“Whether Shonekan likes it or not, God has ordained his regime as the shortest in history of Nigeria. And it will be suddenly terminated by God, because June 12 has a connotation and denotation which Nigerians have not understood. Until they know the extent of June 12, they will be beating about the bush…”

-The late Chief Gani Fawehinmi, September, 13, 1993, The African Guardian

OVERVIEW

INTRODUCTION

BIRTH AND EARLY DAYS

EDUCATION

CAREER

LOVE, ROMANCE AND MARRIAGE

FAMILY AND CHILDREN

BECOMING HEAD OF STATE

SHONEKAN’S CABINET

FOREIGN POLICY

THE PALACE COUP

ACHIEVEMENTS, EVENTS AND ACTIVITIES AS HEAD OF STATE

SUPPORT FOR THE SHONEKAN REGIME

CRITICISM AND CONTROVERSIES

HONOURS, LEGACIES AND AWARDS

LATER LIFE AND SHONEKAN TODAY

HIS WORDS
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For many of us (Nigerians), the name Shonekan is tied to June 12, Abacha and MKO. His fidihe (interim) government remains the shortest of any Nigerian Head of State. For this reason, many Nigerians look at the man and his regime with passing interest, if any. Some have even confined him to a corner in their mind thinking his regime was a drab and uncolourful one. But did nothing really happen in his three months in power? Okay, what happened? Any crucial events? Did you know Abacha was Shonekan’s vice president? Why an aircraft was hijacked by four Nigerian youths in their early 20s (one was a teenager) in his regime? Foreign policy? Drama? What Abacha did to him? Why Shonekan increased fuel prices by five times provoking mad protests all over the nation? takes you on a jolly ride as we take a peep together into the administration of Chief. Dr. ERNEST ADEGUNLE OLADEHINDE SHONEKAN, GCFR, CBE, the man who ruled Nigeria for 120,960 minutes. Enjoy!

BIRTH AND EARLY DAYS

Oloye (Chief) Shonekan was born on the 9th of May 1936 in Lagos, Nigeria. That makes him 77 years old as you are reading this. An Abeokuta (Yoruba) person by origin, his father was working in the civil service and he had five other siblings.

EDUCATION
Early schooling was at Nigeria’s oldest secondary school, Church Missionary Society (CMS) Grammar School, St. Finbarr’s College Road, Lagos (established 6 June 1859, so that technically makes the school older than Nigeria itself). He says of his days at CMS: In my days at the Grammar School, I am proud to say that we had the best of high school education. Teachers were qualified, highly motivated and ready to teach, the needed facilities were provided and students were also willing and ready to do serious learning. We received all round education including religious and moral instruction. Later, he proceeded to the University of London where he finished in 1962 with a degree in law. He is a member of the Nigerian and English Bars.

CAREER
He received training as a lawyer, business executive and industrialist. He would later have a stint as a politician. A consummate businessman, Chief Shonekan was jejely heading United African Company of Nigeria PLC (UAC) (a Unilever Group company) before he was drafted, abi before he drafted himself into politics. His career in the corporate world is an interesting one. In 1964, he joined UAC’s Legal Department and rose through the ranks as Assistant Legal Adviser, Deputy Adviser so that by 1980, he was already the Managing Director, with UAC then being the largest conglomerate controlled by an African south of the Sahara. UAC would also later sponsor him to the Harvard Business School where he completed an Advanced Management Programme.

LOVE, ROMANCE AND MARRIAGE
He is married to Chief (Mrs.) Margaret Shonekan, an anti-examination malpractice champion who contributed greatly to the development of education in Nigeria and the West African subregion as the Senior Deputy Registrar at West African Examinations (WAEC) where she headed the Nigerian National Office of the body. However, as First Lady, she was bitterly criticized for going to a ‘worthless cultural event’ in Seoul, South Korea with a 45-man contingent that started a shopping jamboree right from the moment they landed at the airport.

FAMILY AND CHILDREN

Some of his children include:

-ADEBOYE SHONEKAN (also known as AS, see pictures), a lawyer by profession and also responsible for overseeing some of his dad’s businesses (he was appointed the CEO of Nigerian-German Chemical, NGC) on April 27, 1999 where he was the Executive Vice Chairman since March 28, 1998.

He joined NGC in 1995 as an Executive Director and he was in charge of the Materials Management, Logistics and Import Financing Units. Before then, he was an Investment Officer at the International Finance Corporation of the World Bank (1990 to 1995). He also worked as a Director at his dad’s enterprises, UNIC Health and UNIC Insurance PLC. He also worked with Universe Reinsurance Limited, Virgin Nigeria Limited, Critical Rescue International and Intersource SA Limited. He finished from the University of Reading, Berkshire, United Kingdom in 1986 (LLB, 2nd Class Honours) and like his dad, also attended the Management Program at Harvard Business School in 1998.

-Another child is KEMI SHONEKAN (now Mrs. Kemi Shonekan-Olateju, see pictures), who got married in a high society wedding not too long ago at Four Seasons Hotel, Mayfair, London.

A Senior Manager at GE Corporate, she is a graduate of Syracuse University and University of Kent and had previous working experience as a Database Administrator at KPMG Advisory and Health Insurance Plan. She lives in New York and attended Roedean School.

BECOMING HEAD OF STATE

It all started with General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida. After eight years of dribbling Nigerians in a way that will make even Messi turn green with envy, IBB realized that the game was up. He just had to leave. But he was not going to leave without putting up a last fight. He propped up a civilian member of his dying government, to head the newly-constituted Interim National Government (ING) also known as Ijoba Fidihe. The man to head the ING was Ernest Shonekan, then a 56-year-old business executive. His tenure, the most fugacious in the history of Nigeria, started on the 26th of August 1993 and ended abruptly on the 17th of November of the same year, lasting a mere 84 days (just a little over 2,000 hours) or two months and 23 days. No thanks to General Sani Abacha and MKO…lol! Why MKO? Read on na By the way, read all about Abacha here>>>http://.com/sani-abacha-nigerias-most-enigmatic-ruler/

The civilian Transitional Council set up replaced the Council of Ministers. IBB dissolved his all-powerful Armed Forces Ruling Council (AFRC) and set up the National Defence and Security Council (NDSC) on the 2nd of January, 1993. The Transitional Council got its power by virtue of the Decree No. 54 of 1992 (Constitution (Suspension and Modification) Amendment) and together with the NDSC, started plans on how to ensure that power was peacefully handed over to the civilians. To ensure that MKO was boxed into a corner and eventually crushed, a barrage of decrees was released:

-Decree No. 39 (Presidential Elections Repeal Decree)

-Decree No. 40 (Transition to Civil Rule (Amendment) Decree)

-Decree No. 41 (Presidential Election (Invalidation of Court Order) Decree)

-Decree No. 59 of 1993 ended IBB’s junta while Decree No. 61 established the Interim National Government.

Mago mago don dey this we kontiri e don tey, just imagine: invalidation of court order, shooo! Lol!

On the 26th of August, 1993, at around 3.30 pm at the Presidential Villa, Chief Shonekan was sworn in as the new ‘Head of State and President of the Interim National Government’ by Justice Mohammed Bello, the Chief Justice of the Federation. But the intrigue did not stop there. The Decree No. 61 mentioned above stated that Abacha was going to be the ‘Vice President, Defence Secretary and Senior Minister’. The decree stated that the ‘Senior Minister’ would take over if anything unusual was to happen, instead of leaving the Office of the Interim President vacant.

On the 31st of August, 1993, Shonekan delivered his first speech as Head of State to the nation.

FOREIGN POLICY

In his maiden address to the nation, in which he called his government a ‘child of circumstance’, one of the things Shonekan mentioned was the planned pullout of Nigerian troops in Liberia. He said the ECOMOG intervention efforts were a huge drain on the Nigerian economy. Before he could do that, Abacha booted him out and continued with the ECOMOG activities.

THE PALACE COUP

Shonekan’s regime was supposed to end on the 31st of March, 1994. Everything played right into the hands of General Sani Abacha. An enraged MKO filed a suit to the court to declare ING illegal. The ING was eventually declared illegal and it was time for Abacha to spring into action. He approached Shonekan and told him that now that the ING has been declared illegal, the honourable thing would be to resign. Shonekan was wise, he did not argue. Get the full gist on how Abacha, Diya, Gusau and others stormed the Aso Rock Presidential Villa with army trucks full of fierce-looking soldiers to unseat Shonekan here>>>http://.com/sani-abacha-nigerias-most-enigmatic-ruler/

ACHIEVEMENTS, EVENTS AND ACTIVITIES AS HEAD OF STATE

-Although his regime was of a most fugacious nature and the political situation as at that time was extremely inflammable, Shonekan managed to do some things while in office. He released many political activists (and people like the late Chief Gani Fawehinmi, Dr. Beko Ransome-Kuti and Mr. Femi Falana who were advocates of the June 12 and organized protests) clamped into jail by Babangida, lifted the bans on journalists and allowed exiled opposition leaders back into the country.

-He also opened some of the universities that IBB had ‘padlocked’ and discussed with the National Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers (NUPENG) and the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) to end the strikes.

-He also made attempts and lobbied for Nigeria’s debts to be cancelled while also repealing many of IBB’s brutal military decrees at home. One of the biggest challenges of Shonekan’s short-lived regime was the poor economic profile and spent considerable time pleading for debt rescheduling or total cancellation. He had inherited a carcass from IBB, the economy was in tatters and there was virtually nothing left in the foreign reserves. He also particularly promised to repeal the Decrees 2, 29 and 48 but before he could do that, the Kanuri General wasted no time in ousting him. Abacha later came and ‘dissolved’ everything in existence….lol!

-Shonekan’s government also tried to reduce the influence of the federal government on schools and negotiated with foreign governments like Britain to lift sanctions and ensure proper cooperation between the Nigerian educational sector and counterparts overseas.

-He also instituted that probes be launched into the affairs of government parastatals like the National Electric Power Authority (NEPA, now Power Holding Company of Nigeria, PHCN, not that the name change has eradicated the corruption o! Lol!), Nigerian Airways (already killed, dead and buried), Central Bank of Nigeria (coughs), the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC, more coughs) and the Nigeria Customs Service (licking Vicks Lemon Plus…lol!)

-Shonekan did not let the short-lived nature of his regime deny him of the luxury of foreign trips. On the 7th of October, 1993, Shonekan was before the United Nations General Assembly. He attended the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) (October 21-25), 1993 at the southern port city of Limassol in Cyprus. But while there, he got the shock of his life when the British Foreign Secretary, Sir Douglas Richard Hurd told him to go make a deal and incorporate MKO, hinting at Chief Abiola’s mandate. It becomes more interesting when you realize that a Nigerian, Chief Emeka Anyaoku was the Secretary-General of the Commonwealth. While in Cyprus, Shonekan knew the condition he left home that things were far from calm. He was constantly placing calls to his defence chief, General Sani Abacha to ask about things back home. But you know one thing with that man called Abacha? He plainly refused to pick many of the calls…lol! If you understand the game, Shonekan really had no control over Abacha, remember he was not sworn in as the Commander-in-Chief even if he was addressed as such (a plot that was not without Abacha’s fingerprints…lol). To worsen the matter, Shonekan was briefed about the numerous conspiracies brewing back home especially after the announcement made by the ING that the National Guard would be disbanded.

While Chief Shonekan was still in the cosy Mediterranean nation of Cyprus, something very crazy happened back home in Naija. It was the 25th of October, 1993 and the meeting in Cyprus was reaching an end. But some daredevil Nigerians had something else in mind that fateful Monday. There were four of them, all of the Movement for the Advancement of Democracy (MAD, quite an apt name I tell you) and they were led by Mallam Jerry Yusuff from Kwara State. A Nigerian Airways plane (an Airbus A310 numbered 5N AUH) carrying a total of 148 people (137 passengers and 11 crew members) on its way to Abuja from Lagos was hijacked by these dudes (and they were actually all youths in their early 20s, one was even a teenager). Yes, hijacked! Instead of landing in the FCT, the aircraft was diverted, tried landing in Ndjamena, Chad, was rebuffed and finally touched ground in Niger Republic! It would take the intervention of elite paramilitary commandos from the Niger Republic (not Nigeria) to take control of the aircraft. The four guys later spent a horrible nine and half years in prison in the deserts of Niamey. One of the hijackers was Richard Ajibola Ogunderu, who had plans to become a pilot. After his incarceration, he tried applying to an aviation college in Frankfurt, Germany but was turned down. He initially had plans to rule Nigeria by democratic means. Others hijackers were Kabir Adenuga, Benneth Oluwadaisi and Kenny Rasaq-Lawal. Watch out for the next piece from .com on the four hijackers and the incident that shook the nation. For now, our focus is on Shonekan

To some analysts like Nowa Omoigui, the Shonekan Presidency did not handle the hijacking incident properly. A team led by the Transportation and Aviation Minister, Alhaji Bashir Dalhatu was sent to Niamey to negotiate release of the hostages. At the end of the day, the whole rescue operation was neatly carried out by special forces from Niger Republic. As large and powerful as the Nigerian Armed Forces was, not even a single commando was involved in the rescue of our fellow compatriots. Shonekan received not a few knocks for entrusting the lives of his citizens in the hands of a foreign nation. However, if you look closely, you will see the handwriting of Abacha…lol!

At any rate, that was not the first time an aircraft would be skyjacked in Obodo Naija. The first time was back in April 1967 shortly before the Nigerian Civil War broke out.

-It is noteworthy to also point out that the legislature under Shonekan was a typical Fuji House of Commotion. There were two camps -one supporting the ING and the other doing everything possible to hasten the collapse of the Shonekan regime. Some soldiers too were actively involved in the plot to destabilize the ING while some others both within and outside the military wanted the entire political establishment dissolved, including the political parties. The tensions manifested on the floor of the National Assembly and eventually, on the 2nd November, 1993, the Senate President, Dr. Iyorchia Ayu was impeached and replaced by Senator Ameh Ebute. The late former Senate President and the Oyi of the Universe, Chief Chinwuba Wilberforce Okadigbo led the other Pro-Shonekan legislators to impeach Ayu. Interestingly, Okadigbo himself was charged with corruption in 2000 and impeached as Senate President.

-On the 8th of November, Shonekan made a move that many have condemned as a mistake and a wrong decision at a wrong time. He decided to remove petroleum subsidies due to declining oil prices on the international market. What happened next was that fuel prices jerked up from 70 kobo to N3.50, a whopping 500% increase! Nigerians went crazy! Protests broke out all over the nation and the confusion heightened. Lurking in one corner behind dark goggles was Abacha waiting like a tarantula, waiting for the right time to pounce on a dazed prey. Later on, years later, another Nigerian leader who must have missed this chapter of history, would do another abracadabra for us by suddenly removing the fuel subsidies triggering one of the most massive protests in the history of the country. Why you dey look me like that na? I mention anybody’s name ni?….lmao!!! #winks. On the 15th, the Nigerian Labour Congress declared a general strike and the next day, the National Assembly was forced to make moves to reduce the fuel prices. But it was all too little, too late.

-Just 48 hours later on the 10th of November, 1993 after increasing pump prices, Shonekan’s government suffered its greatest setback: a Lagos High Court presided by Justice Dolapo Akinsanya declared it illegal. Remember that as far back as October, MKO and his running mate, Baba Gana Kingibe had filed a suit before the court to declare the ING as lacking any legality, null and void. After the court judgment, it now fell on Abacha to assume the reins of power, remember the Senior Minister and Vice President clause in the Decree 61? The next day, people like Professor Bolaji Akinyemi begged Abacha to save the nation from plunging into chaos. Abacha, a most patient hunter, struck a week later. He did not even allow Shonekan spend any extra day in Aso Rock, Shonekan, Nigeria’s most fugacious leader, was treated in a gentlemanly manner, allowed to deliver a farewell speech and after that, Abacha made sure he was on the next plane to Lagos. No long thin! Lol! Abacha ti yayakuya….lol!

NB: THIS IS AN ABRIDGED VERSION, I WAS NOT ABLE TO POST ALL HERE, SAYS POST TOO LONG. READ ALL HERE>>>http://.com/ernest-shonekan-nigerias-most-fugacious-leader/

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God bless you ,your piece are very interesting,educative,informative and entertaining.

Shonekan, one of the people who signed for June 12's annulment. He has lost my respect. So far, I don't consider such a weak-principled personality a president of Nigeria. He's not worth my reverence a single bit.

I'd be risking a ban for telling this truth, or at least hiding this post. But am compelled by my convictions to tell it.
The Yoruba man is always destroying himself and his people by himself. Most of those who signed the Annulment document against MKO were Yorubas and their Hausa-Fulani-Kanuri friends. The Yorubas were the greatest saboteurs of the Shonekan administration both at the executive, judiciary and legislature- it took a Chuba Okadigbo to raise a support for the poor president. And today, a Yorubaman want to sale the remaining soul of his people to the same Hausa-Fulan-Kanuri matrimony and the people are in high elation and frenz for it. I only wish them goodluck in their struggles.

Nice 1 .

Didn't know you're a babe, . I don't abuse women. So therefore, not gonna lay into you again

1MCN: I'd be risking a ban for telling this truth, or at least hiding this post. But am compelled by my convictions to tell it.
The Yoruba man is always destroying himself and his people by himself. Most of those who signed the Annulment document against MKO were Yorubas and their Hausa-Fulani-Kanuri friends. The Yorubas were the greatest saboteurs of the Shonekan administration both at the executive, judiciary and legislature- it took a Chuba Okadigbo to raise a support for the poor president. And today, a Yorubaman want to sale the remaining soul of his people to the same Hausa-Fulan-Kanuri matrimony and the people are in high elation and frenz for it. I only wish them goodluck in their struggles.

Can you get of the mind distorting tribalistic Ganga for once.
True nations not about individuals or ethnic nationality.
Any person has the right to support whomever they want to support.
Any person has the right to disagree/hate whomever they want to hate.
So because MKO or AWO is a yoruba,must every yoruba support them ?
The only thing we hate is unconstitutional illegality.
Shonekan from ogun state was never accepted because his government was illegal.is he not yoruba.
It is what we are known as a people for. Principles and the rule of law.
Those yorubas who were involved in the ASSOCIATION FOR BETTER NIGERIAN led by Nzeribe will be judged by their conscience .
That does not deflect where the blame lies. THE BABANGIDA GOVERNMENT.
As an outsider, the more you look at the politics of the SW ,the less you see.
Better for you not to write about a people who you do not understand.

I'd be risking a ban for telling this truth, or at least hiding this post. But am compelled by my convictions to tell it.
The Yoruba man is always destroying himself and his people by himself. Most ofthose who signed the Annulment document against MKO were Yorubas andtheir Hausa-Fulani-Kanuri friends. The Yorubas were the greatest saboteurs of the Shonekan administration both at the executive, judiciary and legislature- it tooka Chuba Okadigbo to raise a support for the poor president. And today, a Yorubaman want to sale the remaining soul of his people to the same Hausa-Fulan-Kanuri matrimony and the people are in high elation and frenz for it. I only wish them goodluck in their struggles


U have not shared any truth but ur myopic views ;


Why would Yoruba supported an Interim National Government when we had a democratically elected President in MKO ::::::::::::


Inspite Shonekan being a Yoruba,tis not enough reason for him to be supported by folks back-home !!!