If anyone has known losses and sorrows in this world, the recently deceased Hajiya Dada Habi Yar’Adua would occupy a prominent mention.
Hajiya Dada passed on Monday, September 2, 2024 aged 102, according to some sources.
In a country like Nigeria where the average life expectancy for women was 52.68 years as of 2021, it is absolutely awe-inspiring that after being widowed and also suffering losses of two sons who occupied prominent positions in the Nigerian political space, and a daughter who died on her way to pilgrimage in Mecca, Dada still lived to full old age.
The late centenarian Dada lost her husband Musa Yar’Adua, a customary ruler and a Minister of Lagos Affairs from 1960-1966 during the regime of Sir Ahmadu Bello. According to his Wiki entry, Musa Yar’Adua died in 1993 at about 81 years of age.
Not long after, on December 8, 1997, she lost her oldest son Gen. Shehu Musa Yar’Adua, who was Chief of Staff, Supreme Headquarters under the Olusegun Obasanjo military regime from February 13, 1976 to September 30, 1979. Shehu was also the Transport Minister in General Murtala Muhammed’s regime from 1975 to February 1976 when Murtala died in the Lt. Col. Bukar Suwar Dimka’s February 13, 1976 military putsch. Late Gen. Shehu’s son and Hajiya Dada’s grandson, Murtala Yar’Adua, was a former deputy minister for defence.
Death had not finished dealing with the Yar’Adua family, as Hajiya Dada lost her oldest daughter, Hadiza Musa Yar’Adua, on March 24, 2009. Hadiza died in a private hospital in Cairo, Egypt, at the age of 65. What is worse, Hajiya Dada probably witnessed her eldest daughter’s demise because they were both on their way to Saudi Arabia for the lesser Hajj when the younger woman took ill and never recovered.
Another son of hers and the 13th president of Nigeria, Umaru Musa Yar’Adua, died on May 5, 2010 after a protracted battle with what was reported as chronic kidney disease. He was aged 58. Umaru was president from May 29, 2007 to May 5, 2010; having also served as two-term Governor of Katsina State from May 29, 1999 to May 29, 2007.
It wasn’t all doom and gloom for Hajiya Dada, though; as at least three of her granddaughters were first ladies of states at some point.
One of ex-President Umaru Yar’Adua’s daughters and Hajiya Dada’s granddaughter, Zainab, is married to Usman Saidu Nasamu Dakingari, a former governor of Kebbi State.
Another granddaughter, Nafisa, is married to Isa Yuguda, a former governor of Bauchi State; while another granddaughter, Maryam, also married Ibrahim Shema, Yar’Adua’s successor as Katsina State governor.
