A Call for Presidential Library in Memoir of Alhaji Shehu Shagari -By Bilyamin Abdulmumin, Ph.D

Late last month, specifically on the 25th, the former president Mallam Alhaji Shehu Shagari posthumously clocked 100 years. To commemorate this milestone, one of his grandchildren, Bello Shagari decided to send him a letter in heaven where he is now residing inshallah.

In the letter, Shagari told his grandfather the whole story he missed seven years since he left. Perhaps starting with what would have concerned him the most: Muhammadu Buhari completed his eight-year tenure, yet never fulfilled the promise to immortalize him even though a similar gesture was extended to MKO Abiola for honoring June 12 and renaming Abuja stadium after him as well as completing a mausoleum for Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe.

The letter continued. Bola Ahmed Tinubu has become the Nigerian president, but surprisingly Nigerians are now more patient with the weight of reforms unlike before when they celebrated coups.

Another piece of information shared in the letter was about the launch of the IBB autobiography, the book trailed by controversies from all directions. But interestingly the book cleared Shagari of corruption.

The Presidential Library the Shagari family is considering as mentioned in the letter was the objective of this article. The family hopes to achieve that by converting his decaying house into a historical monument.

Just before that birthday, a fatherly figure sent me a viral video of an old house of Shehu Shagari left rotten. The video interestingly captioned a suggestion: converting the house to a presidential library. The viral video might have reached the Shagari family. They could have also mulled about it already.

I think that so far, the only official presidential library we have in Nigeria is the Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library (OOPL). The complex is said to be a mini village, including an open-air amphitheater, an auditorium, a hotel, an amusement park, a wildlife park, an observation point, restaurants and bars, a Jumu’at mosque, and of course a Church.

It came as a surprise to me to learn that OOPL contains a Jumu’at mosque. This indicates not only the size of the village called the library but also the diversity of users locally and internationally.

So after all, a promising archive of such magnitude: the preservation of documents of the president, a tourism attraction, and an academic center, is a proud monument not only for a particular state or region but for Nigeria.

As the only democratically elected president of Nigeria’s Second Republic, a call to preserve his legacy for future generations can never be overemphasized. Dear Nigerians, in the memoir of Alhaji Shehu Shagari, let’s make this dream a reality.