Political Briefs
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FORMER President Olusegun Obasanjo said that he allowed people to express their views even when they insulted him because he derived pleasure from jibes people threw at him.
Obasanjo said this while delivering a keynote address at the first international conference of the African Studies Association of Africa, which held at the International Conference Centre of the University of Ibadan on Wednesday, October 14.
He said: “If you visit the Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library in Abeokuta, you will find thousands of newspapers, comics and columns meant to spite and insult my person even as a sitting president in the archive. No individual or group of people was ever queried or jailed or repressed in expressing this freedom. Rather, I encouraged them because I derived fun and pleasure from the humour as I know who I am and nobody needs to tell me who and what I am not.”
Obasanjo also expressed his joy over the gradual disappearance of some vices from Africa. He said: “The right to free speech, the right to express a different view-point, the right to draw personal conclusions based on self-instituted research and to query certain cultural practices and beliefs are part of the huge liberty that the continent of Africa now boasts of.”
— Oct 26, 2015 @ 01:00 GMT
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