₦airaland Forum

You might be surprised to find out that I'm friends with Max Siollun, but I don't depend on one source. I read from a variety of first hand sources.

More from Walbe.

We arrested him as we arrested Ironsi.  We suspected him of being party to the January coup.  You remember the Battle Group Course which was held at Abeokuta….Fajuyi was the Commander of the Battle Group Course…All those who took part in the January coup were those who had taken part in that course.  It gave us the impression that the Battle Course was arranged for the January coup, so he had to suffer it too. I am sorry about that but that is the nature of the life of a military man……..”

https://dawodu.com/omoigui13.htm

Christistruth00

Let me make it easy.

Fajuyi was involved in the plot. We have established that he not only knew of the plot, but he also contributed ideas about how it should be executed. He would have been arrested by the authorities if they knew this. He was involved in the plot.


However, he was not involved in the plot within the plot.


Secondly, as you can see from Walbe's testimony, the junior northern officers that kidnapped and killed him suspected that he was involved and that's why they wanted him.

Christistruth00:
Some of the Coup plotters like Nzeogwu and Ademoyega that Nzeogwu recruited didn’t know they Were only pawns in a bigger Grand Plot which involved Ironsi and NCNC Politicians

Nzeogwu didn’t realise till after he had killed Sardauna

Nzeogwu was not the recruiter. Ifeajuna was the leader of the coup. Ifeajuna and Captain Oji started the plot and yes, NCNC politicians were involved.

Christistruth00

You are mixing up two things. Danjuma gave an assurance to Fajuyi that they won't be hurt. Victoria Ironsi and the other people in the house were referring to Danjuma.

Now, remember that Ironsi and Fajuyi were hijacked from Danjuma by Paiko, Walbe and others. These young northern soldiers also wanted Fajuyi. Fajuyi was one of their targets. This happened outside the house. The people that you mentioned were not there. I'm sure you've read Colonel Walbe's account by now.

He was with Ironsi and Fajuyi till the end.

These younger soldiers did not trust their superiors. They were fed up of Murtala postponing the coup. They hijacked Ironsi and Fajuyi from Danjuma. They had their own agenda and plan. They wanted Fajuyi.

Christistruth00

Even Largema was not on the list of people to be arrested or killed. Ifeajuna made a personal detour to kill him.

Christistruth00:
Fajuyi was not among the Plotters , Ademoyega said Fajuyi helped to delay their trial to save them from execution but Ojukwu did more than that helping many to be transferred to the Eastern Region in addition to preventing the trial from going ahead

Max Siollun interviewed the Soldiers involved they were not interested in arresting Fajuyi

https://www.thenewsnigeria.com.ng/2020/07/31/54th-memorial-the-horror-i-witnessed-when-fajuyi-was-abducted-by-coup-plotters-younger-sister/


https://www.vanguardngr.com/2016/07/many-months-didnt-know-husband-died-lady-aguiyi-ironsi/

Just as Ironsi’s wife and Fajuyi’#0s sister who was with him confirmed

This is an interview with William Walbe, one of the soldiers that kidnapped Ironsi and Fajuyi. As I said, read first hand accounts.

The coup of January 15, 1966 came to the young Lieutenant. serving with the 2nd Battalion in Ikeja at the time,  as a surprise.  Was any attempt made to recruit him  for it?  Not directly, he explained.  It was after the coup took place that he began to "put two and two together" regarding certain unusual conversations he had had with some of the officers who later emerged as key actors.  As one of the few officers trained on the American 106 mm recoil-less rifle, Lt. Walbe  was "academically" questioned about its capabilities in urban 'Internal Security' operations in the Lagos area, and the availability of appropriate ammunition.  His responses (about the weapon's "back-blast" and shortage of ammo) apparently did not excite the plotters and so they ceased any further thoughts of approaching him.   At that time his nickname was "Tanker" because of his association with that weapon.  He also recalled certain liaisons during a course at Abeokuta which later led him (and others) to suspect (correctly, based on testimony from Major Ademoyega) that late Lt. Col. Fajuyi was aware of the impending coup and likely helped some of the officers with the planning.

https://dawodu.com/omoigui36.htm

quote author=Christistruth00 post=100093604]

Fajuyi was not among the Plotters , Ademoyega said Fajuyi help to delay their trial but Ojukwu did more than that helping many to be transferred to the Eastern Region in addition to preventing the trial from going ahead[/quote]

None of my colleagues was interested in the idea of a revolution. Major Nzefili was devoted to other facets of military life. Major Adegoke too was more involved in the other sides of life and would have nothing to do with our plan. Major Bisalla was serious, but was committed to the Balewa Government and would consider nothing to the contrary.

However, Lieutenant Colonel Fajuyi who commanded the course had sympathy for our course and was willing to contribute ideas towards the execution of our plan. It shall stand eternally to his credit that although the coup took place while he was away on leave, he rose for the revolution and stood firmly by its principles even until he breathed his last

Adewale Ademoyega at page 59 of "Why We Struck: The Story of the First Nigerian Coup".

Christistruth00:
Fajuyi was not among the Plotters , Ademoyega said Fajuyi help to delay their trial but Ojukwu did more than that helping many to be transferred to the Eastern Region in addition to preventing the trial from going ahead

Read the picture again. He didn't only talk about what happened after the coup. He also talked about what happened before the coup. He said Fajuyi contributed ideas on how they should execute their plan. Fajuyi knew about the coup beforehand. He sympathised with them. He advised them. He was not one of the executors on the day because he was on leave, but he advised them, knew about it beforehand and sympathised with them.

He knew about the coup during the company commanders course in Abeokuta.

Read Ademoyega's book. Read firsthand account.

Christistruth00:
Fajuyi wasn’t part of the Coup

Read Max Siolluns book

He was booked into Ikoyi Hotel with Largema but only escaped being killed by the Coup plotters because he slept at a Friends house in Lagos

https://www.vanguardngr.com/2016/07/many-months-didnt-know-husband-died-lady-aguiyi-ironsi/

I just took this picture from Ademoyega's book right now. Fajuyi contributed ideas on how they should execute their plan. Although he was on leave when the coup happened, "He stood for the revolution" after it failed.

Ademoyega was one of the planners of the coup. I listen to first hand accounts. His account tallies with the account of northerners in the SMC who said that Fajuyi spoke in defence of the coupists at SMC meetings.

It also tallies with the account of northern soldiers who said that a lot of the January coupists were recruited from the company commanders course in Abeokuta.

Max Siollun was not one of the coupists, Ademoyega was.

Christistruth00:
Fajuyi wasn’t part of the Coup

Read Max Siolluns book

He was booked into Ikoyi Hotel with Largema but only escaped being killed by the Coup plotters because he slept at a Friends house in Lagos

Siollun wasn't one of the plotters. Read Ademoyega's book. Ademoyega was one of the plotters and he wrote about the support that they got from Fajuyi.

I usually like to read from both sides on any issue, so when you read Walbe's account of what they did, also read Danjuma's book to see Danjuma's side of things.



When you read Danjuma's side, also read Adewale Ademoyega's book to read the January coupists side of things.


Also read Ojukwu's book (he also wrote about the fact that Ifeajuna was the leader of the January coup).


Most importantly, read from people that were actually on the scene, not from people that heard about it later.

If you want to know about Fajuyi's role from someone inside the coup, read Adewale Ademoyega's book, "Why We Struck". He explains how Fajuyi helped them and how they planned the January Coup.

Interview with the colonel.


William Walbe was one of the soldiers that kidnapped Ironsi.

He was a member of Ironsi's guard because he knew how to operate the American 106 mm recoil-less rifle. In fact, some of the January coupists tapped him up (he didn't realise until after the coup). They were apparently thinking of using the gun in their coup, but the back blast was too much (they ended up using the Carl Gustav instead).


Some senior Igbo soldiers had removed most of the northern soldiers from Ironsi's guard, but they overlooked him, probably because of his name. However, one soldier knew that he was a northerner and repeatedly tried to remove him, but his attempts were always frustrated.


Anyway, in this interview he describes how their plot to overthrow Ironsi started, how they became impatient because Murtala was always postponing the coup, how they decided to take matters into their own hands and what exactly happened that night.


https://dawodu.com/omoigui36.htm



Ps. Walbe later became Gowon's ADC and was involved in drama during the coup that removed Gowon. He returned from Uganda with Gowon's plane and the coupists thought that it was Gowon.

chasamolu:
I’m really happy you did your homework. Their dead body was found beside a bush not buried. Danjuma led the Soldiers to surround the state house. Danjuma is the one commanding that troop that day. Don’t get it twisted. Danjuma was commanding that troop. He led them to surround the state house after a mutiny the previous night

You don't even know what you are talking about. You are relying on the testimony of people that were asked to sit down on the lawn and were not there when Ironsi died, while the people that were there when Ironsi died have stated what happened.

These were the soldiers that kidnapped Ironsi and took him away from Government House. Remember that Danjuma came from Lagos with Ironsi and most of these soldiers did not even know him. But they remembered what happened to their commander in January.

Lieutenant Colonel Abogo Largema was the commander of the 4th Battalion at Ibadan. He came to Lagos in January 1966 for a conference. Emmanuel Ifeajuna went to Abogo Largema's hotel room at the Ikoyi Hotel on Kingsway Road (now Alfred Rewane Road) and shot him dead on the night of the coup. There were very many rumours about how Ifeajuna allegedly tortured Largema before killing him (those rumours are not true).

Major Macaulay Oyuku Nzefili was Largema's second in command at the 4th Battalion in Ibadan. Despite the fact that he acted to put down the coup, a set of unfortunate coincidences together with the fact that he was Igbo made some people at the 4th Battalion to believe that Major Nzefili was involved in the coup and that he was involved in the killing of Largema. This was Major Nzefili's terrible experience after the death of Abogo Largema.

A lot of unpalatable things happened in the days after 15th of January. My C.O., when going to Lagos, left a medical doctor friend of his in my care. This doctor put up with the C.O. and remained in his house after the C.O’s departure. He came from Kano and would be flying back to Kano on the morning of the 15th of January. I saw him off to the Airport that morning where we met Lt. Col. George Kurubo from Lagos on his way back to Kaduna (Kurubo was then C.O. of the 3rd Battalion in Kaduna). It was from Kurubo that we learnt details about disturbances in Lagos. The doctor boarded the same plane. However, because the doctor visitor was taken to the Airport in the late Colonel’s Mercedes Benz car driven by his driver, this incident was later to be misinterpreted by some soldiers from Largema’s home place to mean that I killed Largema and was seen driving his Mercedes!

 

One of the officers in the battalion, Major Adegoke, phoned me from Ijebu-Ode. Contrary to my advice to stay where he was and keep away from the Battalion for some time, because things were not normal, he came anyway and arrived while I was away on a reconnaissance mission along Iwo Road and at the University. He was arrested and was being led by Lt. Ibrahim Bako when he broke loose and started to run. Lt. Bako pursued and, with both arms out stretched, was shouting, "Don’t shoot, don’t shoot" but unfortunately a soldier on sentry near the Officers’ Mess far away, took aim and shot him down. He died before getting to the hospital. (January 17th)

 

By this time (January 18th) Col. Adekunle Fajuyi had arrived Ibadan as the new Military Governor of the Western Region. I reported to him on my return from Iwo Road but strangely, he had already heard from other sources. Nonetheless, I welcomed him to Ibadan and to Government House according to instructions.

 

Meanwhile, after Adegoke’s incident the soldiers in the battalion were gradually becoming unruly. Col. Gowon (who had been appointed Chief of Staff, Army) got to know of the problem from Intelligence and came along with Major Mohammed Shuwa for him to take over from me since majority of the soldiers in all the Battalions were of Northern extraction. Nevertheless, even in Gowon’s presence, some of them were behaving abnormally. Some attempted to coc*k their guns, which necessitated their being seriously talked to and unsparingly scolded by Col. Gowon. This had the desired effect. I asked him to take my family with him back to Lagos while I chose to remain behind with my troops. He later returned to Lagos, as he came, along with Major Mohammed Shuwa.

 

Back at the Mess, Major Linus Ohanehi, one of my Company Commanders, called me aside and told me that my house had been attacked and the plan was to kill both of us that night. Capt. Achebe, the QuarterMaster (QM) confirmed the information about the attack on my house and on his word of honour confirmed the safety of my family. I told Major Ohanehi to find safety in town if he could but I, as the acting Commanding Officer, was not leaving the Battalion.

 

Two soldiers from late Col. Largema’s compound had carried out the attack on my house. They fired indiscriminately into my sitting room, hitting the pram in which my seven month old baby, Martin, was sitting but miraculously missing him before my wife raced down stairs to carry him to safety away from the house together with the other children. Distraught at the sudden and brutal murder of her husband in Lagos, late Col. Largema’s wife also attempted to stab my wife.

 

A Corporal from late Col. Largema’s place was offered money, ten pounds, to kill me. He came and told my wife and showed her the money but narrated how kind I was to him in the Congo. He was in my Company back then. He was poisoned and I had arranged to send him back to Nigeria for treatment, which is how he was saved. He, therefore, refused to do the bidding. The incident in the Congo had made him a regular visitor to the house and this naturally made him the target for the offer. When my wife asked him his next move he said he was returning the money and nothing will make him harm his "Oga". He did exactly as he said he would do.

 

This was the situation of uncertainty and distrust in the battalion until Captain (T/Major) Mobolaji Johnson was posted in to take over from me as Second-in-Command and Major Joe Akahan took over, also from me, the duties of the Commanding Officer. (This occurred in February/March 1966. Johnson was later posted to Lagos in June 1966 as Military Administrator, while Akahan remained as CO, 4th Battalion.)

https://dawodu.com/omoigui51.htm

The troops in Ibadan were very angry because their commander, Abogo Largema, was killed in the January coup. They even planned to march on Lagos, but the administrator of Lagos, Major Mobolaji Johnson, had to go and appeal to them that the killers of their commander would be punished.

In fact, I'll show you what they did to their 2nd in command after Largema died.

Idiko1:
In one instance of you post, you claimed to have done your research. Anyway, anybody who have written the bolded did no infantile or rudimentary research of a word. From many write-ups from those who precipitated the July 29, 1966 coup concluded Francis Fajuiyi was the leader of January 15, 1966 coup.

Emmanuel Ifeajuna was the leader of the January 15th coup. However, they recruited or tried to recruit a lot of soldiers.

Fajuyi was supportive of their coup and gave them a lot of advice. Some of the coupists were recruited at a course that he carried out.

Furthermore, he usually spoke in favour of the coupists at SMC meetings after the coup.


However, he was scheduled to be out of the country on a course at the time that the coup was to take place, so he didn't take an active part in the coup.

This is what Garba Dada was referring to when he said that Ironsi would disappear with his crocodile.

Officers usually have a swagger stick, but Ironsi's swagger stick was designed like a crocodile.

The soldiers that kidnapped him thought that it was juju. There was a time in the Congo that Ironsi was almost captured, but he was able to escape. A rumour had gone round that he disappeared using juju and that the swagger stick was his "disappearing juju".

William Walbe was one of the soldiers that kidnapped Ironsi from Danjuma. He has stated everything that happened, including events in the bush after they had taken Ironsi and Fajuyi away from Government House.

Fajuyi was one of the coupists as has been stated by other coupists, including Adewale Ademoyega. The northern officers who kidnapped Fajuyi and Ironsi suspected that he was one of the coupists because most of the people that did the January coup were at the company commanders course that Fajuyi commanded in Abeokuta. Some of the January coupists were recruited at that course.


After they came out of Government House, Danjuma ordered that Ironsi and Fajuyi should be detained at a particular place, but Garba Dada (aka Paiko) turned the submachine on Danjuma and complained that their elders were killed in January and people like Danjuma did nothing. He said that Ironsi would soon disappear with his crocodile, yet Danjuma is talking about detention. What stupid detention?


That's how Danjuma lost control. Remember that he was a stranger to the troops, because he came from Lagos with Ironsi. The core of the troops at Government House that night were Ibadan based troops and they were very angry because their commanding officer, Abogo Largema, had been killed at Ikoyi Hotel by Ifeajuna during the January coup. They wanted revenge.


They took Fajuyi and Ironsi into the bush and started interrogating them. Ironsi behaved like a true soldier. Remember that he had been a prisoner of war in Burma. He stated his name and rank and refused to say anything else (that's how prisoners of war are supposed to behave).

Garba Dada was asking him questions but he refused to talk. This angered Garba Dada and he suddenly shot him. William Walbe said that even he was shocked when Ironsi was shot.

The shooting provided an opportunity for Ironsi's ADC, Nwankwo, as he immediately ran into the bush during the confusion. The troops tried to get him, but they couldn't. Thereafter they shot Fajuyi too.


After killing and burying Ironsi and Fajuyi, they went to Agodi Prison to look for the January coup plotters.

They got there and the prison warden didn't want to allow them to see the prisoners because they didn't have the right paperwork.

William Walbe said that he was explaining to the prison warden when he suddenly felt something hot near his stomach. One of the other soldiers had suddenly shot the prison warden dead. The bullet went past Walbe's stomach. The soldier that shot said that Walbe and the warden were speaking too much English.


That's how they went on to torture the January coupists that were detained there.

wingmanIII:
So very true. They implicated Fajuyi in the Jan. 1966 coup, so he was also a major target.

Fajuyi was involved, but he was not around when the coup took place. He was scheduled to be abroad.


The soldiers that kidnapped him figured out that he was involved because he was the commander of a particular course and a lot of people that attended the course were involved in the January coup.

The January coupists tapped up a lot of people before their coup. Ademoyega even tapped up Ironsi in London, but he realised that Ironsi would never get involved.

One of the soldiers that kidnapped Ironsi and Fajuyi from Danjuma has told the whole story of what happened on that day.

He explained why they wanted Fajuyi (Fajuyi was one of their targets from the beginning. Forget about the fable of Fajuyi volunteering to go with them).

He talked about the interrogation of Ironsi in the bush and what Ironsi said and did.

He explained how Ironsi's ADCs escaped.

He talked about the thing that led to the shooting of Ironsi.


He talked about what happened at Agodi Prison afterwards and why the prison warden was killed.


Go and read. Look for facts. Stop believing fairytales.

juman:
Danjuma said he was not involved in killing of ironsi and fajuyi.
The boys got out of control that day.

Go and reread your history.

In fact, one of the boys that kidnapped Fajuyi and Ironsi from Danjuma confessed years before his death, but people don't read history. They prefer sensation to facts.