Obasanjo new Autobiography: My Watch

Obasanjo wrote an Autobiography titled: My Watch. 

The book was launched in lagos on Tuesday.

This book which is a three volumn memoir  is filled with criticism for Jonathan, even the response to the daughter's letter is in volumn 1 of the memoir.

Excerpts from the book. 

About President Jonathan: 

Jonathan is lacking in broad vision, knowledge, confidence, understanding, concentration, capacity, sense of security, courage, moral and ethical principles, character and passion to move the nation forward on a fast trajectory. Although he might wish to do well, he does not know how nor does he have the capacity to. To compound his problem he has not surrounded himself with aides sufficiently imbued with the qualities and abilities to help him out. Most of them are greedy hangers-on or hungry lacklustre characters interested only in their mouths and their pockets

President Jonathan can still make amends to save himself, many of his associates in government, his government, and the nation. If, in the end, he fails he will have no one but himself to blame. He has great opportunities, many of which only come once in a lifetime; and if he misses them it will only be due to his inadequacy, myopia, personal interest and self-aggrandisement, lack of sagacity, wisdom. I hope he can and will avoid having any cause for regret.

About his daughter, Iyabo.

“I got a warning that this administration was attempting to induce two of my daughters, including Iyabo, to do a dirty job. I warned them both against it, but because of her character, the influence of her mother and her attitude, Iyabo succumbed; the other daughter did not. “I was warned about a former minister of finance, who wrote the reply for Jonathan, and about the writer of the letter to which E. K. Clark appended his signature.

Iyabo’s letter and the response to it has been treated as a family issue, so that all the members of the family can be equipped with the other side of the story from me for posterity. “If Iyabo was childish and unwise enough to allow herself to be used, no other member of the family should allow himself or herself to be so used. Tolerance and acceptance of others must be practised in the face of any provocation, no matter how vile.” Obasanjo has previously been openly accused of incest and adultery by his son, Gbenga, who sought to divorce his wife alleging that his father was sleeping with her. The former president, meanwhile, said a “cabal” surrounding late President Umaru Musa Yar’Adau framed corruption charges against Iyabo when she was a senator in order to get back at him because of his personal views against them.

“My adversaries tried other means to get to me,” he stated. “If Obasanjo could not be cut down to size, they must have thought, what about those close to him, including his daughter? When Senator Iyabo, my daughter, was accused of corruption, I took my time to have a serious interview with her on what exactly had transpired. She briefed me in detail and I was satisfied. “But I did not stop there. I spoke with the Senate President, who also briefed me and assured me that Iyabo had not committed any offence as he had personally looked into the matter. I was again reassured but did not stop there. I talked to another senator, Mrs. Ekaette, who was a member of the health committee of which Iyabo was chairman.

Mrs. Ekaette again satisfied me with her explanation. I was advised to talk to President Yar’Adua but I refused to do this, especially as I was told he was expecting me to. Instead, I advised Iyabo to hand the matter over to Chief Afe Babalola, a lawyer and friend, to deal with it through the court process. She was discharged and acquitted by the court. “The fact that my ordeal, and that of my daughter, occurred under the administration of President Yar’Adua, who was brought into power by God through me, did not surprise me.

I have always held to a belief that any person who expects commendation, praise, eulogy, or credit from any human being might die a frustrated wretch.” He named some members of the “cabal” as Tanimu Yakubu Kurfi and Baba Kingibe “aided and supported by two governors – Bukola Saraki and James Ibori – for their own personal and selfish reasons”.