Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, has described the allegations by former President Olusegun Obasanjo of a plot to frame and incarcerate him indefinitely as frivolous and cleverly choreographed to diminish the recent presidential proclamations, a reference to the con ferment of a post-humous award to late Chief M K O Abiola as well as making June 12 the new Democracy Day.
Lai, in a statement on Friday evening, said the President Muhammadu Buhari administration had a lot on its table to be concerned with seeking to frame Obasanjo.
He added: “Those who have skeletons in their wardrobes should be afraid, even of their own shadows, innocent persons need not worry about any investigation, whether real or imagined.
”This administration will never engage in a frame-up of innocent citizens. That is neither in the character of President Muhammadu Buhari nor in that of his administration. Only the guilty should be worried. To paraphrase an African proverb, a man who has no wife cannot lose an inlaw to the cold hands of death.
”The administration is also strongly committed to the tenets of democracy, including freedom of speech and the right to dissent. But we understand that those who, in their time, were untethered to those principles would find it hard to believe.
“We are curious that the frame-up and witch-hunt allegations came a day after a major presidential proclamation reversing some past acts of injustice was made, to the relief and acclamation of a long-expectant nation.
”Apparently, the impact of this proclamation was too much to bear by those who, through acts of omission or commission, helped to deepen the wounds inflicted by the blow of injustice that followed an election that was widely acclaimed to be free, fair and credible, hence they felt the need for a red herring that will distract the nation.
”Added to that is the frustration brought about by the fact that the contraption they have so much hyped as a freeway to power has failed to gain traction. Faced with this double tragedy, even the strongest of men may begin to succumb to a figment of their imagination. They may start crying wolf where there is none.”