The U.S., UK, France, and Germany had to appeal to President Muhammadu Buhari’s regime not to assassinate former CBN deputy governor Obadiah Mailafia, a vocal critic of the regime, including its security agencies, Peoples Gazette has learnt.
“There was a call from the White House in fairness to the Americans. There was a call from London, Germany, and France to Abuja to warn them that no harm comes to me,” Mr Malafia said in an interview with popular journalist Ohimai Amaize.
In footage of the interview shared shortly after his death on Sunday, the economist revealed that his life had been under threat since the State Security Service (SSS) interrogated him on his on-air comments about deliberate violence across the country.
Mr Mailafia, who noted that he had gone into hiding, alleged that the Buhari regime had deliberate plans to keep him at the SSS custody until the next day to have him killed.
“As I am talking to you, I am in hiding. Not even my wife knows where I live. The plan was that they would keep me there and interrogate me until past midnight, then what they would then do was to say it’s too late to return me home and I should just stay in the prison next door,” he said.
“They had already paid somebody who is on death row that in the middle of the night, he’ll just get up and kill me,” he explained.
According to him, the attempt to assassinate him would have been successful if not for the quartet of the U.S., UK, France, and Germany’s intervention. “When they saw the crowd, I think that was what made them backtrack,” the economist said.
The economist also explained that his son addressed the media and also reached out to the UK government and EU parliament “so, the publicity over my case is such that they felt cornered and it became very difficult.”
Nonetheless, Mr Malafia lauded some of the SSS operatives for being “professional and civil” even though they acted on the instructions of their bosses to have him silenced.
Speaking further, he recounted an alleged attempt to bomb his house a month before he granted the interview.
“Over a month ago, they tried to bomb my house. Some people called me and said I had a parcel from the United States and they needed to deliver it to my house, and I should give them the address,” he explained.
The economist said he hesitated to give out details of his residence after he got wind that “there was something else behind it,” he also claimed to have had a dream warning him of such occurrence.
“I dreamt that my whole house had crashed with everybody inside, including myself. It was like a warning dream, and when it came, I said the almighty must be telling me to be careful with this thing. So, I decided to switch off my phone for two days. They’ve not called me till this very day,” he added.
Both the spokesperson for the SSS, Peter Afunanya, and Femi Adesina, a media aide to Mr Buhari, did not respond to Peoples Gazette’s request seeking comments on the allegations.
Mr Mailafia died at the age of 64 at the University of Abuja Teaching Hospital on Sunday.
