1983 - Nigerian President Shehu Shagari won re-election for a second, four-year term as chief executive of the world’s fourth largest democracy. Shagari, a former school teacher and a poet, polled slightly more than 12 million votes, 47 per cent of the total of the six-candidate race, according to complete returns released, more than four days after the balloting. His closest rival, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, 74, was a distant second with 7.83 million votes, or 30.8 per cent. Awolowo, who won little support outside his stronghold in the Yoruba West, also was runner-up to Shagari in elections in 1979. Nigeria is the world’s largest democracy after India, the United States and Japan.
Other important events
1711 - The first edition of the Royal Ascot horse race meeting is held in England.
1772 - The Papandayan volcano erupts in Java, Indonesia, killing 3,000 people.
1906 - Eugene Augustin Lauste patents the first talking motion picture.
1948 - Summer Olympic Games open in London.
1955 - Burhanuddin Harahap becomes Prime Minister of Indonesia.
1980 - Iran’s parliament approves Mohammad Ali Rajai as prime minister.
1998 - American adventurer Steve Fossett becomes the first person to cross the South Atlantic in a balloon.
2002 - E-gate service is launched at Dubai International Airport.
2004 - At least five people are killed and 55 injured when two trains collide near the Turkish city of Istanbul.
2010 - The world’s largest clock becomes operational at Makkah, Saudi Arabia.
2017 - Kuwaiti comedy actor Abdul Hussain Abdul Redha dies in a London hospital at 78.
