By Douglas Anele

Apparently, Ironsi’s explanation was ineffectual: either the emirs and key members of the northern ruling elite doubted his sincerity or the Hausa-Fulani animosity against Ndigbo living in the north had reached the omega point or point of no return.

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But the mayhem that ensued went far beyond what can be rationalised as justified reaction to the unification decree and tactless negative triumphalism by some Igbo in the north following the emergence of Ironsi as head of state. Five days after Ironsi announced the decree, riots broke out in many parts of northern Nigeria against easterners, especially the Igbo.

It has been estimated that over three thousand Ndigbo were killed, more than twice that number wounded while valuable property worth millions of pounds were destroyed. As usual, some elements in the north blamed Ironsi unfairly for unilaterally promulgating the unification decree, forgetting that it was the outcome of several meetings by the SMC comprising nine members among whom were Gowon and Katsina who, even if they had any reservation about the decree, did not express it during the meetings.

Chief G.C.M. Onyiuke, attorney-general of the federation at that time who was present when Ironsi, Gowon, and others brainstormed on the decree, testifies that it was the unanimous decision of the Supreme Military Council. In my opinion, the assertion that the decree triggered the riots is a red herring because the extent of the mayhem indicates that a lot of planning over several weeks or even months must have preceded its actual execution that began on May 29, 1966, less than a week after the decree was promulgated. Now, on closer inspection, the decree did not change the status quo substantially: it merely formalised the type of government that had existed since the army took over in January 1966 and ruled through the SMC based on the central command system common in military regimes globally.

To identify the real causes of the May riots, therefore, one needs to go deeper than the facile resort to Decree 34, which was not as stifling and unitarist as the ones promulgated by Gowon when he became head of state after the gruesome murder of his supreme commander, Major-General Aguiyi-Ironsi. To begin with, many northerners were convinced after several months of overt and covert brainwashing by some elite and elders in the north, such as Aminu Kano, Inua Wada, Adamu Ciroma, Suleiman Takuma and Umaru Dikko, that the uppity Igbo were really working to use their considerable educational advantage and dominance in the commercial sector to dominate the rest of Nigeria.

Thus, it was not surprising that some key members of the northern establishment, including those in the military, felt that something drastic must be done to nip the incipient Igbo ascendancy in the bud. James Barnard, the American Consul to Nigeria, captures the conflict of interests that has bedevilled Nigeria since independence thus: “in the race for the material benefits of life, starting from the same point and on the basis of equal opportunity, the easterners are going to win by a mile. This is intolerable to the north. The only way to prevent it from happening is to impose artificial shackles to progress in the east. This is intolerable to the easterners.”

Similarly, Patrick Wilmot, a radical political theorist, posits that the northern faction of the ruling class that has dominated the Nigerian political scene since independence lacked an established tradition for managing social change rationally. The only answer to dissent or rebellion is large-scale violence directed against non-indigenes.

Herbert Ekwe-Ekwe, in his illuminating work, The Biafra War: Nigeria and the Aftermath, refers to the leading role the Igbo played in the politics of Nigeria’s decolonisation from British rule and independence, which was largely opposed by the north, the more nationally-oriented political mindset of prominent Igbo politicians, and the unsurpassed achievements of Ndigbo in northern Nigeria as factors that propelled the riots of May 1966: they also constitute essential background for understanding the ferocity and complete irrationality of the revenge coup of July 29, 1966.

Concerning that very coup, there is no doubt that it was a premeditated attempt by military officers from the north to avenge what they mischievously misinterpreted as the Igbo coup six months earlier, led by Major Nzeogwu. Another reason was that the emergence of Ironsi as the first military head of state angered some prominent northerners, who felt that adding political leadership to the educational advantages and professional and commercial successes of Ndigbo would be a radioactive combination against northern interests.

Meanwhile, after the departure of British colonial administrators, Prime Minister Tafawa Balewa, working in concert with Alhaji Ahmadu Bello and defence ministers from the north, implemented a discriminatory recruitment programme in the military, which lowered the academic qualifications such that more northerners could be brought into the officer corps of the army, given the wide educational gap between northern and southern Nigeria in favour of the latter.

Still, Ironsi continued to follow Balewa’s footsteps in an effort to placate the north inspite of scepticism there concerning his overtures. But although before the revenge coup Igbo officers outnumbered their northern counterparts both in seniority and experience, with their overwhelming numerical presence in the infantry the foundation of eventual northern domination of the military were laid even before Ironsi took over power.

The revenge coup of July 1966 was led by Lt. Col. Murtala Mohammed, ably assisted by Majors Theophilus Danjuma and Martin Adamu, Joe Garba, Muhammadu Buhari, Paul Tarfa, William Walbe, John Longboem, Nuhu Nathan, Malami Nassarawa, Musa Usman and Shittu Alao, who were stationed in Lagos. Arrowhead of the coup in Enugu was Shehu Musa Yar’Adua, whereas Pam Mwadkon and I.S. Umar took charge in Abeokuta. Jeremiah Useni, Ibrahim Bako, Abdullahi Shelleng and Garba Dada were stationed at the troublesome 4th battalion in Ibadan.

According to Max Siollun, in his enthralling book, Oil, Politics and Violence: Nigeria’s Military Coup Vulture (1966-1976), personal connections between deposed northern politicians who held important official positions in the First Republic and northern military officers also encouraged the lust for revenge by Murtala Mohammed and his cohorts. It is instructive to note that Ironsi’s bodyguards were mostly northerners, a deliberate decision by him to practically demonstrate his firm belief in the idea of “One Nigeria” and remove the insinuation that he was surrounding himself with people from his ethnic group as part of a grand design for Igbo domination.

In his entourage to Ibadan, capital of defunct western region where he was murdered, were Major Danjuma and Lieutenant William Walbe, who betrayed their supreme commander. Siollun wryly remarks that “by surrounding himself with northern soldiers, Aguiyi-Ironsi sealed his own fate.”

Any normal human being who reads the chilling accounts of how Balewa and others were murdered by Nzeogwu and his trigger-happy conspirators would be saddened by the irrationality of it all. In the case of the lunatic killing of Ironsi and over two dozen Igbo military officers in the revenge coup, the feeling of utter disgust is worsened not only by the spread and cold-blooded nature of the murders but also by the genocidal character of the event.

When I perused different narratives of how Major-General J.T.U. Aguiyi-Ironsi and his host and governor of western region, Lieutenant-Colonel Adekunle Fajuyi, were tortured and murdered, tears dropped from my eyes and I wondered whether Nigeria was worth all that wickedness, whether the amalgamation of 1914 was not a huge historical mistake. I have made a compelling case that that the first military coup in January 15, 1966 was not an Igbo coup.

Yet, even if it was, does that justify the murderous ethnic cleansing of Igbo military officers by their northern counterparts in the revenge coup of July 29 of the same year? If not because of sheer wickedness and pure hatred of Ndigbo by some prominent northern politicians and soldiers, why would Murtala Mohammed, Paul Dickson, Martin Adamu, William Walbe and others  carry out mass slaughter of Igbo officers?

To be continued.