This piece is not written in anger, nor as a rebuttal to critics, defectors, or sudden converts to convenience. It is written because moments like this demand memory. They demand that a people pause, step back from the noise of the moment, and situate today’s events within the long, unforgiving sweep of history. When fear is loud and rumours are weaponised, perspective becomes a civic duty. This intervention is necessary not because some deserve answers, but because our people must be encouraged, informed, and strengthened.
What is experiencing today—legal travails, state pressure, media judgment, isolation, and the quiet withdrawal of those who once proclaimed eternal loyalty—is not an aberration in political history. It is a recurring pattern. Power, when unsettled, often tests men before it crowns them. And persecution, far from being the end of the road, has repeatedly been the narrow passage through which destiny walks.
History urges restraint when institutions close in and when former allies suddenly find their voices—or their exits. It reminds us that many of those later celebrated as nation-builders were once branded criminals, prisoners, or pariahs. The record is long, global, and unambiguous.
Below are well-documented examples of leaders who endured persecution, imprisonment, or systematic state hostility before rising to national leadership:
- — Imprisoned for 27 years by the apartheid regime, vilified and isolated, before emerging to lead South Africa as president and global symbol of reconciliation.
- — Arrested and jailed repeatedly by British colonial authorities, spending over nine years in prison before becoming India’s first prime minister.
- — Jailed multiple times as a dissident under communist rule, later rising to the presidency during the Velvet Revolution.
- — Removed from office and imprisoned on charges widely viewed as politically motivated, before eventually becoming Malaysia’s prime minister.
- — Arrested, exiled, and once sentenced to death before being elected president of South Korea.
- — Detained and suppressed after the Solidarity movement was outlawed, later becoming president of Poland.
- — Confined under house arrest for years by a military junta before emerging as Myanmar’s civilian leader.
- — Arrested and tortured after Chile’s military coup, later rising to become president and an international human-rights voice.
- — Imprisoned while organising resistance against colonial domination, later leading Vietnam’s independence.
- — Jailed by colonial authorities for nationalist agitation before becoming Ghana’s founding leader.
- — Imprisoned for years over anti-colonial rebellion charges before becoming Kenya’s first president.
- — Incarcerated by a military regime on trumped-up charges before being elected president at a defining moment in Nigeria’s history.
These examples are not offered as prophecy, nor as claims of identical circumstances. They establish a single, uncomfortable truth: persecution is not proof of insignificance. More often, it is evidence that a system feels threatened by what a person represents—or may yet become.
Against this backdrop, the present season confronting Abubakar Malami should be read with sobriety, not hysteria. He is not the first to be betrayed by those he helped, supported, and mentored. He is not the first to watch silence replace loyalty when pressure arrives. He is not the first to face trial by institution and by media at the same time. And history suggests he will not be the first whose name outlives the accusations of the moment.
To friends, family, and all who love him: have faith. Be strong. Be courageous. Trials refine; they do not define. This moment is not a verdict—it is a process.
To political associates and supporters: do not give up. Do not allow intimidation, threats, or sudden defections to extinguish resolve. Movements are sustained not by convenience but by conviction. History has never rewarded panic; it honours perseverance.
As for those who found new comfort when the winds shifted, their choices are already noted. Betrayal is always loud in the present—and always small in history.
Malami’s story is still unfolding. And if the long road of history teaches anything, it is this: greatness often waits at the altar of practice, patience, and prayer.
“We might be burnt to the ground, but beneath the ashes we shall rise to the pinnacle.”
— Mohammed Bello Doka, Special Assistant on Media to Abubakar Malami, SAN