Former Nigerian President Chief Olusegun Obasanjo has disclosed how he turned down an offer of political asylum from the United States government shortly before his arrest and imprisonment under the regime of late military ruler Gen. Sani Abacha.
​Speaking in an exclusive interview published by BBC News Pidgin on Tuesday, November 10, 2026, the 89-year-old elder statesman recounted the events surrounding his 1995 detention, detailing how he chose to face arrest in Nigeria rather than seek refuge abroad.
​According to Obasanjo, the offer came during an international trip while tension was mounting between his political movement and the Abacha junta.
​”Abacha had decided that I must be liquidated; otherwise, he would not be able to have his way,” Obasanjo revealed. “I was travelling and coming back, and the American ambassador in Nigeria called me and said his country had offered me political asylum because they knew that I would be arrested if I returned home.”
​Despite the diplomatic warning, Obasanjo rejected the sanctuary offer, citing his innocence. “This was difficult for me. I haven’t done anything. What do they want to arrest me for? I don’t want political asylum,” he maintained.
​Upon landing in Nigeria, state security authorities immediately impounded Obasanjo’s international passport. Unperturbed, the former head of state headed to his commercial farm establishment.
​Upon arrival at the farm gate, his private security details flagged his vehicle, warning that plainclothes security operatives had already surrounded the premises.
​Within 15 minutes of his arrival, an undercover police officer approached him, stating that an Assistant Inspector-General of Police (AIG) required his presence.
​Obasanjo recounted his direct exchange with the officer: “I said, ‘You are a fool. If the AIG wants me to help him, he will not be inviting me. He will come here.’ So it was my own car that I used to take myself to the police station. We saw the AIG, and the AIG said, ‘I have been instructed to arrest you’.”
​Following his initial arrest, Obasanjo was held in secret custody at an undisclosed facility. His detention triggered high-level international intervention, most notably from former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, who personally appealed to Gen. Abacha.
​Following Carter’s intervention, the regime commuted Obasanjo’s secret detention to house arrest. However, the reprieve proved short-lived.
​Recounting the moment he was moved to maximum-security prison, Obasanjo stated: “Then President Jimmy Carter came. He pleaded, and then they put me under house arrest. Then they came one day; I was playing squash at about 1:00 AM. They came and said they were taking me away. And they took me away, and from there, I went to prison.”
​Obasanjo had previously served as Nigeria’s military head of state from 1976 until October 1979, when he voluntarily handed over power to democratically elected President Shehu Shagari. Retiring from the military at age 42 as a four-star general, he transitioned into commercial farming.
​He remained in prison until Gen. Sani Abacha’s sudden death in June 1998. Released shortly after by Gen. Abdulsalami Abubakar’s transitional administration, Obasanjo went on to win the 1999 presidential election, serving two full terms as president until May 2007.
