Ex-presidential candidate, Bashir Tofa dies

Kogiflame
The former Presidential candidate of the defunct National Republican Convention, NRC in the June 12, 1993 elections, Bashir Othman Tofa, died on Monday.
Tofa according to reports he died after suffering from a protracted illness.
His popularity came when he contested against the Social Democratic Party, SDP Presidential candidate, late Chief Mashood Abiola. The election was however annulled by the former Nigeria Military head of state, Ibrahim Babangida.
Bellow are eleven things to know about Tofa
1. In 1993, he was the presidential candidate of National Republican Convention, NRC, one of the two parties created by Ibrahim Babaginda administration.
2. His running mate in the election , which was held on June 12, 1993, was Sylvester Ugoh, who was the Central Bank Governor of Biafra in the defunct breakway Republic of Biafra.
3. Before his emergence as NRC candidate, he was a member of the Constituent Assembly, a councilor, and National Financial Secretary of defunct National Party of Nigeria.
4. In the June 12 election, the results announced by the Prof Humphrey Nwosu-led National Electoral Commission, NEC, before the process was stopped by the military, indicated that Tofa had received 2.3 million votes while Abiola got 4.3 million.
5. He won 11 states while Abiola won 19 states in the election.
6. Tofa was defeated in his home state , Kano, by Abiola in the election.
7. In his role as an elder statesman, he was known to have variously spoken against social ills in the society and maladministration.
8. Before June 12, he had a personal relationship with Abiola when the latter was Ogun State Chairman of NPN while he was the party’s National Financial Secretary in the Second Republic.
9. He had called for the reconsideration of the declaration of June 12 as democracy day, saying such an action shouldn’t be informed by “some political cold calculations.”
10. When President Muhammadu Buhari honored Abiola with Nigeria’s highest honour, GCFR, Tofa said he wouldn’t have accepted it if he was given the award.
11. He was born in Kano to a Kanuri family in 1947.