PhysicsQED: @ Katsumoto

It's true that Ademoyega and Ifeajuna fought, but could you provide a source (from Ademoyega's book or any interviews) where he suggests that the reason they fought is because he thought he "was sold a dummy" or "conned"?

I ask, because Ademoyega mentions that they became friends again later (after the fight). It seems more likely that they were blaming each other after the failed coup and the fight might have had something to with what was perceived as Ifeajuna's incompetence in carrying out their part (Ifeajuna's and Ademoyega's part) of the coup.

'Sold a dummy' and conned are my expressions, not Adegboyega. Adegboyega wrote "The next most important cause of our failure was the behaviour of Ifeajuna himself. Having seen that Ironsi had got loose and was already raising troops against us, Ifeajuna took Okafor with him and both of them suddenly disappeared from our midst. This raises the serious question of whether or not there was a common collusion between the two of them, and whether Okafor's failure to arrest the GOC was not a case of deliberate or willful omission." This is what Adegboyega believed and the reason why he fought Ifeajuna. It matters not that Mbanugo helped to settle their differences. They were in prison and had little choice.

Ifeajuna was not incompetent when he killed Maimalari, Balewa, and Largema. He suddenly became incompetent in killing Ironsi, Mbadiwe, Mbu, Orizu. You may buy that BS but I won't. Ifeajuna ignored Ironsi and chose to go and murder Largema, who was sleeping in a hotel in Ikoyi and several miles away from his troops in Ibadan. Before Maimalari and other officers were killed, Ironsi as GOC should have been first. That was not incompetence; that was Zik/Ifeajuna's backup plan.

Katsumoto, you've put together another well thought-out and impeccably-sourced argument.

TerraCotta: Katsumoto, you've put together another well thought-out and impeccably-sourced argument.

Thanks

I dey laugh o.

I couldn't resist posting this quote by katsumoto, who finds a way to truth when he is not otherwise defending Awo's misdeeds.

Katsumoto few years ago:




I am not here to win any awards. I will only tell it like I see it. I have argued, based on the literature that I have read over the years, that there were two factions in that Jan coup. Nzeogwu and Ademoyega provided the noble 'we are going to get rid of the rot in Nigeria' end while Ifeajuna and others were on an ethnic mission. I give my reasons
1. Nzeogwu was recruited by Anuforo and Nzeogwu recruited Ademoyega. Ademoyega was the last to be recruited while Nzeogwu was the second to last. It is conceivable that Nzeogwu and Ademoyega were not privy to earlier agreements and plans
2. Nzeogwu's socialist views were well known before the coup. He had gotten into trouble with senior officers who were concerned about his very vociferous views.
3. The selective manner of carrying out the assasinations. No one has ever said that Okotie-Eboh, Akintola, Bello, Balewa, etc were saints but in the first four years of the government, there were Northern and Eastern members in the coalition. The position that there were no corrupt Igbo pliticians is laughable.
4. The constitutional crisis of January 65 which resulted in Zik being told the limit of his powers after he tried to use the military to dissolve the government.
5. Zik's disappearance from Nigeria while his cousin Ifeajuna carried out an ethnic cleansing. Zik's disappearance all the more curious considering that Nigeria was hosting its first Commonwealth PM's conference and Zik was Head of State. Also, Zik's personal physician leaving Zik in the caribbean after running out of patience with a healthy patient who refused to return home.
6. The killing of non-Igbo officers while Igbo officers (except for Unegbe) were spared.
7. After killing Balewa, Ifeajuna traveled to Enugu to see Michael Okpara (Eastern Region Premier) in the early hours of the 14th before escaping to Ghana.

I have provided evidence to support this before, if you want to see it again, I can oblige you.

Katsumoto:

Thanks

. I meant to respond to the other thread on Awolowo in detail at some point this weekend. One short question for you (and anyone else interested in the subject)--I am interested if you know of any substantiated reference to the idea that Ojukwu had proposed military coups at least twice before secession in 1967 (once during the 1964 crisis, directly to Azikiwe and once in January 1965 to Gowon). There are vague references to this by Odia Ofeimun in his essays last year on Chinua Achebe's book and the forgotten documents on the war, as well as in a speech Gowon gave to the OAU towards the end of the war. The latter could very easily be an example of wartime propaganda, and the former seems to lack any corroboration as well. Do you know anything about this?

Prof Corruption:
Who was that person?

Emmanuel Ifeajuna. The one in Kaduna , Nzeogwu. I think you know that one. Ifeajuna was holding a very big post in the Brigade then. He was a Chief of Staff to Maimalari. He sent a message that we had this meeting which would last a week; that I should come to Lagos . He was the one who booked me into Ikoyi Hotel in Room 17 and my number in the army was 17.. It was a lucky number for me. I got to Lagos for the meeting and then the meeting started on Monday. Then on Thursday, I can’t recall what happened in my hotel room. I just complained that I didn’t like the room. They couldn´t change it on Thursday. It was on Friday, the last day of the meeting that I came back to the hotel by 4.30 pm. When I got to the hotel, they had changed my room because they knew that the following day, I would leave. I said all right. Because of the cocktail party which Maimalari organised for us, we could not come back on time. I left the cocktail party at about 11 p.m when we should have left at 8.00 pm.There was no need for us to come on time. Although he called it a cocktail party, it was like a buffet dinner. So, I ate to my satisfaction and when I got to the hotel, I didn´t go to the dining room to eat again; I just went straight to my bed and slept off. It was at three o’clock that night that the coup plotters came. They killed my colleague, the one commanding the Western Region, and after putting his body in the booth of the car, they rushed to my room, to Room 17, to kill me thinking that I was there. According to their story, they didn´t want me to see them. So, when they kicked the door open, they just sprayed the bed with bullets and then round before they switched on the light. When they switched on the light, nobody was there and they started saying to themselves, “he is gone, he is gone” and I was snoring downstairs. That was how, at least, I can tell that God saved me from the coup. Now, for Gowon.


http://maxsiollun./2009/04/17/igbo-soldiers-plotted-coup-from-independence-day-ejoor/

Why would anybody want to kill David Ejoor, the dirty ar.se Urhobo, who had no command of anything and never sought himself out before he died a miserable death? David Ejoor once said “we should allow northerners to assume political power in Nigeria and at the same assume economic power. I laughed the dude to a bloody jackass and wondered who goon was thinking when sheepishly handed the northerners the keys to his barn. I also asked the dumbass fool who are “we” in his goofy statement.

I will not even touch the nonsensical crap such as “The senior person to me in Nigeria was Bassey, the second was Aguiyi Irons” voiced by the useless fellow. I guess he was also senor to Ademulegun, Ogundipe, Adabayor, Kur Mohammed, Maimalari, Nwawo, Shodeinde, Njoku, Effiong, etc. .

jp philips:

you missed the part where he referred to the 1961 date as a "movement", that parlance suggest an inevitable plan however, the machinery need to be set up first before the Agenda, The agenda was set to hatch when its evident they have a cause and someone whose ideology fits the profile. that was where Awolowo came in.

I dont agree with Gbulie's assessment of Achuzie.

Biafran col, Achuzie also known in the war front as the "Hannibal" recorded a lot of victories for the biafran side.

I know most people in Achuzie's command one on one, some of them are family friends, while some i have blood ties with,his reputation precedes him, Achuzie till date is referred to as Biafra's most gifted commander.

He was the one ojukwu tasked to prevent murtala mohammed's second division invasion into onitsha

ojukwu replaced two french mercenaries with Achuzie in the battle of Oji that speaks volume of his command abilities.from january to march 1968, his pocket troops held the Nigerian second division at Dunukofia stopping the Onitsha invasion on its tracks.

now remember that Murtala at the time was a col, and a civilian held him to ransome for 10 months, also note that murtala's second division was highly fortified with tanks and everything you can think of.
It was achuzie who came up with the strategy "theft in the night", where the Nigerian troops will be sleeping and biafra will send in thieves to steal all their food and arms which will be used to counter attack them in the morning.

Achuzie defeated leutenant inyang bassey's troop under murtalla's command in the battle of the Niger (an attempt to take over onitsha through Asaba), On murtalla's orders, again, Achuzie defeated col. Akini ladi in the battle of Onitsha bridge head, after these series of loses, murtalla mohammed was forced to retreat and went to bida to rendezvous with col. yaradua's troop at Nsukka and continued down to onitsha through ogidi then Nkpor

Also note that Onitsha fell in October 1968, while murtalla's first offensive on Onitsha was in January 1968. ten months, it took three cols to defeat a civilian Achuzie to take over onitsha with all the sophistication and fire power of the Nigerian side.
also note that by the time yaradua and murtalla started attacking from Nsukka, TY danjuma has already captured Enugu so it actually took three Nigerian cols commanding three divisions and all their gracious apparatchik, to defeat a civilian Achuzie to take over onitsha.

Unfortunately even in Wikipedia, people like Gbulie gave all the glory to Rolf steiner the mercenary who couldn't hold the Onitsha front in January when murtala's troops succeeded in taking over the onitsha main market.
that change in command saw a counter offensive by Achuzie who pursued the second Div Nigerian side beyond the Niger, a front that never fell till October 1968.
having encountered a strong resistance, col. murtalla Mohammed headed north to Bida.

The likes of Madiebo and gbulie envy his successes because he was not a soldier like them at the time, he was just a brilliant engineer who turned engineering science to war solutions.

Even after Onitsha fell, Achuzie was still not satisfied, he took a pocket of soldiers to Abagana where he laid an Ambush on an escorted 120 Nigerian lorry convoy carrying supplies, Achuzie's men one of them another brilliant Biafran Engr who developed the bucket bomb nicknamed "OGBUNIGWE". major Uchendu, Achuzie once again roasted this Nigerian troops alive, this attack, gave birth to the famous, "Abagana massacre" in the Nigerian Biafran war history.

Gbulie is too jealous to admit that a civillian could accomplish more than the so called soldiers. Another Gbulie's friend Alexander Madiebo, who served with him in the NA then the Biafran army was in command at Awka when his home town Awka was run over with the least resistance.

gbulie should tell us what he achieved in the biafran army with his "stanford' education, imagine saying, Danjuma wasn't brilliant because he didn't attend stanford what Nonsense.
I wont read any book written by this Gbulie of a person.

Bros please relax. Achuzie was never a soldier before the war. As Ben correctly stated, Achuzie can not be in every battle front at the same time. It gives reason to ask want unit of Biafran army did Achuzie commanded.

Katsumoto: Including Kpera amongst coup plotters is of the most idiotic reasoning. Nzeogwu told his boys they were on a training exercise. The exercise suddenly turns into a coup dead in the middle of the night. What were the boys supposed to do? See excerpt from Special Branch report about what Nzeogwu did to one who wasn't willing to participate.

147. Immediately inside the compound, Major Nzeogwu stationed the Carl Gustavs some 10 yards apart facing the lodge. The gunners were Sgts. Oyegeke and Manga, whilst Sgt. Adebiyi acted as ammunition number. As soon as both guns had been loaded, Major Nzeogwu ordered the NCOs to open fire at the Lodge. Both fired their projectiles bursting inside the ground floor rooms of the building. Sgt. Adebiyi stated that he then
ran towards Sgt. Manga to help this NCO reload. Whilst he was with Manga he heard Major Nzeogwu shouting repeatedly "Fire you bastard, fire". Immediately after this both Manga and Adebiyi heard a burst of SMG fire. They turned round and observed Sgt. Oyegoke slumped on the ground bleeding from multiple wounds. It was clear to both that their colleague had been killed by Major Nzeogwu either for refusing to obey or because he attempted to run away.



And here is Kpera's version (Kpera and many other soldiers were never tried for their participation in this coup. Kpera would rise to become a Governor and Brigadier)

Interviewer - Did you play any role in the first military coup in Nigeria which took place in 1966?
Kpera - Again I would like to refer you to my biography which is nearing completion. I was involved in that operation of January 14-15 1966 code named ‘operation Damisa’ which subsequently culminated into the coup. I did participate in it with my troops as a commander; I was a second lieutenant then. I didn’t plan the coup but I participated in the exercise ‘operation Damisa’ because there was no question of choosing not to participate in an exercise that your unit was involved in.

You seem to bounce off the wall with this silly “copy and paste” attitude. Were all the Igbo Second Lieutenants who participated in the “operation Damisa” also planned the coup or even get the whiff of the coup before January 15, 1966? Did their similar position as that of John Atom Kpera stop bigots such as you from branding them as coup plotters and Igbo for that matter?

DerideGull:

Bros please relax. Achuzie was never a soldier before the war. As Ben correctly stated, Achuzie can not be in every battle front at the same time. It gives reason to ask want unit of Biafran army did Achuzie commanded.

isn't it glaring that you didn't understand the post you quoted.
there were other commanders no doubt, Achuzie was just outstanding.

DerideGull:

Bros please relax. Achuzie was never a soldier before the war. As Ben correctly stated, Achuzie can not be in every battle front at the same time. It gives reason to ask want unit of Biafran army did Achuzie commanded.

isn't it glaring that you didn't understand the post you quoted.
there were other commanders no doubt, Achuzie was just outstanding.

Katsumoto:

'Sold a dummy' and conned are my expressions, not Adegboyega. Adegboyega wrote "The next most important cause of our failure was the behaviour of Ifeajuna himself. Having seen that Ironsi had got loose and was already raising troops against us, Ifeajuna took Okafor with him and both of them suddenly disappeared from our midst. This raises the serious question of whether or not there was a common collusion between the two of them, and whether Okafor's failure to arrest the GOC was not a case of deliberate or willful omission." This is what Adegboyega believed and the reason why he fought Ifeajuna. It matters not that Mbanugo helped to settle their differences. They were in prison and had little choice.

Ifeajuna was not incompetent when he killed Maimalari, Balewa, and Largema. He suddenly became incompetent in killing Ironsi, Mbadiwe, Mbu, Orizu. You may buy that BS but I won't. Ifeajuna ignored Ironsi and chose to go and murder Largema, who was sleeping in a hotel in Ikoyi and several miles away from his troops in Ibadan. Before Maimalari and other officers were killed, Ironsi as GOC should have been first. That was not incompetence; that was Zik/Ifeajuna's backup plan.

I guess I don't really see any evidence that he stated that the cause of the fight was because he "realized he'd been conned." Of course that quote you posted does suggest that he later wondered in his book if Ifeajuna and Okafor had some sort of secret plan that caused them to act as they did, but that's not really the same thing. I was only curious because I don't see how/why you think Ademoyega could have ever believed that the Jan. 1966 coup was an ethnic coup meant to be masked as a non-ethnic/nationalistic coup, when he wrote an entire book defending and attempting to justify the coup later on. If "realizing he'd been conned" was the great realization that made him fight Ifeajuna in that prison, I don't see why he would later write an entire book as if he had had no such "realization".

This is unrelated, but I see that you mentioned Mbu's name. Why do you think they would have targeted him anyway? Was he perceived as especially corrupt or something?

Katsumoto: From the Special Branch Report

27. Major Ifeajuna addressed the meeting on the subject of the deteriorating situation in Western Nigeria to which, he contended, the politicians had failed to find a solution. He added that as a result the entire country was heading toward chaos and disaster. He next acquainted the junior officers with the inner circle's plans and asked them if they were prepared to assist to put an end to this state of affairs. Major Ifeajuna claims that all present pledged their support for his plans with the exception of Captain Adeleke who was, however, later persuaded to join. It was made clear to these junior officers that those who were not with the conspirators would be regarded as being opposed to them and might suffer death as a consequence.

I truly dislike the acts of copying and pasting craps from Nowa Omoigui and advancing them as gospels. I guess goofy Omoigui and you can not feel good without peddling rumors. It appears you want to argue with a man who was involved in the coup as a soldier and believe the nonsensical craps written by a person who was not even in Nigeria when the coup went down.

jp philips:

isn't it glaring that you didn't understand the post you quoted.
there were other commanders no doubt, Achuzie was just outstanding.

Which unit of Biafran army did Achuzie command that spurred you to say Achuzie was outstanding?

PhysicsQED:
I guess I don't really see any evidence that he stated that the cause of the fight was because he "realized he'd been conned." Of course that quote you posted does suggest that he later wondered in his book if Ifeajuna and Okafor had some sort of secret plan that caused them to act as they did, but that's not really the same thing. I was only curious because I don't see how/why you think Ademoyega could have ever believed that the Jan. 1966 coup was an ethnic coup meant to be masked as a non-ethnic/nationalistic coup, when he wrote an entire book defending and attempting to justify the coup later on. If "realizing he'd been conned" was the great realization that made him fight Ifeajuna in that prison, I don't see why he would later write an entire book as if he had had no such "realization".

This is unrelated, but I see that you mentioned Mbu's name. Why do you think they would have targeted him anyway? Was he perceived as especially corrupt or something?

Why can't you just shut up, observe and let them slug it out? I don't see any Edo reference on the thread since you've got a little code embedded in the nl software that alerts you every time Edo is mentioned by Yoruba posters. Papabrowne, ola_edo and other Igbo posters have been running around claiming to be edo for eons and you're yet to call them out. But if it had been a Yoruba poster, your alert tone would have summoned you to the thread.

Just shut it and let them slug it out before exposing your bias.

DerideGull:

I truly dislike the acts of copying craps from Nowa Omoigui and advancing them as gospel. I truly dislike the acts of copying and pasting craps from Nowa Omoigui and advancing them as gospels. I guess goofy Omoigui and you can not feel good without peddling rumors. It appears you want to argue with a man who was involved in the coup as a soldier and believe the nonsensical craps written by a person who was not even in Nigeria when the coup went down.

I don't care for your opinion. Give me something that disproves my position. I don't care if you went to school with moses and were present at the presentation of the 10 ten commandments.

DerideGull:

I truly dislike the acts of copying craps from Nowa Omoigui and advancing them as gospel. I truly dislike the acts of copying and pasting craps from Nowa Omoigui and advancing them as gospels. I guess goofy Omoigui and you can not feel good without peddling rumors. It appears you want to argue with a man who was involved in the coup as a soldier and believe the nonsensical craps written by a person who was not even in Nigeria when the coup went down.

you can't beat Katsumoto on peddling falsehood from Ade, didn't you notice how he smartly ignored regional govs verdict on Ademoyega, this was people who tried and jailed him with over whelming evidence, yet katsumoto believes Ademoyega was conned in his complicity.
Katsumoto has argued this crap with dede few years ago here on nairaland, even when dede told him he was there life, dede said his older brother was killed in his presence during the war.
if such a man could not convince Katsumoto, do you think you stand a chance?

he just wants the whole world to believe that the only westerner involved was conned.

I ignored him because I am convinced he is better off in his ignorance, I advise you do the same.

ndu_chucks: I couldn't resist posting this quote by katsumoto, who finds a way to truth when he is not otherwise defending Awo's misdeeds.

I am not here to win any awards. I will only tell it like I see it. I have argued, based on the literature that I have read over the years, that there were two factions in that Jan coup. Nzeogwu and Ademoyega provided the noble 'we are going to get rid of the rot in Nigeria' end while Ifeajuna and others were on an ethnic mission. I give my reasons
1. Nzeogwu was recruited by Anuforo and Nzeogwu recruited Ademoyega. Ademoyega was the last to be recruited while Nzeogwu was the second to last. It is conceivable that Nzeogwu and Ademoyega were not privy to earlier agreements and plans
2. Nzeogwu's socialist views were well known before the coup. He had gotten into trouble with senior officers who were concerned about his very vociferous views.
3. The selective manner of carrying out the assasinations. No one has ever said that Okotie-Eboh, Akintola, Bello, Balewa, etc were saints but in the first four years of the government, there were Northern and Eastern members in the coalition. The position that there were no corrupt Igbo pliticians is laughable.
4. The constitutional crisis of January 65 which resulted in Zik being told the limit of his powers after he tried to use the military to dissolve the government.
5. Zik's disappearance from Nigeria while his cousin Ifeajuna carried out an ethnic cleansing. Zik's disappearance all the more curious considering that Nigeria was hosting its first Commonwealth PM's conference and Zik was Head of State. Also, Zik's personal physician leaving Zik in the caribbean after running out of patience with a healthy patient who refused to return home.
6. The killing of non-Igbo officers while Igbo officers (except for Unegbe) were spared.
7. After killing Balewa, Ifeajuna traveled to Enugu to see Michael Okpara (Eastern Region Premier) in the early hours of the 14th before escaping to Ghana.

I have provided evidence to support this before, if you want to see it again, I can oblige you.

Regarding #5, I think that I mentioned this a long time ago on a thread where me and Katsumoto discussed this coup, but it's already known that multiple members of the federal and regional governments were aware of an imminent coup - that Zik chose to stay away when given the opportunity might mean that he knew that his position as president made it especially unlikely that he would survive such a coup (had it been carried out successfully), but it doesn't mean that he stayed away because he had in-depth, secret knowledge of the particulars of the coup beforehand, or that he had private discussions with the coup plotters beforehand. That would just be guessing/insinuation.

There are other publications that make the same observation (about government officials being warned about an impending coup), but this one (Max Siollun's book) actually has the relevant material easily available online to preview: http://books.google.com/books?id=t5Q78sVbLakC&pg=PA39 Scroll down to the section labeled "Unheeded Warnings" and read on from there.

And of course, there is still the possibility that Zik stayed away merely because he wanted an excuse for an extended vacation (although I think this is the least likely possibility). But in any case, there's no real reason to just assume that Zik's absence is evidence of his involvement in any sort of plot.

tomakint:
It seems you are a slave to the "books" you read! Sorry, you are too rigid attimes, I only asked an innocent question...was kpera the only one who was unaware of the said 'Operation Damisa'? You so much believe in your 'many literatures on Nigerian politics'

What is he supposed to believe if not the books? Hearsay?

Katsumoto:

1. They could all see through Ojukwu's attempt at making the coup one Nigeria. They weren't at Aburi to decide the guilt of Kpera or anyone else. It was Ojukwu who was worried by a guilty conscience. As far as the Northerners were concerned, they had corrected a wrong, from their perspective, and didn't need to correct Ojukwu's tomfoolery. When real men are dicussing, they don't focus on irrelevant things.

2. Ademoyega was involved in the coup. A Brazilian playing for the Spanish national team doesn't make the Spanish team a Brazil-Spain team. Ademoyega was sold a dummy and that was why Ademoyega and Ifeajuna fought physically when they saw each other in prison after the coup failed. Ifeajuna had a list of those who were to be killed. This list included Mbadiwe, Wachuku, Okpara, Osadebey, Mbu. But lo and behold, Ademoyega realized that he was conned as none of those people was arrested let alone killed. The plotters were overwhelmingly Igbo and the victims were almost exclusively non-Igbo. They would have been forgiven for being almost exclusively Igbo if the victims included prominent Igbos as well. And then after the coup was over, Orizu refused to swear in the NPC candidate to replace Balewa saying he needed to consult with Zik first. After the consultation, he handed over to Ironsi, who was also Igbo.

3. Comparing Walbe and Kpera is really daft. Walbe was a part of a coup plot that succeeded. Not one of those who took part in the July coup was tried. Why would Walbe be singled out? Arresting Walbe would mean arresting everyone else - Mohammed, Adamu, Danjuma, etc. Who would arrest them? Kpera on the other hand followed instructions of his senior officer. The coup failed and his senior officer was arrested. Kpera wasn't the only one freed in any case.

The above analogies are akin to Nigerians. I did not know Igbo had army or armed forces. If I may follow this crap, “Ademoyega was involved in the coup. A Brazilian playing for the Spanish national team doesn't make the Spanish team a Brazil-Spain team”, it is likely the Spanish national team in reference is Nigerian army not Igbo army. A person with average intellect could easily discern that Spanish national team is Nigerian army and Ademoyega, Ifeajuna and Nzeogwu were national team players. .

DerideGull:

Which unit of Biafran army did Achuzie command that spurred you to say Achuzie was outstanding?

I can't recall but one biafran veteran said it's the Biafran special forces, but another mentioned what his unit was called, I will tell you once I get the info.

jp philips:

you can't beat Katsumoto on peddling falsehood from Ade, didn't you notice how he smartly ignored regional govs verdict on Ademoyega, this was people who tried and jailed him with over whelming evidence, yet katsumoto believes Ademoyega was conned in his complicity.
Katsumoto has argued this crap with dede few years ago here on nairaland, even when dede told him he was there life, dede said his older brother was killed in his presence during the war.
if such a man could not convince Katsumoto, do you think you stand a chance?

he just wants the whole world to believe that the only westerner involved was conned.

I ignored him because I am convinced he is better off in his ignorance, I advise you do the same.

Bros it is unbelievable and I guess it is inherent. I read a crap posted on a previous thread by Katz stating that Ironsi’s advisers were limited to Igbo people such as Dr. Pius Okigbo, Chief Francis Nwokedi and Lt Col Patrick Anwunnah. I also have the link of the Nowa Omoigui’s crap where Katz lifted such fabricated nonsense. It is even funny that Lt Col Patrick Anwunah was not even among the team of Ironsi’s advisers. It is unfortunate most lazy goons feel extremely happy with such fabricated craps.

Katsumoto:

I don't care for your opinion. Give me something that disproves my position. I don't care if you went to school with moses and were present at the presentation of the 10 ten commandments.

Of course, why would you care when you have goons as ordinance clapping and enjoying the concocted craps from you.

PhysicsQED:

Regarding #5, I think that I mentioned this a long time ago on a thread where me and Katsumoto discussed this coup, but it's already known that multiple members of the federal and regional governments were aware of an imminent coup - that Zik chose to stay away when given the opportunity might mean that he knew that his position as president made it especially unlikely that he would survive such a coup (had it been carried out successfully), but it doesn't mean that he stayed away because he had in-depth, secret knowledge of the particulars of the coup beforehand, or that he had private discussions with the coup plotters beforehand. That would just be guessing/insinuation, but

There are other publications that make the same observation (about government officials being warned about an impending coup), but this one (Max Siollun's book) actually has the relevant material easily available online to be preview: http://books.google.com/books?id=t5Q78sVbLakC&pg=PA39 Scroll down to the section labeled "Unheeded Warnings" and read on from there.

And of course, there is still the possibility that Zik merely stayed away because he wanted an excuse for an extended vacation (although I think this is the least likely possibility). But in any case, there's no real reason to just assume that Zik's absence is evidence of his involvement in any sort of plot.

Physics--Did you see my question about the idea that there was an earlier plot in 1964/1965 that Azikiwe rejected? Odia Ofeimun, who Max Siollun cites as one source for the idea that the coup's goal was to install Awolowo, wrote that some people claimed Ojukwu approached Azikiwe about mounting a coup after the 1964 political crisis, well in advance of the Nzeogwu group's move in 1966. Azikiwe is said to have turned him down. Gowon also claimed that Ojukwu approached him about mounting a coup and that he rejected the idea as well. Finally, David Ejoor claims that there had been a grand conspiracy for a military coup since Independence (a claim I find hard to believe, but I add here in order to have a full catalogue). Do you know if anyone's ever substantiated these rumours or were they just wartime propaganda?

jp philips:
you can't beat Katsumoto on peddling falsehood from Ade, didn't you notice how he smartly ignored regional govs verdict on Ademoyega, this was people who tried and jailed him with over whelming evidence, yet katsumoto believes Ademoyega was conned in his complicity.
Katsumoto has argued this crap with dede few years ago here on nairaland, even when dede told him he was there life, dede said his older brother was killed in his presence during the war.
if such a man could not convince Katsumoto, do you think you stand a chance?

he just wants the whole world to believe that the only westerner involved was conned.

I ignored him because I am convinced he is better off in his ignorance, I advise you do the same.

Dude, if in your almighty 'intelligence' you can't figure out that Dede and Deridegull are the same people. Why should anyone believe what you have to say? Or is it the cataracts in your eyes induced by old age?

Well, old people's home beckons.

Sheeple:

Why can't you just shut up, observe and let them slug it out? I don't see any Edo reference on the thread since you've got a little code embedded in the nl software that alerts you every time Edo is mentioned by Yoruba posters. Papabrowne, ola_edo and other Igbo posters have been running around claiming to be edo for eons and you're yet to call them out. But if it had been a Yoruba poster, your alert tone would have summoned you to the thread.

Just shut it and let them slug it out before exposing your bias.

I'm not exactly sure what alternate handle this is, but I think I have a very good idea, judging by the writing style and the misguided grievances against me in the post. I won't name who I think it is only because I don't want this to descend into an ugly back and forth argument.

So just to clarify a few things:

1. I've intermittently (every once in a while, that is) participated in threads discussing or related to the 1966 coups on here (NL) before, from years ago to now. I think only a newer poster wouldn't know that I've discussed such issues multiple times in the past and would think for some bizarre reason that I don't discuss that era of Nigeria's history (the 1960s) and only discuss what the Edo were doing in the 1600s or some stuff like that.

2. I don't actually participate in most of these threads that involve Yoruba and Igbo posters arguing over historical interpretations of events in Nigeria's past, actually. I do almost always just observe, in those instances where I don't just ignore such topics entirely without even reading them. However, if there is a particular interpretation or an issue that I want enlightenment/edification on, I will ask for clarification/explanation, whether it's Katsumoto, Dede1, etc. or anyone else. If I disagree with an interpretation of something, shouldn't I just ask the person directly if they could give a better explanation and possibly enlighten me about why my view is wrong?

3. When Katsumoto made that joke about me having "little code embedded in the nl software that alerts me every time Edo is mentioned by other posters" he didn't suggest that it was only when those posters were Yoruba, but for some reason you are. Maybe it's because he's actually seen me conversing at length on NL with non-Yoruba posters over issues involving the Edo before, whereas you haven't? Or are you just deliberately ignoring the times that I got into discussions (sometimes heated arguments/debates) with non-Yoruba posters on issues involving the Edo before, in a weak attempt to portray me as having some particular bias against Yorubas?

4. I have no clue what Papabrowne's ethnicity is, only that I'm not sure that he's specifically Bini, based on some comments of his I've read, though he might be from an "Edoid" group. He might be from somewhere else in Edo state and genuinely hold the views/perspectives that he holds, simply because he gets along well with Igbos and agrees with the perspectives of a lot of Igbos. There can be people like that after all. Tam David-West has made statements praising Igbos before. Does that mean he's suddenly not Ijaw? Sam Loco Efe (a Bini man) had a great rapport with Igbos throughout his career/life and apparently fought on the Biafran side during the civil war. Does that suddenly mean he's not Edo? I can't be sure in Papabrowne's case, because it's simply not as obvious that he's faking anything as you would like to think it is. There's another poster on here who lives in Lagos, named Edogirl, that some people might think is Yoruba poster pretending to be Edo, but there's really nothing to suggest that she might not just be an Edo poster that gets along well with Yorubas and agrees with Yorubas about a lot of things (and her Lagos background makes that even more likely). Just as with Papabrowne, there's no "smoking gun" to really prove that that poster isn't Edo either, and a few seemingly "pro-Yoruba" or Yoruba centered posts from her aren't proof that she's actually Yoruba. Aren't there even Yoruba posters, like Jarus, whose posts sometimes come across as supporting another ethnicity or region other than their own? (I'm referring to Jarus sometimes being accused of loving northerners to the detriment of his supposedly mandatory "ethnic allegiance" to Yorubas)

I don't see why I would need to "call out" Ola Edo for "pretending to be Edo" when I haven't seen any evidence that he's pretending to be Edo. Ola Edo is Chyz (that's his old moniker from a year or two ago), and that's not exactly some sort of great secret, nor has he really denied that he is Chyz. Chyz's ethnicity is already known and he hasn't claimed to be anything other than Igbo (Ukwuani, specifically). You realize "Edo" is a word in some other Nigerian languages, right? I don't think his username is supposed to refer to my ethnic group or even the state in Nigeria. At most it might be a reference to the kingdom, since his people (the Ukwuani) had a connection to it in the past. But I haven't seen him trying to convince anyone that he's ethnically Edo.

By the way, I have made posts in the past where I argued with (and exposed) both Igbo and Yoruba posters pretending to be Edo ( they were doing so presumably to appear more "neutral" in ethnic-centered arguments), but the two cases you directed me to here are bad ones. In any case, it's not my duty to go after every single poster that is pretending to be Edo. I just sometimes expose the ones that I happen to come across.

5. You shouldn't have polluted the thread with an irrelevant personal attack. It was dumb. To the other posters in the thread, I apologize for the length of this response of mine to "Sheeple" on a thread that is about something else entirely.

^Why do you always write epistles? You bore me to sleep most times with that bs. If you want to write a Ph.D thesis, save that for your tutors, not me. I have noticed your bias and it's better to expose you for who you're.

Sheeple:

Dude, if in your almighty 'intelligence' you can't figure out that Dede and Deridegull are the same people. Why should anyone believe what you have to say? Or is it the cataracts in your eyes induced by old age?

Well, old people's home beckons.

what is this one saying? when did you join nairaland?

Didn't intend to derail the thread. But people should be called out whenever there's an expose on them. I will leave the contributors to continue their mudslinging.

jp philips:

what is this one saying? when did you join nairaland?

Have you got cataracts in your eyes, old man? Dede1 is Deridegull.

Sheeple: ^Why do you always write epistles? You bore me to sleep most times with that bs. If you want to write a Ph.D thesis, save that for your tutors, not me. I have noticed your bias and it's better to expose you for who you're.

Okay, it's becoming very clear who this poster is now. A question for you, now. Why do you repeatedly make alternate monikers and hide behind fake identities on the internet on an anonymous forum? Isn't that kind of weird/crazy? It also seems kind of dumb and cowardly at the same time. Please do explain why you behave that way.

PhysicsQED:

I guess I don't really see any evidence that he stated that the cause of the fight was because he "realized he'd been conned." Of course that quote you posted does suggest that he later wondered in his book if Ifeajuna and Okafor had some sort of secret plan that caused them to act as they did, but that's not really the same thing. I was only curious because I don't see how/why you think Ademoyega could have ever believed that the Jan. 1966 coup was an ethnic coup meant to be masked as a non-ethnic/nationalistic coup, when he wrote an entire book defending and attempting to justify the coup later on. If "realizing he'd been conned" was the great realization that made him fight Ifeajuna in that prison, I don't see why he would later write an entire book as if he had had no such "realization".

This is unrelated, but I see that you mentioned Mbu's name. Why do you think they would have targeted him anyway? Was he perceived as especially corrupt or something?

I base my position on the fact that Ademoyega fought Ifeajuna. In my opinion, he wouldn't have resorted to fighting if he believed Ifeajuna was just incompetent. He believed and he stated as such in his book. That is enough for me.

Ademoyega would always defend the coup; he was a part of it. There is nothing strange in that. He has left clues to what his afterthoughts were in his book.

I mentioned Mbu by listing NCNC officers that could have been targeted but weren't. If innocent pregnant woman could be shot, one of them killed, why should they care about someone who was actually in government? After all, Ademulegun, Shodeinde, Maimalari, Kur, Pam were supposedly collateral damage.