In spite of protestations and denials, the truth is slowly rising to the surface, the intrigues and actors behind the lies and plans to sell Nigeria to a particular clique.
Yar' Adua, an annointed son and beneficiary of the scheme, may know more than he is letting on!

Pease read on:

Unmasked
The real brains behind third term
By IKENNA EMEWU
Saturday, October 6, 2007

Third term. That dragon. That nexus between democracy and dictatorship (with a weaker link to the dictatorship end), created out of greed for power, and the ghosts it spawned last year is a saga whose full dimesions remain uncharted.
Facts of the clandestine plot to castrate the nation’s political growth keep surfacing from the dark minds and games of those that created, animated and prosecuted it, just as details of how the propaganda was run and lost, keep surfacing as other events unfold from time to time.
In one of such recants now embarked upon by an insider that knew more than others on what actually happened, it has been revealed exclusively to Saturday Sun the very hidden details of key players of the evil agenda but who today hide under the shadows and mouth sanctimony to Nigerians on good governance, sweeping under the carpet what they diid in the last days of Obasanjo or what they knew but kept quiet about in the third term plot epoch.

Not an Obasanjo idea
Contrary to popularly held views, the idea of perpetuating Gen. Olusegun Obasanjo in office was hatched by a group of billionaire friends of the president. When they could not put it into a sellable package, they drafted some great brains -among them, of the most celebrated technocrats in the regime, including the most visible members of the economic team who seemed to have the president's ear on everything. It was only after it was all cobbled together that they now sold the fantasy to the politicians who greedily lapped it up.

An insider in the Presidency and indeed one of the losers who could not find an alternative stand after the Obasanjo expired hinted that: “the area the former president came into the picture of third term smear was his gullibility to buy the dummy some business moguls marketed before him. I must tell you the truth that the third term agenda was not a creation of Chief Olusegun Obasanjo. But he latched onto the idea when it was sold to him. Frankly, he dragged foot before finally yielding. The real enemies of the democracy of this nation who concieved third term are these so-called super rich businessmen who gained from one incentive or the other from his government. I think they felt they had it all too good and never wanted the frolick over. They were the originators of the plot.

“When Obasanjo dragged foot, after counting the likely repercussions, these same men drafted those notable Obasanjo boys who were actually in charge of the house to throw their weight behind this”.
According to this source, himself an appointee of the ex-president's, those overzealous aides and beneficiaries of the regime worked on the ego of the former president and got him to consent. “When they had sailed through with that, the ex-president then intimated some inner circle members of the PDP leadership who brought more dimensions into it.
The boys move in
Like soldiers squatting on danger zone and itching to go, after some inner jobs had been cleared about the incubating third term project, the Obasanjo boys felt there was no time to waste. In frenzy and stimulated sentiments to unleash their vaunted abilities to market the impossible and force it down the throat of Nigerians, some key persons around the presidency, including two very young ministers (one a man from the North-west, and the other a usually religious woman), the head of one the the anti-graft agencies, a very influential presidential aide and some few others commenced the mobilisation for the final showdown.

These henchmen, like Adolf Eichmann, Goering, Rudolf Hess and the other Furher chiefs with Hitler in the Nazi order did the leg work and brought every other accomplice through all manner of subtle persuasion and coercion into the third term theatre. The grand irony in all the plot, however, was that these foot soldiers - except one - were not people Nigerians readily associated with the third term plot. They were the people who readily passed as democrats and young men who are almost in a hurry to see the back of the country's over-recycled politicians. And because, they held very powerful positions, it was also possible to use both blackmail and persuasion to win people over.

Co-opting INEC
One of the knotty points they encountered was the INEC chairman, Prof. Maurice Iwu. “After the gaming had been nearly perfected, the caucus, including the ex-president who at this time had assumed the unofficial headship of the project started reaching out to various sectors and interest groups whose roles would be vital to the actualisation of the third term project. When it was time to reach INEC, these movers encountered a near hitch which however took the intervention of the former president to clear.
On meeting Iwu to finetune how the matter would be handled electorally, the Prof. allegedly proved stubborn.

What we were told reliably by this source who was almost one of the foot soldiers is that: “Iwu flatly refused to take the suggestion”. One of the persons that met him confided in me that Iwu was rather keen on knowing the possibility and the inherrent dangers of the plan to the nation, the ex-president, the democracy and the rest. He kind of distanced himself from it”.
Saturday Sun gathered that the persuasion mounted on the INEC chairman by this machinery of five plotters that night of visit could not sway him from his own argument.

Re-plotting
By the time these presidency schemers left without a word of clear support from the INEC chief, the old man would have thought the matter was over. But he was practically wrong, as it did not take more than twenty minutes after they left before he got a call from the former president himself summoning some key INEC chiefs to Aso Rock.

On getting there, the INEC men to discovered that they had been preceded to the meeting venue by the same quartet that had tried in vain to win over their chairman earlier that night. Deploying all the tricks in their political bag, the third term team left the meeting with what could pass for a commitment from the INEC side. The deal seemed sealed and delivered. But that not withstanding, Iwu was said to have still been able to give the former president a piece of his mind on the project.

What Iwu told Obasanjo
During one of the encounters between Iwu and Obasanjo, our source also revealed that the INEC being the umpire that would have the last lap of the job when it came to election, the old Prof. told his boss of his reservations. It is true we say many people in public positions don’t tell the leaders the truth, but it was not so in this matter. I am sure that Iwu intimated Obasanjo of the inherrent dangers in the gambit. He reminded the man in Aso Rock that “if this project sails through, Nigeria would gain from the continuation of his policies, but his image would be dented because, maybe even beyond Nigeria, he would be percieved as one that wants to hold onto power forever. But if that fails, the nation would lose and his image would still have problems because those that have been part of this will all stand aloof and maybe deny knowing of it while he faces the shame alone”.
To this serious caution, Saturday Sun was told that Obasanjo simply told Iwu not to worry about all those and should rather play his role in the game and forget what comes next. The ex-president was said to have sounded like one who had made up his mind to face whatever came out of it as just part of life.

Longest night in Aso Rock
After the long road to third term which at last hit the boulders, Mr. President (then) still summoned his inner clique of plotters to brief them on his position. That night of the meeting, what the source called ‘third term post-mortem' was, according to him, like the longest night in Aso Villa. It was a night of series of meetings at various layers and tiers of hierarchy. The former Aso landlord or chief tenant met various inner circle groups to brief them on his next line of action.

Anointing a new president
When it was time to meet the INEC top chiefs, it was also in the same stratification. But the ex-president was specific to tell INEC not to “allow any politician, in whatever party that was against the third term, who did anything (either directly or remotely) against third term, especially in the PDP, to smell power through elections.
While the parly was on, the Aso Rock forces sent some of the foot soldiers to fetch someone that was needed to conclude the issue.


That person who was ushered in by the Aso Rock aides minutes later was Governor Umar Musa Yar’Adua (now President Yar’Adua) It was during that meeting that the likely result of the presidential election of that was still several months away was made known. The mandate to INEC in the meeting was simple: “This is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased, crown ye him”, It was also at this night that all the people you know that lost their elective positions, especially in PDP had their fate sealed”, he explained.

How Odili lost
“Prior to this long night, everyone - including even INEC - knew that the anointed man for Aso Rock after Baba was Governor Peter Odili of Rivers State. But Aso Rock said it had hard facts that Odili was against third term. He openly canvassed his support but was accused of working underground against Baba’s plans. So that altered the equation against him”.

That was not all, INEC was further mandated to travel to Port Harcourt to convey the development to Odili after sometime. At a point in the jamboree by PDP governors who said they wanted to be president, some of them were told of the real plans and cautioned never to back out. It was a double-edged plan. The ‘aspirants’ who got the information were told to play along as good party members and give the grand plan some false credibility. Others were left in the dark to junket with seriousness that all was well. Even those that were told Yar’Adua had been anointed were all promised number two position without knowing it had been the same word individually for others and asked to hang on to hope as party position may still change before the final day.

“Believe this, the task of going to Port Harcourt to inform Odili of the new arrangement was more than a handful for INEC top ranks as they had also been part of the old arrangement to deliver Odili.
As it was hard for INEC to embark on this long journey so was it also incredible for the man in Port Harcourt to believe what he was told the day the message reached his quarters. The shock of the information would have made impressive records on the Richter scale. The final outcome was the alleged triggering off of series of faint feats in Port Harcourt where people that had sunk billions into this project with the expectations of being in control of forces in the nation saw the stark reality of having laboured in vain.

Why Odili was chosen
Odili, by the calculations of PDP was the best bet for two reasons. They believe he has some affinity with Igbo and a South South man. Maybe by location of his place at a border point close to Igboland and by marriage, PDP believed Nd’Igbo would have seen Odili as their own person if he became the president though from the South South. “It would have amounted to shooting down two birds with one pebble. You know the two zones – South East and South South agitated most to take the Aso Rock seat as a means of upturning the marginalisation cry”.
“But when the push actually came to a shove, the man in charge never minded any longer who was hurt - afterall he too felt hurt by Nigerians who worked against his intentions to rule forever”.

Comment:

This confirms what we have been saying for years, that Obasanjo is a stupid opportunist and a greedy slowpoke with the intelligence of an average monkey!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

An extremely selfish man who decided to damn all possible consequences of his obsessions to Nigeria and to his reputation. A leader with a high level of integrity wouldnt have allowed himself to be convinced to agree to such an evil plot. Almost all the world leaders including the president of the World Bank asked him then and he shamelessly denied even when intelligence report would have shown them that the plot was on. He became a prisoner to his inordinate ambition and today he is the worse for it. He would live with this stigma for the rest of his life. A leader that lacks self respect who when he was aked on national television, after the failure of the plot, also denied saying he never sent anyone to work on third term for him forgeting that he once gave a hint of that plot when he said his god was not a god of unfinished projects. (I deliberately used a small "g" for OBJ's god because the God I know and worship, the creator of heaven and earth, would not encourage His child to twist a nation's constitution to suit his selfish interests.)