Death Of A Merchant Of Death: The Exit Of A Tragedy — By Emmanuel Ogebe

The passing of ex-Nigerian dictator and subsequent autocrat Gen. Muhammadu Buhari was not so much a tragic exit as it is the exit of a tragedy.

The man who had more access to Nigeria’s wealth than anyone alive, first as oil minister in the ‘70s, then as military ruler in the ‘80s, then as Petroleum Trust Fund chief in the ‘90s and then again twice as president and oil minister for two terms in the last decade, died in a London hospital this week.

There was no hospital worthy in the country he misruled for 10 years to spend his final months on earth, notwithstanding that he knew he was ill when he was in office and had power to fix that. That’s the irony (not tragedy) of his exit.

Gen Buhari is the first ex-Nigerian dictator to die out of office. The nationwide reaction is pregnant with meaning for all the others. Even Kano that mourned the death of the most brutal dictator Gen. Abacha, the only one to die of natural causes in office, celebrated the demise of Buhari. It was truly the exit of a tragedy.

Buhari borrowed $4Billion to build a railway from Kano and Katsina to the nation of Niger where his father is from and arrogantly declared to us that those are his cousins so therefore! Yet even Kano is not impressed…

Buhari was the only General in world history to “technically defeat” terrorists. Two years after he left office, current Generals say that the only way to defeat the terrorists is to build a fence along the very border he built a railway line through. Buhari was the only ruler in the world to build a cross border railway where he should have built a border wall despite known proliferation of illicit arms and terrorism ravaging his nation.

Buhari was Nigeria’s worst ruler and second worst ruler. He also had the dubious distinction of simultaneously being Nigeria’s worst military ruler and worst civilian ruler. While a worse civilian ruler is conceivable, indeed likely, in the fetid fecundity of failure masquerading as leadership in Nigeria, no one will have the combined dishonors that Buhari achieved. The only question was which was worse – his dictatorship or autocracy?

Undoubtedly to me, his second coming was the bigger disaster. As dictator, he never arrested a judge but as autocrat he arrested several including justices of the supreme court.

As dictator, he retired judges believed to have compromised in political cases in the 1983 elections but as autocrat he dismissed the Chief Justice of Nigeria who he couldn’t compromise for his political cases in the 2019 elections – or who was the first southern Christian CJN in three decades – or both! This is why in my petition to the National Judicial Council, I labeled him the worst enemy of the Nigerian judiciary in history.

He subsequently installed a morally, intellectually, mentally and academically bankrupt stooge as CJN in a judicial coup against the third branch of government.

His usurper was so terrible that the Supreme Court justices revolted after Hon Justice Ejembi Eko JSC publicly called for a corruption investigation into its finances from the bench to his face. Buhari the worst president of Nigeria had to remove the worst Chief Justice of Nigeria who he himself had illegally appointed!

Buhari had already practically overthrown his able deputy, and certainly the most erudite individual to ever come within close shot of the presidency, VP Prof Yemi Osibanjo, thus self-sabotaging his administration and any last hope of salvaging his legacy via succession. The fact of the matter is Buhari was nothing and nobody without Tunde and Yemi the two Yoruba men of intellect and integrity he was privileged to have as deputy.

If success is succession, as it is said, then Buhari failed woefully even in that because there is no doubt things would have been different now under Osinbajo. Rather, Nigeria is like the U.S. where a former state attorney general and VP was supplanted by the opposite.

There are not enough letters in the alphabet to do justice to the apocalyptic cataclysm that the unmitigated Buhari disaster was but suffice it to say that had the Buhari of ‘83 seen the Buhari of 2019, he would have overthrown himself!

As my learned colleague Tony Nnadi, Esq. aptly posted online, “When in 1983, Buhari overthrew Shagari, one of the reasons offered was that our Hospitals have been reduced to “mere Consulting Clinics”. 42yrs after, same Hospitals are now Morgues as Buhari, Abdusalam & Tinubu hop to London, to be treated by Nigerian Drs who fled Nigeria.” That’s the irony of his exit.

While the consensus is that his death could not have been too soon, sadly even in death, his legacy of death and destruction lives on.

Buhari single-handedly mass weaponized Nigeria’s elections. In 2011, post-election violence notably in the 12 sharia states of the north destroyed 700 churches in 48hrs with over 1000 lives lost in the single deadliest attack on Christendom in contemporary world history.

My fact-finding tour of northern Nigeria discovered operational similarities, modalities and methodologies between Buharists and Boko Haram terrorists who incidentally had nominated him as their representative in negotiations with the Federal Government.

Our investigations show that like Trump’s Jan 6 insurrectionists, upon ascending power, Buhari freed his followers who had been incarcerated for post-election violence.

By the 2015 elections, Buhari who had illegally solicited millions of dollars in cash from Saudi Arabia and Libya for his serial campaign war chest (which he reportedly filched) switched tactics and mobilized killer Fulani militia from the West African sub region into Nigeria for violent takeover.

When President Jonathan peacefully conceded after our pre-election threat assessment showed massive security vulnerabilities amidst violence build up, his imported bush army were denied their violent attack. As a prominent Fulani security official now in government explained, Fulanis were killing Nigerians because they were angry that Buhari had not kept his promise to them.

Troops killed 6,260 terrorists nationwide in the past two years per Army DHQ. From May 29, 2023 to May 2025, at least 6,896 people were killed in Fulani attacks across Benue per Amnesty International.

Fulani Terrorists killed more citizens in Benue state alone in two years than the entire number of terrorists Nigeria killed in the whole country. We’re losing the war Buhari bequeathed us.

For illustration just look at the Yelewata massacre. Two policemen were killed, 200+ Benue villagers and one Fulani attacker died. The war isn’t going well especially as these fatalities are comparable to the full-fledged aerial war between two nations Israel and Iran.

After the same Friday of the Yelewata massacre, 24 Israelis were killed by Iranian missile attacks and 224 Iranians by Israeli plane bombardment.

Not only was the one-night fatality in the single Benue state attack equal to the one-week war between two nations but Israel’s casualty is 10% of Iran’s showing clearly who has the military advantage. The terrorists’ casualty in the Yelewata massacre was less than 0.1% and Nigeria 99.9%! We’ve been ‘technically defeated.’ This is an exit of a tragedy but not an end of his tragedies…

Buhari fought me. He forgot he would unfailingly lose power like before. That’s the tragedy that he never learnt anything. He was so dull that even past experience wasn’t a good enough teacher.

Some years ago, my defamation suit against the Buhari government discovered a secret memo proving that I was being elaborately and deliberately targeted by the Nigerian embassy in USA for my human rights advocacy.

The Nigerian embassy in Washington at the highest levels authorized my punishment and silencing for/from speaking in “Congress,” saying specifically, ”Mr. Ogebe derives pleasure from trash-talking Nigeria on social media, in the Chambers of the United States Congress and other public places across the United States.”

More worrisome, the Charge d’ affaires (Acting Ambassador) of Nigeria Hakeem Balogun made the following chilling request, “Going forward, to prevent Mr. Ogebe, who is a Nigerian citizen, from making further derogatory comments that are inimical to the image of Nigeria, Government may consider taking punitive action against him, including withdrawal of his privilege to carry a Nigerian passport.”
This was a criminal offense and conduct incongruent with their diplomatic status.

18 USC 1505 provides in pertinent part that, “Whoever corruptly, or by threats or force, or by any threatening letter or communication influences, obstructs, or impedes or endeavors to influence, obstruct, or impede . . . the due and proper exercise of the power of inquiry under which any inquiry or investigation is being had by either House, or any committee of either House or any joint committee of the Congress— Shall be fined under this title, imprisoned not more than 5 years or, if the offense involves international or domestic terrorism (as defined in section 2331), imprisoned not more than 8 years, or both.” “

The U.S. did nothing over this violation of U.S. and international law due to diplomatic immunity and disinterest but famed human rights icon Femi Falana sued Buhari on my behalf to prevent the revocation of my citizenship which also violates Nigerian law.

My case is an interesting metaphor of Buhari and Nigeria – that the son of a Fulani from the country of Niger who imported foreign Fulanis to kill Nigerians and landgrab despite all the opportunities Nigeria blessed and accommodated him with attempted to revoke the citizenship of an indigenous Nigerian who dared to help victims of the atrocities of his kinsmen.

Buhari was the most traitorous, treacherous and treasonous ruler Nigeria has ever had. Putin imports foreigners to fight his enemies abroad. Buhari imports foreigners to fight his people at home.

All said and done, aside from his merchandising his country for a mess of pottage in the Middle East, Buhari did worse by selling out our very lands and forest to his nomadic marauders and murderers who now hold us to ransom. And this is why, far from being a patriot, he was a tragedy and a merchant of death upon deaths. Like Nigeria’s most brutal dictator before him, Buhari has sustained the tradition that the only fleeting joy Nigeria’s misrulers give the people is demise.

Nigeria is just a health insurance and wealth assurance card to them. Within less than two years out of power, he was terminally hospitalized. That’s all power was for – he, his cousins and cows.

As Rinu Oduala aptly posited online.

“In 1984, Buhari had Umaru Dikko kidnapped from London in a crate labeled as a diplomatic bag. Guess who’s returning to Nigeria in a crate from London 41 years later?” The very passport they plotted to deny me of; he’s not using in a cargo bin.

As one of only two men to rule Nigeria twice, Buhari still acquitted himself discreditably. Obasanjo handed over twice, Buhari was kicked out once. One would have expected him better than anyone else to understand the transience and limits of power. This is why he was doubtless the most asinine person in Nigeria’s presidency ever whose own wife he termed “opposition” and became Nigeria’s only “Internationally Displaced Person” IDP First Lady fleeing his wretched misgovernance.

But it’s not just that he couldn’t even govern his own household within Aso rock and that he and his wife mocked each other globally on the world stage. The world itself recognizes he was an abject and irredeemable failure and that’s why like his first stint in power, he crawled back under the rock he crept to while Obasanjo resumed his role as super statesman globetrotting world summits instead of hospitals.

“Merchant of death” is a mercenary or drug dealer. Buhari fit both bills. Fulani nationwide kidnap is a drug that Nigeria claims Nigerians lives now daily comprising much of the 612,000 lives lost last year.

Until our forests are freed and our farmlands safe again, Nigeria is a glorified grazing area for the merchant of death and his kin – even after the exit of the tragedy.

Emmanuel Ogebe is a Washington-based international human rights lawyer and Nigerian prodemocracy icon.

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