₦airaland Forum

Salami


He was allegedly stabbed to death by a member of the Oodua People’s Congress, identified only as Kabiru.

Kabiru and three other suspects, who were at large, were said to have conspired and killed the victim with a dagger.

Who is this person called Kabiru? This is third or fourth time I have seen Kabiru in news and each case he is the violent party.

Kabiru, stand up and identify thine self.

Awon were, blaming their flaws on a faceless Kabiru. Shyyte!

Yanga dey smell!

Sealeddeal:
It seems you wish he had mentioned Yoruba militants as the ones carrying out the act. Is there any award for that?

Yorubas do not glorify and flaunt criminality. Tell me anytime you have ever read about a Yoruba militant rayping women, robbing people, keeping torture camp, and in particular, harrasing or rayping married women. Mention just ONE instance!

dopeboi142:
Have been a member of this forum now for quite a couple of years been watching from the side lines but the rubbish and degrading words i read about this issue is what prompted me to speak out and charge us to think wisely and do our research well before saying some of the things we say. Well thanks op for enlightening most of the nairaland folks who think it's some tale. It's true most of it if not all what the op has stated above.. I know cos I live there and I know the hardship we face everyday we can't even leave our houses while most peeps have left their homes cos of fear of being the next victim of stray bullet...I pray the millitary is deployed fast to this area cos the lawlessness is much I don't believe the police can curb such violence cos the ammunitions that they have are rumoured to be more powerful than that of the police.. thanks once again op for the enlightenment... I pray peace is restored soonest..I know some people will still call all this lies and propanganda but only a fool doubts without understanding the basis of the story. No one is trying to portray the ijaws as bad people but I can say that once you come to this areas and you ask even the kids the cause of this violence they can testify that it's them.. our differnces in culture is what affects us as Nigerians it's clouds our judgement of truth speaking instead we think they always want to say bad about our tribe or ethnic group .. thank you. Say no to # tribalism# I believe the sensible and free thinkers of nairaland will understand...

So let me ask you this, how is the Ijaw settlement in these places different from the pattern of living back at home in Rivers and Bayelsa?

Do Ijaws raype married women back in their homeland?

...is there a reason this black man is made to stand on top and and at the jaw of a killer croc?

Bloody racists!

Bekwarra:
3. Contrary to claims by some nairalanders that the militants are from the niger delta that have been displaced by the military onslaught there, that is a blatant lie. 85% of those militants are Ijaw boys from Ondo State. I know a few names which I won't mention here. Some were born there, some have stayed for many years. In fact in Elepete phase 2, there's a place they call Abule Ijaw. The number of the militants spread across the creeks from Ishawo, igbo olomu, Elepete down to Arepo are more than 5, 000(five thousand not five hundred). There are many of them. Lots of teenagers among them in fact. Well armed. I've seen it in movies or on news before when people carry bullets abi magazine ni won pe ni across their chests, but it was there that I saw it live. The boys are a law unto themselves. They fear nobody and they kill for fun. They kill at the slightest provocation. They are the real dons in the pipeline vandalism business. They have camps on the rivers which the Yoruba folks that transact the illicit business with them don't know about because they only tie the kegs to the boats and use the boats to draw them away, fill them and draw them back for sales. Then you have carriers, the young boys in the area that carry the kegs from the river banks to where the vehicles are waiting (a distance of about 70m) for 150 naira per keg. Some of them have married Yoruba women while some just go about sleeping with the young village girls, raping both girls and married women especially in Ishawo.

4. The Ishawo guys are the deadliest in the Ikorodu axis. Ishawo is a no go area especially for folks that live around Agric. Ishawo militants even have a cell where they take people to for punishment and torture. They've become so much powerful there. The impunity in Ishawo is second to none. You see them with guns in broad daylight. They rape married women in front of their husbands without giving a hoot. It is pertinent to note at this juncture that these militants are not only vandals, they are also the ones responsible for spate of robbery attacks and kidnapping all around. This happens especially when there is a stop in oil flow. So to keep body and soul together, they "diversify" their economy. The recent pipeline bombings in the niger delta has affected oil flow down there which has led them into other crimes which culminated in the current crises. I'm still coming to that. To the dude up there talking about his correspondents, it's either you go to meet them because if you have any at all you have no business here or you call them here to come and counter my claims. You are part of those in one thread like that blaming it on IPOB and NDA. Your ignorance is in terabytes.

This is nothing but a backend attempt to pump up Ijaw as some invicible deadly people that should be feared. You profile yourself as some reliable journalist to gain people trust and then you spin conjectural tales to podition Ijaw as a dominant independence force on a foreign land. What are they, Ijaw herdsmen?

They rape, they torture, they vandalize, they use drug, they carry deadly weapon.....is that all the good you see in Ijaw people, is criminalty an Ijaw culture? Who send you?

Bekwarra:
In the last few days, the media has been awash with news of series of militants attacks on some communities in Ikorodu Lagos. What I notice is that, information has been scanty and many people have been making false claims as to the where, when and how of the attacks. Many of the comments on social media have taken ethnic and political colouration with many miscues. This is just an attempt to set the records straight. PS: I'm neither a militant nor a vandal, neither do I live in any of the communities I'll mention, but I've been there on several occasions because I have someone who lives close by and I've gone inside the creeks out of curiosity to see things for my self. The few times I went to the creeks, to say I was so shocked was an understatement. Although you can't just walk in their without an insider, don't mind me I was a campus journalist and I'm still doing some little journalistic work. This is just an attempt to tell the story as it is and disabuse our minds from rumours and half-truths.

The communities largely involved are Ishawo, Igbo Olomu, Elepete, Oke Muti and Magbon with Ishawo being the deadliest. It's been a while that I wanted to write about the menace of militants and vandals in that axis but my tight schedule wouldn't allow me. My initial write up was going to be based on the folly of withdrawing the pipeline surveillance contract from the OPC without thinking it through. Even if you had any grouse with the contract, you should just have reviewed and restructured it instead of cancelling it outrightly. I can say here unequivocally that the OPC did a better job than the Nigerian Army are doing there now. The boys had it tougher during that time but currently the only thing that happens is those soldiers going there every 3 days to collect money and fill their own jerry cans and zoom off. In fact in some places like Magbon, it is the soldiers that handle the pumps by themselves filling tankers and jerry cans. Those guys are stinkingly rich now. The major business in those communities are pipeline vandalism and sale of petrol. It's a big time business that has made many to become millionaires overnight and has big as it is overthere, government can never claim ignorance.

As can be noticed from some people's comments especially here on nairaland, some persons have been making some spurious allegations; from the bizarre, to the utterly ridiculous. While some say the militants are Niger Delta Avengers, some say they are fulani herdsmen and some others say they are Yorubas trying to give Biafra a bad name. Just imagine o gosh! Now let's take a look

1. These things(vandalism and oil theft) have been having in these communities for a while now with the only hiccups being the intervention of the OPC then but since the exit of the OPC boys, it has blossomed into a big time business. Many people are involved, male and female, old and young, policemen and soldiers. If you been close to the creeks before, you will be annoyed with the brazen display of defiance. Whenever their is "pressure" which is used to referred to when fuel has started flowing through the pipes to warrant pumping, you'll see them moving to the creeks in droves. Lots of women are involved in it and a visit to the creeks will make you think you are at some sort of market. They even sell beer, hot drinks and food at the river bank. You'll see cars and buses moving in at night with lots of kegs to make purchases. The kegs are 50-litre kegs and they go for between 2500 when fuel is not scarce to around 4500 when there is scarcity. At times during rainy season when there's much pressure, price drops to 1500 or 2000.

2. All the residents know what's going on. While some are involved, others simply cannot talk due to the fear for their lives and coupled with the fact that law enforcement agents are culpable. Many residents have been threatened and harassed so many times...........

Buull shyyte tale by moonlight!

Go and sit down! An official response will be released soon.

TheFreeOne:
Who created the religious problem in Osun

What is Aregbesola rationale for merging the schools Will such move not cause distraction for students that ought to be committed to studying and create divisions

The Op should stop supporting a religious bigot with insincere intentions.

Aregbesola created the crisis and he has no other option than to resolve it.

The schools belong to government, as head of govt he can do that.

Religious sensitivity in West is a recent phenomenon and legacy of Jonathan's PDP, using Oritaejafor in his capacity as head of CAN to bring division between muslims and christians and also creating animosities between pentacostal, protestant and catholic christians.

Oritsejafor spread the wrong gospel in exchange for exclusive access to Jonathan and largesse.

Most people who never before saw their neighbour's faith and religion as an issue are now camped under tents that promote religious intolerance.

CAN got a lot of people thinking that schools bearing missionary names are owned by the missioners. WRONG! This is the case in Osun where christian parents are saying muslim girls enrolled in schools bearing christian names cannot come to their school with hijab. Who told these people that a Baptist High School in Ede belong to Christians? No, it belongs to government.

The new president of CAN needs to go on field campaign and bring his flock back into the age long tradition of communal toletance that the West is reputed for.

Jonathan and Oritsejafor were bad leaders for this country and moreso for the South. With another four years of Oritsejafor, under a re-elected Jonathan, religious crisis would have erupted in Yorubaland and consume indigenes and non-indigenes alike.

Buhari is placing the jigsaw puzzle pieces where they fit to complete the whole mission of mapping grazing zones into the Nigerian landscape.

One of the criterias for herding is waterways. Water sustains both the herder and his livestock, if it is in scarcity they will be greatly malnourished and if in abundance they will be fattened.

This lawyer is positioned to seek legal loopholes and as well find legitimacy in the means to acquire rights of access along waterways and wet grounds around the country.

Does anyone disagree?

An Airport?
An Olympic Stadium?
A Second or Third bridge?
A Grazing Reserve for Fulani?

Read...

Tony Okafor, Awka

The Federal Government has slammed a N50bn suit against the Anambra State Government over land.

The state government had purportedly revoked 148.337 hectares of land at Amansea, in Awka North Local Government Area of the state, which was said to have been acquired by the Federal Government for Sites and Services Scheme.

In a Supreme Court suit No. SC 876/2015 (the Attorney General of the Federation of Nigeria as plaintiff and the Attorney General of Anambra State as defendant), the Federal Government is seeking eight declarations, including N50bn for exemplary and aggravated damages suffered by her by the alleged unconscionable actions of the defendant.

In the claim of the plaintiff against the defendant, as contained in the writ of summons signed by the Registrar of the court, the Federal Government sought for “a declaration that the 148.337 hectares of land at Amansea, Awka North LGA, Anambra State, comprising Federal Government’s Sites and Services Scheme, Amansea/Awka, was lawfully acquired by the Federal Government of Nigeria through the Anambra State Government in 1992, under the Land Use Act of 1978 (as amended).

Parts of the required declarative expectations are, “A declaration that the Federal Government of Nigeria had duly paid the required compensation that was assessed to the knowledge of and active collaboration with the Anambra State Government.

“A declaration that the Federal Government of Nigeria had duly granted Statutory Rights of Occupancy to her allotees and development partners, members of the public and original land owners to the knowledge of and active collaboration with the Anambra State Government.

“A declaration that the purported revocation of the Federal Government of Nigeria’s rights and interests over the said Federal Government Sites and Services Scheme, Amansea/Awka, measuring 148.337 hectares of land, by the Anambra State Government vide a public notice, dated September 1, 2014, is wrongful, unlawful, null, void and of no effect whatsoever as same is neither supported by any extant law in force in Nigeria, nor done for any justifiable reasons, among others.”

When the matter came up before a full panel of the apex court, presided over by Hon. Justice Ibrahim Tanko Muhammed on Thursday, June 9, 2016, the court adjourned the case to February 13, 2017, for hearing of the motion on notice for interlocutory injunction filed by the counsel for the Federal Government, Chief Mike Ozekhome (SAN) for interim an order of injunction.

http://www.punchng.com/fg-slams-n50bn-suit-anambra-land/

I am truly surprised that Ibos are not protesting Ihejirika's arrest or issuing ultimatum, or at best, label Buhari enemy number 1 of ndigbo. Oh i forgot, Ambode already earned the number 1 position, Buhari will get number 2!

Yeye dey stink

I am truly surprised that Ibos are not protesting IhejirikaIhejirika's arrest or issuing ultimatum, or at best, label Buhari enemy number 1 of ndigbo. Oh i forgot, Ambode already earned the number 1 position, Buhari will get number 2!

Yeye dey stink

The 31-year-old Major Emmanuel Ifeajuna was the brain behind the Revolution. He studied zoology for 4 years at Ibadan University and graduated with a B.Sc before being commissioned into the army in 1961. At the age of 20, he brought glory to the nation when at the 1954 Commonwealth Games in Vancouver, he won Nigeria’s first ever gold medal at any international games and set a new record in high jump. He refused to wear the athletes’ spiked boots or any shoe at all for the run-up competitions. At Vancouver, in front of the international cameras, he was persuaded to wear the boots. As a compromise, he wore a boot only on one leg and jumped the highest setting a new world record in high jump and in bizarre outfitting. Ifeajuna knew he was not born to be ordinary and so was addicted to breaking rules and setting new records. As a charismatic orator and Director of Information at University College Ibadan Students Union, he led the protest against the Queen’s visit to the University in 1956.

Ibadan City was born by dissident soldiers headed by Lagelu among seven hills as a refuge for immigrants fleeing wars in 1829. By 1960, Ibadan had become the most cosmopolitan city in Nigeria. Being an embodiment of the lure of consistent non-conformism, Ibadan like New York of that time, held an extraordinary collection of flame-headed intellectuals avid for novelty and whose creativity and distinguished activisms enriched the city and the country. There was nowhere in Africa that matched Ibadan’s assemblage of fire then. There was SG Ikoku who challenged and defeated his own famous father Alvan Ikoku at the Eastern Region Assembly elections of 1956 and then radicalised his new adopted father Chief Obafemi Awolowo into socialism. There was Anthony Enahoro, Chris Okigbo, John Pepper Clark, Chinua Achebe, Tayo Akpata, Benedict Obumselu, Chike Obi, Wole Soyinka, Sam Agbam, Akin Mabogunje, Bola Ige, Emeka Anyaoku, Elechi Amadi. Ifeajuna was a friend to most of them. He wrote in his manuscript:

“It was at Ibadan also I learnt my third lesson. One morning, workmen arrived in the campus with what looked like burglar grills. In a matter of days, they had sealed off each hall or residence from the outside and turned all into cages. Altogether, they gave the place the look of a zoo, so that students saw themselves as animals on show…Then the students took a decision – the cages would have to come down faster than they had been put up. But how to do it? Everybody knew what was wanted but they had not or did not know the means and the manner of effecting the change desired and demanded by all. Each waited for the other to act or simply waited in the hope that something would happen by way of providential intervention.

“At the appointed hour, I and two others met in a hidden rendezvous. We worked out the detailed plans and assembled hammers for the job. The events which took place a week or so later went according to plan. We called a Union meeting. There were speeches, moving speeches. Then one of my friends shouted: ‘Down with the cages.’ He led the way to the hammer dump. Before long the cages were down. At the end of it all a student friend reflecting on the incident made interesting comment that a collection of professors would still be a crowd: a group must have a leader or remain in chaos. The University College was closed for a term but we made our point. And the lesson that emerged for me from this incident was the need for careful planning before [undergoing] any operation; the chance of success can be said to be proportion to the work put into the planning.”

Ifeajuna informed Okigbo the discussed Revolution was in the works. According to Wole Soyinka, Okigbo informed Achebe and informed him also without going into details. Soyinka was then on trial for allegedly using a gun to persuade the state broadcaster that instead of Akintola’s tape announcing himself as the election winner, his own tape asking Akintola to pack and go was of better value to the people. He was later freed by Justice Kayode Eso on 12 December 1965.

Ifeajuna was pleased to hear about Okigbo’s friend subversive broadcast. He regarded it as theatre; they were plotting the real stunt. On the day of this stunt, more than anywhere else in the country, there was great euphoria of vindication in Ibadan as the people leapt around on the streets like compressed chests freed at last from the tyranny of pushdown bras. Ibadan claimed Ifeajuna as one of its very own and Okigbo distilled the joys of that day into his poem Hurray for the Path of Thunder. When Nzeogwu’s voice fountained out like a genie of the lamp amongst some Ibadan intellectuals clustered around their radio at Risikatu’s restaurant, Okigbo was reported to have called for patience, patience, patience. He confidently proclaimed that there was still another voice that would soon follow suit. He was referring to his friend and chief engineer of the Revolution, Major Emmanuel Arinze Ifeajuna born on 3rd March 1934, married to Rose on 16th June 1959 at Lagos Registry in Ikoyi and commissioned into the army on 6th December 1960.

On the night of the coup, after Ifeajuna concluded his address to his fellow mutineers in his sitting room, he led the largest unit comprising 22 soldiers. Reaching Onikan roundabout, he divided them into three groups. One officer, 2/Lt. G. Ezedigbo and 8 NCOs would go to arrest the finance minister, Chief Festus Okotie-Eboh who was then the most corrupt politician in the history of Nigeria. Just like the Downing Street model in London, the Prime Minister and Finance Minister lived side-by-side. But they had become respectively like church and state that did not mix. Another unit comprising 5 NCOs commanded by second warrant officer Onyeacha was left behind to watch over their vehicles and ensure that no other vehicle entered or exited the Onikan roundabout during the course of the operation. Ifeajuna himself commanded the remaining soldiers whose task was to arrest the Prime Minister, Sir Tafawa Balewa Abubakar, the novelist and teacher turned Prime Minister.

Abubakar was widely known to hardly surround himself with guards at home or even when commuting. He always cautioned his household against striving for the inessential and ostentatious materialism which expressed itself in need for elaborate security measures. Only Abubakar could have a disabled cripple called Inspector Kaftan Topolomiyo from Nangasu in Chad as his head of security. It was only in 1964 that he consented to a supplement ADC, Sgt Maxwell Orukpabo fondly called “the Igbo” in the household. In February 1963 during a police council meeting with the four regional premiers, the newly restored Western Premier, Akintola proposed a budget for armoured cars for themselves given the security situation in the country. Abubakar softly reprimanded him: “Mr Premier, if I ever thought I would need an armoured car to go anywhere in Nigeria, I would resign.” In the pornography of corruption called the Nigerian government, Abubakar was a monk. And so Ifeajuna knew his task would be very easy. The soldiers he took to abduct him were service soldiers drawn from Signal Squadron, Lagos Garrison Organisation and Camp. None were combat soldiers.

Around thirty minutes later, without a single shot fired, the cool and soft-spoken Prime Minister emerged from the front gate of his residence untied, gently rattling his prayer beads and was dressed in a white flowing jalabiya and a pair of sandals. A lifetime of emotional discipline had rendered his signature face docile and unconquerable by fear. The dead silence of the night lent a hallowed majesty to his steps as he advanced towards his Golgotha. Behind him was Ifeajuna and eight other non-combat soldiers with guns drawn. By the time the entourage reached the parked vehicles, Okotie-Eboh his NCNC Finance Minister had been arrested with his hands tied. Abubakar was assisted into the backseat of Ifeajuna’s luxurious red Mercedes Benz while Okotie Eboh was tossed like a sack of potatoes into the back of the 3 tonner. The convoy drove to report to Federal Guard’s Officer’s Mess.

Ben Gbulie

Lagos
Down in Lagos, at 11 Thompson Avenue Ikoyi, home of Brigadier Zakariya Maimalari, the commander of the 2nd Brigade, there was an elaborate gathering of all the senior officers and some junior officers for a cocktail party. It started at seven in the evening. The compound was a green sprawl patterned with stout palm trees and garden benches. Ramadan was ongoing but Maimalari did not concern himself with such rituals. Instead, military stewards in white gloves moved gracefully around with trays on which were delicately perched wine bottles with bow ribbons tied to their necks. All senior officers including their ADCs were in mufti except the Joe Nez-led regimental orchestra who amongst other songs played popular hits from the British comic play, Pinafore. Zak Maimalari was under his jacaranda tree with the GOC, Major General ‘John’ Aguiyi-Ironsi, Lt Col Yakubu ‘Jack’ Gowon and Patrick Keatley, a British journalist for the London Guardian. (Note: all Nigerian officers had English nicknames so that their erstwhile colonial officers could easily remember them) As the guests swayed to the orchestra, Jack Gowon said, “There was song of revelry by night.” It was the famous opening line of Lord Byron’s poem The Eve of Waterloo in which Byron narrates how the night before their defeat at Waterloo, French soldiers kept on drinking and dancing and womanising at a party thereby ignoring the advancement of death and destruction from the animated enemy forces. In his later account of that night, Keatley said he replied Jack Gowon:
“But surely we need not conclude that Nigeria is facing her Waterloo?”

Brigadier Samuel Ademulegun

But he was not scheduled to survive. Onwuatuegwu asked the Brigadier, “Get dressed and come with us sir. Those are my instructions; to bring you to the headquarters.” It sounded like nonsense to him. As the head of that headquarters since 17 February 1964, he was the only person that could give such an order. His wife Latifah, 8 months pregnant, planted herself fearlessly between her husband and the pointed guns knowing full well that if she remained glued to the comfort of their bed those weapons would not be diverted away from her husband. The Sardauna’s senior wife did exactly that at that moment somewhere else. (Any other Nigerian woman would have done the same. Contrary to what the New Feminists led themselves to believe, Nigerian women were never born to be weak. In the top bedside drawer was a service pistol. As a Brigadier, Ademulegun knew a pistol was no match for 6 soldiers armed with SMGs. But he would rather fight and die gallantly than degrade the honour of his office by surrendering to subordinates.

As he made a dash for a quick draw, Onwuatuegwu opened fire on the Brigadier, his wife and the unborn. Cruelty resulted when anything stood in the way of the indefinite expansion of the will to power. Without Ademulegun dead, Nzeogwu could not preside over the biggest Brigade of the Nigerian Army. Ademulegun’s children Solape and Kole were in the next room. They heard all the clash and they were the first to see their lifeless parents surrounded by a pond of blood. Onwuatuegwu and his mutineers then strolled out across the street unchallenged by the guards to the home of Colonel Shodeinde, Deputy Commandant of Nigerian Defence Academy whom Ademulegun usually handed over the Brigade too when he was not around. They killed him too in cold blood with an angry grenade. They then left for the Brigade Headquarters satisfied their mission was a success. That was what Nzeogwu meant when he asked his fellow mutineers not to see the epic bloodbath that was about to start as an outbreak of evil but their unique and generous contribution to the development and welfare of the nation. Anything that benefitted their Revolution cannot be injurious to morals. That was their driving belief. And it freed them to be terrible.

The mutineers had divided themselves into three groups. Nzeogwu headed the group that looked after the Sardauna, Captain Gbuile was to seize the 1st Brigade Headquarters, the TV and radio stations and Major Timothy Onwuatuegwu headed the group to delete the existence of Brigadier Samuel Ademulegun and his Deputy, Col Raphael Shodeinde. Ademulegun was startled when Onwuatuegwu entered his bedroom just after 2am. He was reported to have asked, how did you get in here? As the commander of the 1st Brigade of the Nigerian Army, he was the most protected personality in the whole of the Northern Region. While police personnel guarded the Premier and the Governor, Sir Kashim Ibrahim, his own guards were drawn from the 3rd infantry battalion. They guarded not only inside and outside his compound but around his main house too. But the guards had been compromised and they led Onwuatuegwu straight into the Brigadier’s bedroom. Had Ademulegun survived the assassination, he would have ordered all the guards, the guard commander and their officer commanding to face firing squad because as guards, they were supposed to die first before anything happened to him.

For Nzeogwu and his soldiers had cut through the Premier’s Lodge fence by the side and at the entrance rounded up three policemen (Police Constables Yohanna Garkawa, Akpan Anduka, Hagai Lai) and a soldier (Lance Corporal Musa Nimzo) rubbing their hands together between their knees to resist the harsh harmattan. Nzeogwu asked them to face the wall and coldly pulled the trigger on them. He was trying to man up his fellow soldiers who were still acting like reluctant rebels and give them a taste of where the night was heading. He then posted two new sentries by the entrance while he and other soldiers conducted a room-to-room search in the main house for the Sardauna. Routine police patrol that sighted the mutineers converging menacingly in front of the Premier’s Lodge radioed the British Police officer on duty in the Kaduna Police Operations room. He in turn phoned Mallam Ahmed T. Ben-Musa Sardauna’s Senior Assistant Secretary (Security). He immediately sprang up and went to the Lodge. He was shot on arrival by the sentries who were motivated by Nzeogwu’s earlier example. They had accepted the transformation from reluctant rebels to motivated mutineers.

The general alarm had woken Sardauna. He was not in the main house but upstairs in the rear annex with his senior wife Habsatu, the daughter of Mallam Abbas, the Waziri of Sokoto, his second wife Goggon Kano, the third, Jabbo Birnin Kebbi and Sallama, a house retainer. They listened and rattled prayer beads in fear for an hour as Nzeogwu and his motivated mutineers booted down doors, pumped bullets into guards mounting resistance and shouted to others, “Ina Sardauna? Take us to the Sardauna.” It was dark, Sardauna and his wives went downstairs and into the courtyard connecting the annex and the main house. They were trying to escape. On finding them, Nzeogwu shot the Sardauna and his senior wife who was trying to protect him. He then blew a whistle which was the agreed signal for all soldiers to converge at the rallying point at the front gate for the final onslaught on their symbol of national decay. The rocket-launching party then began shelling the house. Boom! Boom! The ground shuddered like the cannon fire which the great Russian composer Pyotr Tchaikovsky laced into his 1812 overture. Nzeogwu was a lover of jazz and classical music.

Their beauty heightened his sensitivity to the decay which Nigeria was. He even mentored Captain Theophilus Danjuma to become a classical connoisseur. With the huge flame before him overpowering the harmattan and the night with abundance of light and heat, Nzeogwu was satisfied his own unit’s assignment was a success. He felt like a single note from an oboe, hanging high up there unwavering, avid for glory, above pulses from bassoons and basset horns till a drag from a clarinet took over and sweetened the note into a phrase of such delight, such unfulfillable longing making the coup’s failure unlikely with every passing bar. Nzeogwu then left for the brigade headquarters to await news from other units confident as ever like that high oboe note from Mozart’s Serenade for the Winds in B Flat that the news would be good news.

Victor Banjo.

Emmanuel Ifeajuna: the sports hero turned revolutionary. This University of Ibadan Zoology graduate was the brain behind the revolution. He recruited Nzeogwu (who said he could gun down corrupt politicians) into the revolution

Kestolovee95:
yoruba revisionism again. Where is Adewale Ademoyega's name in your epitles of lies, i mean the author of "why we struck"?

you are ahead of yourself...reserve that question till am done posting and you will see its unecessary.

That evening, Nzeogwu went back to the airport to pick up his best friend Major Olusegun Obasanjo the Officer Commanding the Field Engineers who had just finished his course in India and flew in via London. Obasanjo’s deputy Captain Ben Gbuile was supposed to pick him up at the airport but he was busy mobilising for the Revolution. And so he telephoned Nzeogwu who promptly came to the airport. Though they slept together in the same room, Nzeogwu never told him of the death awaiting certain personalities.

The following day, 14th January, Bernard Floud a British MP and director of Granada TV (now ITV) which partly owned the Northern Region Television Station was staying at the plush Hamdala Hotel in Kaduna. He had met with the Sardauna briefly to discuss funding and expansion of the television reach. They were supposed to meet the following day Saturday 15th January to continue the business talk. But there would be no tomorrow.

On Thursday, 13th January when Sardauna arrived from Mecca, Akintola flew to Kaduna to meet him to dissuade Abubakar from imposing a state of emergency on the West or replace him with an Administrator. Akintola had recently buried his daughter and staunchest ally Mrs Modele Odunjo who on 26th October died allegedly of overdose of sleeping pills. She was married to Soji Odunjo, who was a staunch enemy of her father and he was also the son of the Alawiye’s Chief J.F. Odunjo whom Akintola also sacked as the Chairman of Western Region Development Corporation for being pro-Awolowo. Akintola had also sent his son, Tokunbo (who died in 1973) faraway to Eton College in England. He had imported the first ever bulletproof car into Nigeria: an £8000 Mercedes Benz. As the 13th Aare Ona Kakanfo of Yorubaland, he felt unchained and fired up for a total fight. With more men and firepower, he told the Sardauna, he would crush all disturbances from AG’s supporters and their Eastern sponsors. The Sardauna promised to discuss his request with the Prime Minister. Major Timothy Onwuatuegwu, a 27-year-old instructor at the NMTC who was detailed to track Sardauna’s daily movements reported this surprise meeting with Akintola to the Revolution’s high command. From his No 13, Kanta Road residence, Nzeogwu promptly dashed to the Kaduna airport where Sardauna had already gone to see off Akintola. Nzeogwu went to the VIP lounge saluted the Sardauna and wished Akintola safe journey back home convinced that in 48 hours at most, both VIPs would be counted among the dead.

That morning, The New Nigerian newspaper wrote an unprecedentedly scathing editorial laying the blame for the region’s financial woes and lack of development on Sardauna inefficiencies and ineptitude and asked him to “put his house in order.” When Nzeogwu read the editorial, he went straight to the paper’s newsroom and demanded to see the writer. He was in his uniform and his eyes were red. No one knew him nor had seen his face before. The staff did not know what to make of his demand. The expatriate managing editor Charles Sharp then stepped forward. Nzeogwu shook his hands and said the content and tone of the editorial reflected their thinking in the army and they had resolved to put that house in order. The newsroom did not understand what he meant until the morning of the January 15. The paper was the first to publish for the world the picture of Sardauna’s house still smouldering in the flames of Nzeogwu.

Meanwhile, the premier of the Western Region, Samuel Ladoke Akintola received a tip from his NNDP ministers in the federal cabinet that after the Commonwealth special meeting, the Prime Minister planned to impose a state of emergency on the Western Region, drop him as an ally and appoint a federal caretaker just as he did in 1962. Market women staging protests against skyrocketing costs of foodstuffs, burnout cars, shot and charred corpses, politicians and civil servants’ houses set on fire, intellectuals’ houses emptied onto the street were weekly occurrences in the West. Ever since the rift between Awolowo the Action Group leader and Akintola his deputy, the Western Region that was an Africans-can-do-it model of governance and jaw-dropping development was turned into a landscape of sorrow, blood and tears. With fund from the public treasury and under the command of Fani-Kayode the deputy premier, Akintola’s well-armed hooligans held the upper hand while AG’s bully-boys sponsored by Dr Michael Okpara and the NCNC leadership were on the defensive. After the elections of 11 October 1965, Akintola used the state broadcasting services to announce false counts while the Okpara-sent Eastern Nigeria Broadcasting Service team secretly camped in Awolowo’s house declared the correct results ward by ward. On the night of 15th October, when Akintola was to announce himself the winner, Wole Soyinka, with a generous assistance from his pistol, forced the Western Broadcasting Service to air his own subservice tape asking Akintola to resign and go. Akintola and his supporters went berserk. The police declared Soyinka wanted and he fled to Okpara in the East for temporary refuge until his arrest on 27th October 1965.

By Damola Awoyokun

Damola Awoyokun, an engineer and historian has perused hitherto hidden dispatches from British diplomats and intelligence officers on Nigeria’s first coup—a very bloody one—executed by Chukwuma Kaduna Nzeogwu and Emmanuel Arinze Ifeajuna on 15 January 1966. The coup in which political leaders and military officers of northern Nigeria extraction were majorly killed triggered a counter-coup and eventually declaration of Biafra and a civil war.
TheNEWS today shares the rare insight into the bloody event of 15 January 1966 and we believe it may serve as a good lesson as the drums of war are being sounded in some parts of our country

Kaduna

It was a soundless morning, dark, pulsating, starless. The harmattan spiked the 2am air with prickly cold and fog. With his finger to the trigger, the 28-year-old Major Patrick Chukwuma Nzeogwu addressed the soldiers from Charlie Company of the 3rd Infantry Battalion and some Nigerian Military Training College (NMTC) personnel. They were armed with fury, submachine guns, knives, grenades, torchlights, rocket launchers. Nzeogwu reeled about how the politicians had dragged the country to the cliff of fall and kicked it down into a worst-case scenario. He reeled about nepotism, large scale looting of public wealth, persistent poverty of the people, the yearnings of millions hollowed out by afflictions, the epidemic of insecurities, the Tiv riots, the Western Region’s daily bloodletting, the country’s tireless race to the bottom instead of high up to the plane of regard.

He pointed to Sardauna’s residence right behind him as the ultimate symbol of the filth Nigeria had become. His fellow soldiers were stunned. They did not know they had been turned into reluctant rebels. They thought this was supposed to be another night’s training exercise the brigade high command had approved for them which they started two weeks previously. Nzeogwu then asked the soldiers to concentrate on how to be necessary and to feel proud that they were the ones called upon to rescue the nation, to show the way, to be the new founding fathers of a better Nigeria. In other words, like Homer’s Illiad, he was asking them not to see the epic bloodbath that was about to start as an outbreak of evil, but their generous contribution to the redemption and welfare of the nation.

They Charged Forward

Four hours earlier around 10 o’clock, the last lights in the Sardauna’s household had gone out. They were expected to wake by 4am to eat suhur, the predawn meal to begin the fast. Ramadan started on 23rd December 1965. A week earlier, the Prime Minister Mallam Tafawa Balewa Abubakar met the Queen and the British Prime Minister Harold Wilson. He had invited all the Commonwealth Prime Ministers for a special meeting in Lagos from 11- 12 January to resolve Rhodesian crises. It was the first of its kind outside London. On 19 December, he went to the small village of Arondizuogu in Orlu for the commissioning of his trade minister, Dr Ozumba Mbadiwe’s Palace of the People. Built by Italian contractors, it was a three-storey affair resplendent with blue terrazzo walls, swimming pool and a fountain, grand conference halls and event rooms, red carpet and gilt chairs. All these in a village where most houses were still born of mud and thatched roofs.

Since the first tarred roads were constructed in 1890s in Lagos, and the first dual carriage way in Nigeria – Queen Elizabeth Road – appeared in 1956 in Ibadan, no road in Arondizuogu or in Orlu had ever been graced with bitumen before. Yet Mbadiwe situated the grand palace there as a source of pride for his people. At the commissioning ceremony, the Eastern Premier, Dr Okpara never saw the project as a white elephant planted by megalomania and watered by corruption, rather he hailed the project as “a great achievement for one of the priests of pragmatic socialism to have been so clever to accommodate this building within the context of pragmatic African socialism.” The press placed the value of the house at least half a million pounds. Mbadiwe said it was “at most £40,000.” After the commissioning, Abubakar then proceeded to his farm in Bauchi for his annual leave. On Tuesday 4th of January, he joined the retinue of well-wishers in Kaduna airport to bid farewell to his in-law and godfather, the Sardauna, who was going to Saudi Arabia to perform Umra, a lesser hajj, in the company of 184 other state-sponsored pilgrims. The cost of the one-week pilgrimage to the government was around £17,000.

Did you know that the first coup in Nigeria was planned in 1965, and it was by no other than Ojukwu? His plans failed to take root.

Anyway, I bring to you, courtesy of Mythbuster Squad of Nairaland, a penetrating version of the Jan 15th Coup, the first successfuly executed coup, popularly known as the Ibo coup.

Read on...

AmbIzuchukwu:
Oh! I thought you know history?

Sorry, I'm out. Do help yourself out.

Which history? It is only in Ibo history book that Sir Ojukwu owned a Rolls Royce used to chauffer Queen in 1956. That story is non existing in Nigerian history or British records.

However, this all important creation of God is not available for the people of the South East zone due to lack of planning or neglect by the various administrations that have served in the five states of Abia, Anambra, Ebonyi, Enugu and Imo which make up the area.

Politicians still play politics with provision of water. During the first republic, politicians were said to have used water supply as a weapon of blackmail against communities.

Weapon of blackmail

They would take water pipes to communities in order to woo them but later went back to collect such pipes if such communities failed to vote for them.

Perhaps it is time the people begin to ask the law makers and the executive questions about the allocations made for pipe borne water, and hold them accountable.

In Anambra there are many gigantic water schemes in various parts of the state, including the famous Nkisi Regional Water Scheme in Onitsha started by the Nwobodo administration in the second republic, the Nnewi water scheme, the Awka water scheme, the Enugwu Ukwu and Nimo Water schemes, which, unfortunately are no longer functioning.

In Onitsha, the Nkisi Water Scheme, which was started during the second republic (over 32yrs ago), is yet to be completed.


Read whole article here...


http://news.bestnaira.com/posts/view/south-east-living-without-water

By Vincent Ujumadu

Awka—THE people from Nawfia in Njikoka local government area of Anambra State have appealed to the state governor, Chief Willie Obiano to intervene on behalf of the community over alleged confiscation of their communal land by some officials in the ministry of lands and the state Housing Corporation, with the connivance of some indigenes of the town.

The people said they were initially given the impression that the land was acquired by the Nigerian Army for the construction of a housing estate, adding, however, that their investigations showed that the hierarchy of the Army was not aware of any military housing estate in Anambra State.

Gov. Willie Obiano of Anambra State

Chairman of Urualor/Umuejimofor Village Association, one of the villages that own the land, Mr. Chukwuma Obunneme, said hundreds of economic trees in the over 100 hectares of land have been destroyed, and the entire area was being fenced by the speculators without the consent of the people and without paying any compensation.

Obumneme said they were surprised when they went to harvest their crops in the area early this year to see some soldiers brandishing arms and warning them not to step into the land again.

Waving placards and marching along the Enugu –Onitsha expressway with inscription such as “Save us from Nigerian Army invasion please”, “No compensation, no land”, “Army leave our land alone”, “Governor Obiano rescue Nawfia people from Nigerian Army”, “Stop destroying our economic trees”, “This land provides our only source of income”, and “Where do you want our children to live?”, the people believed that only Governor Obiano’s intervention would make the people concerned to vacate from Nawfia land.

He said: “While we were wondering who might have illegally entered our land, the next thing we saw was a military signpost and since then, they have not allowed us to enter our land.

They have destroyed all the crops in the farms, including cassava, yams and plantain and cut down all the palm trees and raffia palms. Most of our women who go to the farm daily have been crying as they are no longer allowed to enter their farms.”

Also speaking, the chairman of Urukpaleri Village, Chief Anthony Nwinyi, whose village also owns a section of the land said that when his people noticed what was going on, he personally went to the headquarters of the 82 Division of the Nigerian Army in Enugu.

He added that even though the GOC informed him that he did not know anything about the military presence there, soldiers have continued to occupy the area on daily basis.

Nwinyi said: “In my presence, the GOC signaled the Onitsha Military Cantonment who also said that he did not know anything about it. The GOC told me that it is not possible for the Army to have two formations in a state and advised me to go to the state government.

“After briefing my people, they asked me to go to the Ministry of Lands, Awka and the officials directed me to the Anambra State Housing Corporation. At Housing Corporation, they called one Sunday Odumegwu, who is from our town and he claimed that compensation for the land had been fully paid when the corporation acquired the site for the proposed Liberation Estate in the Capital Territory.”


http://news.bestnaira.com/posts/view/anambra-community-protests-alleged-confiscation-of-land

Tony Okafor, Awka

At least 18 per cent of Anambra State children under the age of five suffer from stunted growth as a result of malnutrition, the Civil Society Scale-up Nutrition in Nigeria, Anambra State chapter, said on Friday in Awka, the state capital.

In a press briefing by the Local Working Group Coordinator of the NGO, Dr. Moses Ohamaeme, the organisation said a survey conducted in the South-East showed that Anambra State has the worst record in child malnutrition.

Ohamaeme said cases of malnutrition were severe among children with low milk consumption, whose mothers had limited knowledge of its importance.

He added that malnourished babies had a higher risk of dying in infancy and would likely face lifelong cognitive challenges, leading to poor academic performance and other chronic health problems.

He explained that malnutrition in children would manifest in the forms of waisting (low weight for height), stunting (low height for age), and underweight (low weight for age).

He said he wondered why this was so in Anambra State despite the abundant human and material resources available in the area.



http://www.punchng.com/18-anambra-children-suffer-malnutrition-ngo/