Former President Olusegun Obasanjo said Jimmy Carter was the only leader outside Africa who visited Sani Abacha, the late military dictator, solely to plead for his release from prison.
Obasanjo stated this in a tribute to Carter, the late American president, who passed on December 29, 2024, aged 100.
Obasanjo said former president of the United States of America, Jimmy Carter, saved him from death in the hands of late General Sanni Abacha.
He said this during a memorial service in honour of the late US President, who died at the age of 100 years, last year December, held at Chapel of Christ The Glorious King, in Abeokuta.
Obasanjo noted that the visit and effort of the late US President to the late Abacha made his release from detention possible.
The former president said, the late Carter, was the only non-African leader, who paid a visit to Abacha solely to plead for his release, according to information at his disposal.
While describing the late Carter as a “titan and a man of peace”, with whom they shared some things in common.
He equally expressed appreciation to other world leaders and friends who ensured his release from prison.
“President Carter was one of my foreign friends who stuck their necks out to save my life and to seek my release from prison. On President Carter’s visit to Nigeria, he got Abacha to agree to take me from detention to house arrest on my farm. But that did not last for too long.
“Many other friends and leaders intervened but President Carter was the only non-African leader, according to my information, that paid a visit to Abacha solely to plead for my release.
“I would remain ever grateful to all who worked for my release from Abacha’s gulag. Abacha ensured that I would not be released. Within a week of his death though, I was released by his successor, General Abdulsalami
Abubakar, who also facilitated my going round Africa and the rest of the world to thank all those who worked for my release,” Obasanjo added.
He said Carter later informed him of the efforts of Ted Turner, an American entrepreneur and founder of the Cable News Network (CNN), and others to secure his release.
“But the most surprising thing Carter said to me was, “Please see Ted Turner and thank him for his generosity. He came to me and asked me to get his friend, Obasanjo, released from prison. ‘I will take care of him and his family here or wherever he chooses to live’.
“I was touched and moved to tears. I immediately went to Ted who expressed to me the same sentiment that President Carter expressed,” he said.
While describing the late Carter as a “titan and a man of peace”, with whom they shared some things in common.
He said “In terms of early life background, I shared similarity with President Jimmy Carter. He was born into a farming family in Plains, Georgia, and I was born into a farming family in the rural village of Ibogun-Olaogun in Ogun State.
“He grew up under a father and mother who were disciplinarians, who instilled in him the essence of discipline, morality, hard work, integrity, kindness and humility, compassion for the poor, and strong belief in God. My parents inculcated similar attributes in me as I was growing up in a rural area that had no piped water, and no electricity just as it was in Plains, Georgia, while Jimmy Carter was growing up there.
“He beat me though in one respect, there was a road to his settlement, there was no road to my village. We walked to every place or, at best, we were carried on bicycles.
“President Carter had a military background which I had and, in fact, we met when I was a military Head of State. But if not that we were both in politics, our paths may not have crossed.
“When I became Nigeria’s military Head of State, one major issue that Africa was facing, among others, was removing the last vestiges of colonization and getting rid of apartheid all in Southern Africa
In his sermon at the memorial service that devoid of any ceremony, the President of the Nigerian Baptist Convention, Rev. Israel Adelani Akanji and who highlighted some of the tributes of world leaders on his (Carter) death, said the late president, did not allow his humble background to leave him till he died.
Making reference to the parable of a trader and Good Samaritan in the Holy Bible, Luke Chapter 10, Akanji described Carter as a compassionate person,who believed in the philosophy of “What is mine is yours if you need”.
The president of the Baptist Convention, therefore, called on leaders to be compassionate and not to fold their arms and feel unconcerned about welfare of the people
