Theatre of the Absurd (Part 3): A coup, a secession, a counter coup, another secession and a war

A coup and a secession: 

On February 23, 1966, barely a month after first coup d'etat in Nigeria which took place on the 29th of January 1966, an Army officer of Ijaw descent, who was born in Oloibiri in 1938 and was from Kaima in present day Bayelsa, named Isaac Jasper Adaka Boro, declared the Niger Delta Republic (NDR) as an independent nation. He was just 27 years old and was at that time a student at the University of Nigeria Nsukka. 

Adaka Boro was a radical through and through. He was a student union activist, who had once taken the Nigerian Government to court to challenge the 1963 Constitution. He trained a motley group of young men literarily behind his father’s compound and declared them as his army that would fight against the Nigerian forces and steer the NDR into independence from Nigeria. He called his ‘army’ the Niger Delta Volunteer Force (NDVF). As was to be expected, his secession was short-lived. It lasted a mere 12 days. 

Adaka Boro

It is instructive that the secession was crushed by the Nigerian forces led by none other than Odumegwu Ojukwu who at that time in 1966 was the Military Governor of the Eastern Region. Let us recall that at the time of the declaration of the NDR, General Aguiyi Ironsi was the Head of State and Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces and he had appointed military Governors for the regions with Ojukwu being the military Governor of the Eastern Region where most of the Niger Delta states (Rivers and Bayelsa) were placed. Present Delta State and Edo State were in the Mid-west Region at that time. 

Was Adaka Boro intent on the secession or was the declaration more of a cry for redress against perceived marginalisation and/or exploitation? 

Let us read Boro’s own words on the day he declared the secession: 

“Today is a great day, not only in your lives, but also in the history of the Niger Delta. Perhaps, it will be the greatest day for a very long time. This is not because we are going to bring the heavens down, but because we are going to demonstrate to the world what and how we feel about oppression…. Remember your 70 year old grandmother who still farms to eat, remember also your poverty stricken people and then, remember too, your petroleum which is being pumped out daily from your veins, and then fight for your freedom.”

The main reasons for the secession as given by Adaka Boro were the exploitation and marginalisation of the Niger Deltans (the ijaws specifically) by Nigerian Government in general and ironically, by the Igbos of the Eastern Region of Nigeria in particular. The allocation of oil resources which predominantly was being extracted from the Niger Delta region was not equitably being utilised according to the grievance laid out by Boro as will be seen below.

History records that oil was discovered at Oloibiri in 1956 after several years of exploration and that the first oil fields came on stream in 1958. Adaka’s grouse was that the region that owned the oil fields did not enjoy development but rather, many of the infrastructure that proceeded from the oil wealth were located elsewhere in the Eastern Nigeria. These are Boro’s words when he was giving an allocutus before Justice Phil Ebosie of the Port Harcourt Assizes that tried him and his fellow revolutionists on a 9-count charge of treason before he was sentenced to death:

“Economic development of the area is certainly the most appalling aspect. There is not even a single industry. The only fishery industry which ought to be situated in a properly riverine area is sited about 80 miles inland at Aba. The boat yard at Opobo had its headquarters at Enugu . … Personnel in these industries and also in the oil stations are predominantly non-Ijaw."

"Most of the youths were so frustrated with the general neglect that they were ready for any action led by an outstanding leader to gain liberty…. we were clenched in tyrannical chains and led through a dark alley of perpetual political and social deprivation. Strangers in our own country! Inevitably, therefore, the day would have to come for us to fight for our long-denied right to self-determination."

 

There are some factual insights that we must ponder on from the first coup and the first secession in Nigeria:

• The first coup occurred on the 15th of January, 1966.
• The coup perpetrators were all Igbos save one, Major Wale Ademoyega.
• The coup brought in an Igbo Head of State of Nigeria, Major General Aguiyi-Ironsi.
• “The Supreme Military Council headed by General Johnson Aguyi-Ironsi, a member of the predominantly Christian Igbo ethnic group, took control of the government and suspended the constitution on January 16, 1966.
• 22 individuals were killed during the military coup. Some 3,000 Nigerians fled as refugees to Dahomey (Benin).
• The government of Ghana provided diplomatic assistance (diplomatic recognition) to the military government on January 17, 1966.
• The Nigerian government of Ironsi abolished the 4 regional system on May 24, 1966.The Niger Delta Region was inhabited by Ijaws. They were and are not Igbos.
• Adaka Boro led the Ijaws to protest the oppression of Ijaws by the Igbo-dominant rule in the Eastern Region.
• The Eastern Region was multi-ethnic. The Igbos being the largest, the Ibibio and Efik who lived in the districts of Uyo, Opobo, Calabar, Enyong, Eket, Creek Town, Duke Town, Old Town and Ikot Ekpene, the Ijaw of Opobo, Bonny,Degema, Okrika, Buguma, Brass, Abonnema & the Annang of Ikot Ekpene, Yakurr, Bahumono, Oron, Ogoni and Ekoi. 
• The Ijaws were not only in the former Eastern Region, but were also in the former Mid-west region which comprised the Benin Province with Edo speaking people and the Delta province that had Ijaws, Isekiri, Urhobo, Isoko and Ukwuani speaking people excluding Ika and Aniocha. 
• The Ijaws also have representation in the Southwest in Ondo State along the riverine areas of Ese Odo LGA, where they are known as the Arogbo Izon clan. 
• History teaches that the origin of the Ijaws is in Bayelsa State from where they migrated along the paths of the rivers to other places that make up the Niger Delta. 
• Marginalisation was the theme of the first secession. Whether or not one agrees with Adaka Boro would depend on what side of the two tribes (Igbo and Ijaw/Nigeria) one chooses to be. 
• Adaka Boro’s secession was quashed by Nigeria through the actions of 2 Igbos; Ironsi and Ojukwu. 
• Adaka Boro was against the January1966 first military coup. He was a supporter of Sir Tafawa Balewa in whom he had faith that the plight of the Niger Delta would be addressed. 
• The Yorubas had no major part in the first coup and first secession as they were engrossed in their own war of self-annihilation or the implosion of the western Nigeria at that time.

With the 1966 first coup, Francis Adekunle Fajuyi became the first Military Governor of Western Region. He would later die at the hands of the second coup plotters in July of 1966 alongside General Aguiyi Ironsi who was his guest at the time of the fateful event.

Which of the marginalisation stories shall we believe? Ojukwu’s marginalisation theorem or Adaka Boro’s posit? I leave readers to judge based on facts as recorded in history. 

My agenda in this segment is to show that there was scarcely any homogeneity in the Eastern Nigeria and the same region did not comprise of a unitary ethnic group. What then is the concept of Biafra that the MASSOB and/or the proscribed IPOB and their 'supreme' leader Nnamdi Kanu are defining?  

The concept of Biafra seems to me to be the unification of the region around the same arbitrary mapping of Nigeria (as per "Nigeria is a mere geographic expression") by the colonial masters. A Biafra that includes all the other tribes of Ijaws, Ibibios, Efiks, Eket, Kalabari, Ogonis, Isoko, Urhobos etc, would not be Biafra but the former Eastern Region. If this posit is correct, then a war to achieve this would be utterly calamitous, in the same way that it was during the Biafran war when Ojukwu overran Benin for a few days en-route Ore in Ondo State and declared it the Republic of Benin before he was rooted out by the Nigerian troops. 

We must remember that most of the other ethnicities in the Eastern Region were sympathetic to the Nigerian side and not to Biafra. In fact, Adaka Boro and his NVDF fought on the Nigerian side after he was pardoned from the conviction for treason and released by Gowon. 

In conclusion of this first segment -the first coup and the first secession, we can say this: Secession was not tolerated by Ojukwu and Aguiyi Ironsi when it was attempted. Boro’s rebellion was crushed quickly, and the Nigerian state remained one indivisible entity. Why then did Ojukwu find secession palatable shortly thereafter? The readers can form their own opinion. In fact history also records that Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe was not a fan of secession at all.

A second coup and a second secession 

We discussed the inattention of General Aguiyi Ironsi to the need for justice after the first coup. Perhaps if he had court-martialled the coup plotters who had killed many northern leaders in the wake of the coup, the second coup would not have occurred. Sadly, this is a matter of conjecture. For whatever reason, his inattention became fodder for conspiracy theories that he did nothing to disprove. That he did not believe in Nigeria as one indivisible country is however not true, because the coup was quashed. Ojukwu also showed that he believed in Nigeria as an entity at that time because he was stationed in the north in January 1966 and helped to quash the coup in the north. Injustice un-redressed has a way of spiralling out of control and this has been the bane of Nigerian nationhood since 1966. Northern military officers staged a reprisal coup in July of same 1966 in which Aguiyi Ironsi was killed. But prior to the coup, ethnic violence was rife in the north against the Igbos. Nigerians must not heap the blame of the descent into war solely on the Igbos. It was the inattention of one man and not the inattention of an entire tribe. The following account of the descent into war was recorded in the university of Arkansas Political Science Department archives (https://uca.edu/politicalscience/dadm-project/sub-saharan-africa-region/nigeria-1960-present/) 

• “About 115 individuals, mostly ethnic Ibos, were killed in political violence on May 28-June 2, 1966.
• Major General Aguyi-Ironsi was deposed and killed in a military coup led by Lt. Colonel Murtala Muhammed on July 29, 1966.
• Some 30 individuals were killed in political violence in Lagos on July 29-August 1, 1966, and some 250,000 ethnic Igbos fled from the Northern Region to the Eastern Region following the military coup.
• Lt. Colonel Yakuba Gowon was sworn in as the head of the federal military government following the military coup, and he restored the four federal regions on August 31, 1966.
• Some 2,000 ethnic Ibos were killed in political violence in the Northern Region from September 29 to October 4, 1966.
• Lt. Colonel Odumegwu Ojukwu, military governor of the Eastern Region of Nigeria, declared that the region would no longer recognize Lt. Colonel Yakubu Gowon as head of the federal military government on March 2, 1967.
• Lt. Colonel Gowon assumed full powers as commander-in-chief of the armed forces and head of the military government on May 27, 1967.
• Lt. Colonel Gowon proclaimed a state-of-emergency on May 28, 1967.
• Lt. Colonel Odumegwu Ojukwu, military governor of the Eastern Region, declared the independence of the Republic of Biafra in southern Nigeria on May 30, 1967.”

Why did Nigeria go to war? What part did pride or arrogance play between the evenly ranked Gowon and Ojukwu? Could war have been averted if the two had been able to master their individual selves? 

The 4 regions were reinstated by Gowon, but Nigeria now had a unitary system that Ironsi had installed. It is noteworthy that the July coup failed in the Eastern Region where Ojukwu was Governor. Curiously, Ojukwu was not removed by Gowon as the Governor of the Eastern Region. Was that because of naivety, caution, or poor strategy or deference to the equality of rank? Why was Ojukwu okay with the unitary system that Ironsi installed but found the system unpalatable under Gowon. There is the recorded account that Ojukwu was opposed to Gowon because he was not the most senior military officer at the time of the second coup which was successful, and he had wanted Brigadier Babafemi Ogundipe as the most senior military officer to become head of state. This would suggest that Ojukwu perhaps wanted equity, or he did not want power in the hands of the northern officers who had shown a decided plan to conduct reprisals against the Igbos. Both conjectures are plausible but sadly no one could stem the tide of war. 

It is my belief that the failure by Ironsi to address the first injustice led to the second coup, and that the failure by Gowon to also nip in the bud the ethnic killings of the Igbos in the north and redress same led to a position where Ojukwu felt he had no choice but to declare secession. As an amateur psychologist, I believe that the duo of Ojukwu and Gowon were buoyed up with a failure to curb their pride and/or arrogance. Ojukwu was not able to submit to someone of equal rank and the latter did not have enough tenacity of purpose to enforce his position as the Head of State. Ojukwu was an Igbo who had worked closely with Aguiyi Ironsi and surely, he would not have been happy at the death of his Commander in Chief who was of the same ethnic tribe as his, the same way that Murtala Muhammed, Danjuma and the other northern coup plotters must have felt at the killing of Tafawa Balewa and Ahmadu Bello. In any event, sleep had been murdered and Nigeria has not recovered since then. 

The Civil War July 6, 1967, to January 15, 1970 

Any chronology of the Civli/Biafran war by me will not be adjudged free of bias. As a Nigerian, my loyalties to Nigeria will likely slip into my recall of events especially as I was too young to truly experience the war while it was ongoing. I have decided therefore to refer readers to the account contained in the University of Arkansas Political Science Department earlier quoted

see: https://uca.edu/politicalscience/dadm-project/sub-saharan-africa-region/nigeria-1960-present/. 

I have taken the liberty to present excerpts in Boxes 1 and 2 following:

Which way Nigeria?

I am pan Nigeria and I love all the peoples God has blessed this nation with, BUT I am also open to other options that will release this beloved nation from the bondage of underdevelopment. The more we bicker on the past and things that divide us, the more undeveloped we shall remain. There can be no development where there are constant divisions. I am also sick and tired of fighting divisive propaganda. The Biafran war happened over 50 years ago. Ojukwu waged a war and lost. It was a war; it was not a game of chess. This war claimed the lives of Nigerians and Biafrans (at that time) on the war front almost in equal numbers, but the collateral loss of lives through starvation happened on the side of the Biafrans and the numbers of those dead by this means are huge indeed, so I can understand the pain of the Igbos. 

It is human for those who lost the war to be angry. No one likes losing. Politicians kill each other to retain power, acrimony is the norm except for those who have the generosity of spirit to put the nation above their pride or self-interests like GEJ. Has Nigeria done enough to understand the pain of the Igbos? Have the Igbos done a soul searching to understand the pain of Nigerian war veterans who also suffered trauma from the war? Have citizens on both sides reflected on each side's pain and points of views?

With the arrest of Nnamdi Kanu and his imminent trial for treason, will the Igbos rest the agitations for secession, or will there be a renewal of the 'struggle'. The future will tell, but what i know is this, Nigeria cannot continue in limbo and these distractions must be brought to an end and it is with sadness in my heart that I have come to this realisation that If the Igbos truly desire an independent nation, then the remaining federating states need to cooperate in talking about it and helping to actualise this rather than waging a war. 

Where there is a will, there is a way. The Igbos may be  landlocked, but surely it is not impossible to grant them a passage to the sea through two states in the South South if those states cooperate. If the Igbos genuinely want to leave this union, I will grant them that right to pursue secession. What I will not grant them however is a right to wage another unnecessary war. This nation needs a reprieve from distractions. There is a Constitutional way to demand secession and any ethnic group that is of the bent should take the legal route. We cannot abdicate the legal for the illegal. Nnamdi Kanu is not the elected representative of the people. He is a dissident. The representatives of the people in the SE should engage with their people and get a mandate to discuss secession through the inclusion of referendum in the Constitutional reforms that are ongoing. 

Many have said that a call for secession is mere bargaining strategy on the part of the Igbos. I would not presume this. The Igbos I know are smart enough to come to the negotiating table and argue their desire for an independent nation. Subterfuge should not be the way to go. Nigeria needs a reprieve from all these shenanigans.

I rest my case.