[b]“People, Politics and Power” [/b]is the appellation of the AIT’s television programme which gave General Yakubu Gowon the platform on Tuesday October 24, to give some primary insights on the conundrum that befell Nigeria from 1967-1970 under his watch. Rather than utilize the opportunity to heal wounds as an elder statesman and the architect of the R3 (reconciliation, reconstruction and rehabilitation) façade, he left millions of Nigerians aghast by ‘lying’ against the person of the Late Gen. Ojukwu.

To an avalanche of average Nigerians, the Civil War which brought the Nigerian polity into cataclysm between 1967 and 1970 remains a truculence with a myriad of tales, myths, legends and even parodies. In fact, the civil war remains one of the historical themes that are shredded in secrecy, leaving room for assumptions, counter-assumptions and ‘official sophistries’. Forty-seven [47] years after, minute or no document is yet to be declassified for even the ‘most irrelevant’ would be a Pandora’s box.

It could be recalled that the violent reactions to the “Unification Decree” [Decree No. 34] of May, 1966 and the aftermath of the July 29, 1966 ‘counter attack’ had exclusively tackled the Easterners with casualty rate running in over 30,000 (Forsyth, 1977) by the eve of the 1967 escalations. This had forced the Eastern Governor Lt. Col. Ojukwu to, in equanimity, take some radical decisions which pitched him at loggerhead with the Gowon-led Federal Military Government. Nigeria had become so hostile for the Igbo that any meeting in Nigeria outside of the geographical delineation of Eastern Nigeria was perceived as a decoy for further slaughtering of the Easters. Lt. General Ankrah provided the needed good office which culminated in the Aburi meeting of January 4/5, 1967.

[center]“The whole world is looking up to you as military men and if there is any failure to reunify or even bring perfect understanding to Nigeria as a whole, you will find that the blame will rest with us through the centuries”[/center]

– that was the opening speech made by Lt. Gen. Joseph Ankrah, the then Ghanaian Head of State, at the Aburi convention called by the former to address the gridlock between Lt. Col. Gowon and Lt. Col. Ojukwu, in January 4, 1967. Also present in the meeting were Comm. J. E. A. Wey, Col. R. A. Adebayo, Lt. Col. H. U. Katsina, Lt. Col. D. A. Ejoor, Maj. M. Johnson, Alhaji K. Salem and Timothy Omo-Bare and five civilians from the Federal and Eastern divides.

In the Tuesday AIT programme, General Gowon gave Ojuwku a warlord figure that was bent on seceding.

“We went there [Aburi] to restore the trust of our country. If we were working together, anyone with conscience will assuage the feelings. But Ojukwu thought otherwise. He had in mind all along, based on what happened to his people in the North, that secession was the only way out”

, Gowon claimed!
The above vituperation by General Gowon is highly tendentious of his outcome of the Aburi meeting which must not be swept under the rug for posterity concerns. It should be noted to all and sundry that the proceeding of the Aburi meetings, to avoid misrepresentation such as this, was on a complete stenographic record and a tape recording.

In the recordings, Ojukwu had stated his position utilizing a metaphor thus,

“it is better that we move slightly apart and survive, it is much worse that we move closer and perish in the collision”

. That clearly was a call for a confederation not secession. Both Katsina, Gowon, and Adebayo accepted the proposed regional autonomy. In enthusiasm, Col. Adebayo vented for the

“repealing of those Decrees that were passed after 15th January, but I think we should revert to what the country was as at 14th January, 1966, that is regional autonomy”

.

After painstakingly studying the recordings of the Aburi Meeting, Max Siollun in his book “Oil, Politics and Violence: Nigeria’s Military Coup Culture” submitted that

“the fulcrum of the agreement of Aburi was that each region would be responsible for its own affairs, and that the FMG would be responsible for matters that affected the entire country”

(pg.158). Ojukwu did not go back and tell lies. He played the recordings of the Aburi proceedings which crystallized situations the way they were. If the recording was a lie, Gowon should have disclosed the truth; a feat he could not achieve, not then, not during the quagmire, not even now. Also, Lt. Gen. Ankrah, who was neutral, would not have wondered why Gowon rescinded on the Aburi agreement for both parties had rejoiced and toasted champagne in celebration of the understanding. Could it mean that Gowon did not realize how much he has given out? Would the “inscrutability” of the concept of regional autonomy to Gowon make the agreement a lie? Why would Gowon delay announcing the outcome of the meeting if not for the rebuke and ‘superior’ argument he was confronted with by various detractors? If truly he had fever as he claimed, why didn’t his aids or the other members of FMG assist in publishing the agreements since tension was already exacerbating?

Why then would Gowon lie against the dead, even before a plethora of evidences against such brazen lie?

Little wonder that aside the dubious “Nigeria 1966” there is yet to be an official document disclosing what happened, how it happened, why it happened and when it happened? The hypocrisy embedded in the Gowon’s ‘no victor no vanquished’ apothegm is highly disgusting to ardent of Nigerian political history. Rather than being a pledge for reconciliation, events and comments such as this, that have transpired overtime have proven that such an epigram was a caricature for while the federalist pursued a ‘just cause’ the antagonists, as it appears, were mere ‘rebels’ and ‘criminals’; it never mattered the grievances, secession was a criminal act and the Easterners deserved the atrocities unleashed them before the war, during the war and even after the war for “Ojukwu’s lies caused the war”.

Who would have thought that a ‘custodian of the civil war tradition’ like General Gowon would mount the airway and cast blames and aspersions 47 years after his acclaimed ‘reconciliation’ and amnesty? Gowon’s vituperation reveals the true nature and position of the cosmetic amnesty he offered the Biafrans and explains why even until now, the mistakes and constitutional challenges that instigated the inferno then is still perpetuated today.

If history must be revisited, it must be relevant to the present. Obviously, distorting the past and lying against the dead is not in any way honourable nor relevant to the present. What is the lesson in Gowon’s statement other than the fact that Nigerian elites are not yet at peace with the East over the ‘3-year gyrations’ of the late 1960s?

When next Gowon appears on the airway, he should narrate what led to war and how he tackled the contradictions during his 5 year reign after the war. He should also address the spill-over effects of the war and the best model and pathway Nigeria can chart now based on the mistakes made in the past. This is the best thing an elder statesman like him could do having been a part and parcel of the mistake that defines today’s complexities that characterize the Nigerian polity.


Charles E. Ekpo is the
Founder and National Coordinator of the History 4 Nation-Building Initiative
The Initiative can be reached at history4nationbuilding@gmail.com

https://web.facebook.com/History4NationBuilding/posts/1991068034506091

Image Credit: http://dailypost.ng/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/ojuku-gowon.jpg

The idiot should keep on lying.... Fulani's will soon send him to his grave

BUHARIjubrin:
The idiot should keep on lying.... Fulani's will soon send him to his grave

He's an elder statesman and should represent and defend his Reconciliation and Amnesty stands by his statements. It's very ignoble to lie against a dead friend

After the civil war,the Fulanis shared the oil wells without even seceding any to him.He was just used and dumped,instead of apologizing he is busy distorting facts

There's no need to drag d mata too far, Gowon himself said "We went to the meeting I'll prepared". So y blame your ill preparations on Ojukwu by saying he lied about the Aburi agreement, when in reality Gowon n his team of advisers that didn't deem it fit to take there expertise to Aburi were d ones dat dragged Nigeria into a Civil war that will hunt dem till death.