Few of Nigeria’s former military leaders
(dead or alive) are spoken of with any great
affection. General Murtala Ramat
Mohammed is one notable exception. The
period his government lasted is recalled with
nostalgia by many Nigerians as a golden
era.
Murtala, the only Nigerian leader
affectionately called by his first name, gave
Nigeria a glimpse of the principled, focused
and dynamic leadership that its citizens
crave for.
For many Nigerians who are 40 years and
under, however, the only knowledge of
Murtala they have is all they see of him on
the crispy N20 note, which has his face
emblazoned on it, from history books or
stories passed down from others who claim
to have known him.
The Man Murtala
Born in Kano on November 8, 1938, Murtala
Rufai Mohammed later changed his name
from Rufai to Ramat when he became Head
of State.
Like many northern elites, he attended
Barewa College in Zaria. He began his
military training in 1959 and was
commissioned into the Nigerian army as a
second lieutenant in 1961. Like so many
Nigerian army officers of his generation, he
trained at the Royal Military Academy at
Sandhurst, England.
Early in his career, Murtala was taught
military tactics by an eloquent and intelligent
Oxford University- educated officer named
Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu. Little did
teacher and student realise that, one day,
they would end up as protagonists on
opposing sides of the battlefield.
In 1962, Murtala served as a member of the
Nigerian-led United Nations’ peace-keeping
force in the Congo. Murtala specialised in
the army’s signals corps and was stationed
in Lagos where his uncle, Inuwa Wada,
served as the Federal Government’s Defence
Minister.
He was very decisive with issues and this
made his country men and women to be
immensely happy with his administration,
believing that, at long last, the country had
got a strong, decisive and uncompromising
leader; the one with the discipline and
tenacity to take the nation to the Promised
Land.
These qualities, perhaps, were the defining
tendencies that influenced a young Colonel,
Muhammadu Buhari, who would also come
to the rescue of the nation at a critical time
in her history.
On July 30, 1975, Murtala, now a general,
came to power as head of state and,
immediately, set out policies and
programmes that defined his government.
One of such was making Africa the centre-
piece of his government’s foreign policy – a
policy which was to add more bite to the
struggle for independence, especially, in
Southern Africa.
Within a short time, Murtala’s policies won
him broad and popular support. His
decisiveness elevated him to the status of a
folk hero. Sadly, his tenure was short-lived.
The nation woke up on the morning of
Friday, February 13, 1976, to the news that
he had been killed in a coup d’état led by
Colonel Buka Suka Dimka on February 13,
1976.
Influence On Buhari
Murtala started grooming the young Colonel
Muhammadu Buhari for leadership when he
made him governor of the North-eastern
region, which is now broken into six states:
Adamawa, Bauchi, Borno, Gombe, Taraba
and Yobe.
Long before that, a story is told of how, after
the counter-coup of July 1967, Murtala, then
a major in the army, marched the young
Lieutenant Buhari to then Colonel Yakubu
Gowon, who had just been made Head of
State. After saluting him, Murtala introduced
Buhari thus: “Sir, here is your ADC; don’t
look further if you are looking for a
competent, honest, dedicated, diligent and
focused officer for that position.”
Gowon, known for his joviality and good
humour, looked up at the young officer, who
stood at about 6’4” and laughingly, with
eyes twinkling, said: “Ah, my brother,
Murtala, when people see me and this man
they wouldn’t know who the Head of State
is.”
Based on Murtala’s recommendation of him,
Gowon made him the Brigade Major of the
Third Infantry Brigade, Makurdi, where he
served between July 1967 and October 1968.
The Brigade had broken down in terms of
structure and organisation, due to the effect
of the Civil War and, though he was a juniorr
officer, Buhari was able to rebuild and
reorganise the Command, instil discipline
and boost the morale of the soldiers.
He was later elevated to Brigade Major/
Commandant, 31st Infantry Brigade, where
he served between 1970 and 1971.
As governor, Buhari was part of a regime
that took on the fight against corruption,
indiscipline and indolence head-on. His
regime fought to purge the public service
and hold government officials accountable
for their stewardship.
Murtala’s very thought-challenging quotes
and catch-phrases outlived him and, to this
day, some of these phrases, like: “Fellow
Nigerians” and “with immediate effect” are
now a part of the national lexicon.
“Africa has come of age…,” the crux of a
speech delivered by Murtala on the 11th of
January, 1976 at an extraordinary meeting of
the OAU became an anthem to leftist
activists and students in the late ‘70s and
‘80s in the heat of the struggle for
independence in Africa.
Repeating the mantra of military
governments, Murtala declared his
government a “corrective regime” that would
tackle the corruption that was increasingly
infecting government institutions.
Enter Buhari
When then Major General Muhammadu
Buhari became Head of State after the coup
of December 31, 1983, his deputy, late Major
General Tunde Idiagbon, in telling Nigerians
that their regime was an off-shoot of the
Murtala/Obasanjo regime, promised that
they would correct what they found wrong in
the country.
In Buhari’s first coming, as it is now, public
officers of previous regimes were made to
account for their past actions or inactions.
In 1984, Buhari, in whipping up the fervour
for patriotism in Nigerians, said: “Indeed, this
generation and future generations of
Nigerians have no other country to call their
own; we shall remain here and salvage it
together.”
The phrase which has taken everyone’s
fancy is one from his inaugural speech in
May, 2015: “I belong to everybody but I
belong to nobody.”



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