IBB disowns X account, distances self from comments endorsing military rule

Former Military President, General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida, IBB, has distanced himself from a statement accredited to him on X.

IBB was quoted to have said that Nigeria had the best years under military, and that democracy made things worse for the nation.

He denied the comments in a statement from the IBB Media Office signed by Alhaji Mahmoud Abdullahi.

The statement read, “Our attention has been drawn to a post on a parody account on X, formerly known as Twitter, which carries the handle, @General_Ibbro, in which former President Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida, GCFR, was supposed to have endorsed the virtues of military rule over democratic governance.

“This dubious account carries our principal’s picture and name, and the coat of arms of the Federal Republic of Nigeria for added effect, but it does not belong to him, nor does the former President sanction any post appearing there.

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“In the past, and more famously during the presidential elections last year, it posted a blatant falsehood that the former President had endorsed a particular presidential candidate and his party, thereby causing public confusion and some embarrassment to the elder statesman.

“We want to state, unequivocally, that neither the Twitter or X account, which is essentially a parody or pretend account, nor the statement made therein, ever belonged to the retired General.

“General Babangida truly believes that the era of military intervention in Nigeria’s politics is long gone and he has said how proud he is that the Nigerian military has stood firmly behind multiple democratic governments in this country since 1999, thus giving us the longest run of civilian administration since independence.

“The user of this unfortunate parody account, which we gather was traditionally supposed to be an account that imitates or at least mirror the sentiments of the original twitter or X account that it copies, has serially chosen to use the account to undermine democracy and spread stories capable of causing animosity.”

The statement advised the general public to ignore any post from the X account that purportedly claims to represent IBB’s opinion adding, “Sadly, there seems very little we can do to make the overseers of X or twitter to remove or sanction the tiresome account.

“In future, we sincerely hope that our media practitioners and social media users will be more discerning and make the necessary efforts to get confirmation before sharing messages attributed to former President Babangida on X on any social media platform.”