Shagari: A man with humility

It is always hard for us as human beings to really get use to death as ultimate and final abode one day. But for every death that occurred, we quickly mourn and showered tributes to the deceased and prayed for the repose of his soul. For Alhaji Shehu Usman Aliyu Shagari (Turakin Sokoto) and former […]

It is always hard for us as human beings to really get use to death as ultimate and final abode one day. But for every death that occurred, we quickly mourn and showered tributes to the deceased and prayed for the repose of his soul.

For Alhaji Shehu Usman Aliyu Shagari (Turakin Sokoto) and former President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, that made his journey to the other world on Friday 28th December 2018, it was indeed a death that affect Nigeria and Nigerians and to a great extent democrats all over the world.

The death of Malam (as Shagari uniquely called within the family circle) personally to me is a great loss of a man of humility and leader that led exemplary attitudes of governance of our nation.

My direct contact with late Shehu Shagari was in Germany in May 2002 at Wiesbaden near Frankfurt where he was undergoing rehabilitation after twelve hours heart surgery that almost terminated his life due to complications as a result of burst of one of the artery. I remember vividly a seventy year old heart surgeon was rushed from Munich to Wiesbaden to save the life of President Shagari. Closely concerned was the then President Olusegun Obasanjo, who intermittently called through my late friend Abdurrahman Shehu Shagari to monitor the development. At the end Shagari recovered but lost his voice for almost two weeks. One day, President Obasanjo called and heard the voice of President Shagari answering, I guess at that time, Obasanjo got a sign of relieve. The rest is history, today President Shehu Shagari Shagari has joined our ancestors.

During that period of President Shagari rehabilitation at Wiesbaden, I use to travel from Cologne to visit him and also took along our local food ‘masa’, ‘kanun tsamiya’ and sometimes ‘Tuwo da miyan kuka’ which he likes most. Some days if my duties at DW-radio are tight, my wife travel from Cologne to Wiesbaden and deliver our local delicacies to our first democratically elected president.

As part of his humbleness, President Shagari wrote an appreciation letter signed personally to me through Malam Baba Wakil of Nigerian embassy in Berlin. This letter to me is worth more than a diamond from a person of humbled background as teacher, a technocrat and President of the largest black race on earth. Adieu Shehu Shagari.

 

Zubair Abdurra’uf Idris, Danmasanin Birnin-Gwari.