beat up Igali before releasing him.
About 11:00 minutes into a video shared on YouTube by Channels TV, Obasanjo said: “Let me digress a little bit here, part of transformation that the chairman of this occasion didn’t mention was what he and I undertook to transform the militants in the Niger Delta. It cost me some anxiety because I would send him to the boys, I called them naughty boys in the creeks and I will expect him to be back at three or four o’clock and he will not be back and I will not hear from him then he will probably be back at 8 p.m. or the following day.
“I will say what happened? He will say that he was arrested and he was told to tell Obasanjo to bring money and he will say Obasanjo has no money and then they will say you will remain here until Obasanjo can send us money, and Obasanjo will not send money and after they have abused him; at times even beat him up then they will say go back to Obasanjo and tell him that he should send us money. Of course we started the process of reforming them and to some extent, we even achieved some success”.
