Babangida plans to win the National lottery jackpot in 2007

Barely a week after a man serving a life sentence for attempted rape won £7m on the British National lottery, former military dictator Babangida yesterday announced his intention to revive his 2007 presidential ambition.

The British lottery winner, Hoare, 52, was on temporary release from jail in Gloucestershire when he bought his winning ticket for Saturday's Lotto Extra draw.

Drawing inspiration from the lottery win, Babangida felt confident that his chances of returning to Aso Rock without doing penance for his misdeeds while in office and for annulling the June 12 elections are quite high.

He bared his mind to reporters in Funtown, Katsino State yesterday when he paid a courtesy call on the newly appointed Chairman of the Nigerian PDP Lottery commission, Pastor Tom Bola. He said he wasn't quite sure before, whether with his kind of credentials, God would look favourably towards his contesting 2007 presidential elections. But the news of a convicted felon netting the jackpot and a burn-again Pastor at the helm of the lottery commission placed a different perspective on his outlook of his chances.

"That lottery winner is an example of what God can do", Babangida said. "It proves that God can grant your wishes irrespective of how many women you have raped or how much money you have stolen from the national treasury or how many elections you have annulled."

On being reminded that another man of God, the primate of Methodist Church in Nigeria , Dr. Sunday Mbang has threatened to lead a crusade to foil his presidential ambition, Babangida said: "Mbang may decide to play God but no matter how hard he tries, he remains human and as such cannot fully understand how God works. And Pastor Tom Bola is on our side."

According to him, only God can stop him from winning the Nigerian lottery which will reward him with the Presidential villa, Aso Rock.

In the meantime, Babangida's associates and hangers-on are celebrating the good news; while his more sober political agents are busy planning strategies to ensure that the 2007 winning lottery ticket will be zoned to Babangida's constituency - his home address in Minna, to be precise.