Buhari, a True Patriot

It was a sad day and moment for everyone who valued anything that meant integrity, discipline, and true patriotism when Nigeria’s former military head of state and the country’s immediate past president, Muhammadu Buhari breathed his last on Sunday, July 13, 2025 at a London hospital where he was on admission.

From the time his demise was announced, Nigerians from different walks of life including the military, politicians, technocrats, the business class, Muslim clerics, and ordinary citizens have continued to pay tributes to him; some of them recounting their personal experiences with him. Many of the stories told or re-told by those who worked together or interacted with him in the course of his military career or sojourn in politics had some lessons from which the surviving generation of Nigerians could learn.

My first attempt to meet General Buhari in Kaduna sometime in 2010 failed because he had traveled out of town. The military personnel at the entrance gate of his residence only told me he was not around. I then told them I came from outside of Kaduna and would like to drop a message.

They agreed and I dropped a copy of one of my published books with them for delivery to Buhari. In addition, I also scribbled a note on my complimentary card; and left both (the book and the card) with the security men. Few minutes past 8pm of the same day, my phone rang and I reluctantly picked it up. Behold, it was General Buhari calling to acknowledge receipt of the message I left for him.

Immediately I picked up the phone, I needn’t be told who was speaking as his cackle voice was a clear identity. He asked whether he was speaking with Dr Ndagi, and replied in the affirmative. He quickly followed it up with an apology for my not meeting him; adding that he had travelled on a condolence visit to Bauchi.

He said he appreciated the book I left for him and even promised to read it. At the end of our conversation on the phone, I requested him to grant me the permission to save his number, which he graciously did.

During this same phone conversation, I asked him if it was possible for me to see him when next he’s in Abuja. “Of course,” he replied. While discussing the frequency of his meetings in Abuja and how I could meet him, Buhari told me he usually returned to Kaduna as late as 6pm after his meetings in Abuja.

When I politely asked why he was making late evening journeys. He said, “Dr Ndagi, I don’t have a house in Abuja and I don’t have the money to pay for the very expensive hotel accommodations in Abuja.”

Two things amazingly struck my mind from the above phone conversation: (i) a former military head of state directly calling me (ordinary university lecturer) to acknowledge receipt of the book I dropped for him, and (ii) that a public officer who once held the highest public office in the country (as head of state and commander-in-chief) had no house he could call his in Abuja. Meanwhile, even local government chairmen in the same country compete to own properties in the nation’s capital city.

My first direct contact with the late Nigeria’s 15th leader, Muhammadu Buhari, was during my second visit to his GRA residence in Kaduna in 2011. This was after the general elections in which he as a presidential candidate under the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP).

I was on a two-day academic assignment to Arewa House in Kaduna. As I prepared to leave Kaduna after my breakfast on the third day, my mind suggested to me that it was an opportunity for me to, once again, check on the man I previously attempted to see but had then travelled out of Kaduna.

In this my second visit to Buhari in 2011, which was in company of a close friend, Prof (then Dr) Ibrahim Abubakar Husam Imam of the Nigeria Defense Academy Kaduna, I was lucky the man I have longed to meet was in town and was at home.

We got to his residence at about 10.30am and asked the military personnel (some of them in mufty) at the gate that we were there to see General Buhari. They asked if I had a complimentary card and I gave them one, which was quickly taken inside. Soon, the officer returned and led my friend and I into the sitting room of General Buhari.

My friend and I sat on the rug, and within seconds, the light complexioned, tall, and diastema-teethed retired army General appeared before us. He queried us for sitting on the rug while cushion seats meant for sitting were available. We thought our sitting on the rug instead of the cushion seats (as every Nupe native would have naturally done anywhere), was out of the respect and awe in which we held General Buhari. Yet, our host insisted we sat on the cushion seats.

Our discussions, beginning from how I missed him in my first visit covered a range of areas including how he’s been a regular reader of my Daily Trust column, philosofaith. Appreciating how the Daily Trust newspaper had consistently reported news and covered political events in a fair-minded manner including the 2011 general elections, he said General Obasanjo, his political opponent, once told some people that Daily Trust was blatantly favouring him (Buhari) in its reportage because he (Buhari) owned the paper.

I said but how could Obasanjo say so when knew Malam Kabiru Yusuf very well? He said, but you can’t stop people from choosing to believe in that which is false even when such is obviously true. While talking about the 2011 general elections, he recalled how party executives of the ANPP and his supporters from Niger state paid him a solidarity visit after he lost in the presidential election.

For most part of our discussion that lasted at least an hour, Buhari was full of lamentations particularly about how education had continued to be on the decline. At the end of our discussion, he saw the two of us, his guests, to the gate of his residence.

Of course, Buhari was human, and therefore, not infallible. He was, however, an embodiment of the virtues and qualities that made him a true patriotic Nigerian. He would be missed by his constituency, the Nigerian masses. May Allah grant him eternal forgiveness and mercy, amin.