By Revisited! What FP Wrote About Buhari’s New Chief of Staff, Ibrahim Gambari, Ten Years Ago
In an article titled, ’The U.N.’s Dictator Envoy – Meet Ibrahim Gambari, diplomat to the autocrats’ on February 11, 2010, the Foreign Policy Dot Com news site, tagged President Muhammadu Buhari’s newly appointed Chief of Staff, Professor Gambari, United Nations’ ’favorite dictator-whisperer’.
Gambari, a veteran of U.N. missions from Zimbabwe to Myanmar, known to have developed a knack for mediating between the UN and autocratic regimes around the globe got the appellation ”by working for one, Sani Abacha, the notorious late strongman president of Nigeria, whom Gambari served as U.N. ambassador from 1990 to 1999,” the foreign news platform wrote over a decade ago.
No doubt President Buhari’s connection to his Chief of Staff dates back to the inglorious Abacha days. While Buhari served as the Chairman of the Petroleum Trust Fund (PTF), Gambari was Nigeria’s ambassador to the UN. Modern day commentators particularly on social media have nicknamed late Abacha ’Sinzu Money’ because of the over $4.6 billion (N1.4trn) allegedly looted from the nation’s treasury and stashed majorly in four countries namely Switzerland, Jersey Island in United Kingdom, United States of America and Liechtenstein. These loots were recovered in the late Head of State’s name between 2002 and 2020.
To understand the enormity of what has been recovered from Abacha so far, Lagos State budget for the year 2020 to cater for its over 20 million population is only N1.17 trillion, even lower to what has been recovered from Abacha so far.
FP wrote that ”Dictators are Gambari’s specialty” and he has become the ”United Nations’ go-to guy to coax despotic rulers out of isolation.” Many are wondering if this appointment will not aggravate the dictatorial tendencies of President Buhari in the coming days.
Though having a rich CV, Gambari is not considered a respecter of human rights. As U.N. ambassador, Gambari vigorously defended the Abacha regime’s execution of Ken Saro-Wiwa, calling his group of activists “common criminals.”
