How Yar'Adua's cabal almost succeeded in sacking me from office - Ex-Jonathan's minister

- Osita Chidoka revealed how a call by Babagana Kingibe alerted him to false claims that he was planning to launch a smear campaign against late President Yar’Adua

- He said a fundamental problem of ideological differences between the so-called ‘Obasanjo boys’ and the emerging ‘Yar’Adua group’ was what led to all the talk about a plot against Yar’Adua

- Chidoka’s career was only saved by efforts made by Kingibe and then permanent secretary, General Services Office Hakeem Baba-Ahmed in defending his reputation

Osita Chidoka, a former Corps Marshall of the Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC) during the administration of late President Umaru Yar’Adua, has revealed that he was to be sacked from office in 2008 in a mindless game of power politics.

Chidoka, who later became a minister of aviation in 2014 during the Goodluck Jonathan administration, disclosed that his job was to be terminated on mere suspicion of being an ‘Obasanjo boy’ and allegedly plotting to get Yar’Adua out of office by discrediting him.

Premium Times reports that Chidoka made the remarks during a public lecture organized by the Youth Development Centre of the Obasanjo library while presenting a paper on the topic ‘Towards a Guiding Political Philosophy for a Democratic Nigeria’.

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Narrating his ordeal, Chidoka stated:“Ambassador Baba Gana Kingibe, then Secretary to Government of the Federation called me and inquired about a meeting I had in London with then EFCC Chairman Nuhu Ribadu and Mallam Nasir El-Rufai to launch an international media campaign to discredit President Umaru Yar’Adua as part of plans by the Obasanjo boys to remove President Yar’Adua from office.”

Revealing to his audience that he was alarmed after the call from Kingibe, Chidoka further disclosed: “Shortly after that discussion another senior friend of mine, Chief Mike Nwakalor, frantically called me and said I should thank Amb. Kingibe for standing up for me and insisting that the Osita he knows would not be part of a plan to discredit a government he is serving as a Chief Executive.

“Chief Nwakalor had also told some of those peddling the story that unless Ojo Maduekwe was part of the plot he does not see how Osita would plan such.

“The truth was that I had come out of Paris from a road safety conference with my wife and checked into the Hilton Metropole where incidentally Nuhu Ribadu, who arrived from a Thisday Event in New York, was also staying.

“We met in the lobby and he told me he was waiting for Nasir to go and see Gani Fawehinmi who was very sick at the time in London, I quickly offered to go and see Chief with them as I hadn’t seen him since he was hospitalised. After the visit I left with Nasir and Jimi Lawal to join the Awujale of Ijebu for Iftar dinner as it was Ramadan. The following day I left for Nigeria.”

Chidoka discredited all claims of a plot to discredit or remove President Yar’Adua from office.

According to the minister, all such talk about a plot against the former president “was only symptomatic of a more fundamental problem of ideological differences between the so-called ‘Obasanjo boys’ and the emerging ‘Yar’Adua group’.

“This difference arose largely because the PDP at that time was not constructed along any guiding political philosophy hence the immediate effort to dismantle what some termed the Obasanjo hegemony.

“Subsequently Nuhu Ribadu was removed as EFCC Chairman, Nasir El-Rufai went on exile.”

He proceeded: “In my case, a Presidential Panel was set up to investigate allegations that my appointment did not follow due process and other sundry allegations, same petition was also sent to ICPC and EFCC. Luckily for me Ambassador Kingibe and then Permanent Secretary General Services Office Hakeem Baba-Ahmed stood their ground and saved my nascent career from the forces I worked day and night with President Obasanjo to bring to power.”

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Meanwhile, NAIJ.com previously reported that Pro-Biafra agitator and leader of Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) Nnamdi Kanu, after his release from Kuje prison on Friday, April 28, was driven out of the detention facility by former aviation minister Osita Chidoka.

Watch this NAIJ.com TV video of a Nigerian man calling for mass burial for all Nigerian leaders