- Our man should have been more forthcoming on the question of why the seniority regime was not adopted, in determining the successor to General Ironsi – after his death
The Nigerian Civil War, that 30-month-long fratricidal battle that shook Nigeria’s foundation, not only threatened the shaky independence and fragile sovereignty of the new country, but it also redefined and reshaped its socio-cultural and political landscape. But 55 years after the war, during which many of the leading actors who had front row seat in that morbid gallery where the darkest episode of our nation was painted sordidly on the canvas of death, destruction, and agony, have long died, the true accounts of what led to the war and what transpired during the war are still steeped in revisionism and subjectivity.
The man at the centre of it all, General Yakubu Gowon, was Nigeria’s head of state between 1966 and 1975. He led Nigeria during the civil war and had the singular providence of having his surname paraphrased to mean “go on with one Nigeria”. Not often do you see or hear him speak publicly about his time as the leader of the country, especially his role in the civil war that engulfed the country during his time as the head of state, but whenever he does, you’re certain to see some ruffling of feathers, hairsplitting and debates among members of the public.
Gowon, during a recent interview on Arise TV, said that a key reason for the collapse of the Aburi Accord, the last major attempt to prevent Nigeria’s civil war, was a fundamental disagreement with Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu over who should control military forces in the country’s regions.
Gowon disclosed that although both parties engaged in a frank and candid dialogue during the January 1967 summit in Aburi, Ghana, the eastern region leader, Ojukwu, later pushed for regional autonomy that the federal side could not accept.
Gowon said, “Although we said that the military would be zoned, you know, but the control… he wanted, you know, those zones to be commanded by the governor. Say you have a military zone in the north, it would be commanded by the military governor in the east, it would be commanded by, you know, by him. And, of course, we did not agree with that one”, Gowon said.
Gowon’s explanation for reneging on the Aburi Accord may sound plausible and reasonable to those without any knowledge of what actually transpired in the build-up to the civil war. Those who were alive during the war and those who have read through different accounts of the war from people who lived through that period may have a problem, a big one for that matter, with either Gowon’s sense of history, or his appreciation of it. A cynic once quipped that history is always written by the winners. I strongly believe that our general needs an urgent purgation of his emotions. After all, as archbishop Desmond Tutu stressed, “If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse, you say you are neutral, the mouse would not appreciate your neutrality.”
Gowon is trying to make Ojukwu the villain now as the latter is no longer around to confirm or deny his (Gowon) claim of his outlandish and inappropriate demands. Gowon pretends not to remember that between July 29 and August 1st 1966, the country was without a leader. History records that that year, the flag of the northern separatist group flew, at full staff or mast, at the 9th mechanised brigade headquarters, that is, Ikeja cantonment. This is after no less than 260 officers of eastern Nigeria origin, chiefly Igbos, were killed, with two of them reportedly buried alive.
In the days leading to the July coup of 1966 and its aftermath, hundreds of thousands of Nigerians of Igbo extraction were brutally murdered in a coordinated carnage across the country, especially in the northern region of yore. When he seized power after skilfully bypassing the military seniority ranking, he did nothing to arrest and prosecute those who were involved in the ogre of violence against the Igbo. If anything, he shielded them from any form of punishment for their heinous crimes.
Our man should have been more forthcoming on the question of why the seniority regime was not adopted, in determining the successor to General Ironsi – after his death. Our dear Gowon, now in his twilight days, is a bible-clutching, peace-preaching, prayer-mongering, god-fearing, good-old-man, who has decided to close the stable door after the horse had bolted.
I wonder if the general could ever come to terms with the opportunity of a lifetime which he fluffed when, for nine gruelling years, he took the country on a pot-hole ride, just to maintain the status quo. Twice, he postponed his handover, something which keeps haunting the country.
If Gowon, now in his 90s, is sincere about going on with one Nigeria, 220 million or so Nigerians should be spared the sour grapes.