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Nigeria The 1966 Coups, Civil War, and Gowon's Government
By the time a disparate group of junior officers struck
first
in January 1966, the officers were still politically naive
and
had yet to master the art of coup planning and execution.
This
inexperience partly explains why Major Kaduna Nzeogwu and
others
who masterminded the coup, failed to take over state
power.
Instead, Major General Johnson Aguiyi Ironsi, commander in
chief
of the army, became Nigeria's first military ruler. Some
of the
remote causes of the coup included the use of soldiers to
quell
unrest, such as the riots among the Tiv people of the
lower
northern region, and calls on the military to supervise
the 1964
elections. Whereas the latter involvement gave the
soldiers a
feeling of political efficacy, the beginnings of what came
to be
known as the "federal character" principle that sought to
give
each area some parity of representation, gave military
personnel
a sense of being sectional representatives. The coup of
January
1966 was seen by many northerners as an attempt by the
Igbo
people of the east to dominate the federation. A
successful
countercoup six months later led by northern soldiers
demonstrated the degree to which soldiers had become
politicians
in uniform.
The immediate reasons for the first-coup, however,
concerned
the nationwide disillusionment with the corrupt and
selfish
politicians, as well as with their inability to maintain
law and
order and guarantee the safety of lives and property.
During the
initial stages, Nzeogwu and his collaborators were hailed
as
national heroes. But the pattern of killings in the coup
gave it
a partisan appearance: killed were the prime minister, a
northerner, the premier of the Northern Region, and the
highest
ranking northern army officers; only one Igbo officer lost
his
life. Also killed was the premier of the Western Region
who was
closely allied with the NPC.
General Ironsi, an Igbo, emerged as the head of state.
In his
policies and actions, Ironsi did little to allay the fears
of
Igbo domination. He failed to place the coup plotters on
trial as
northern leaders demanded, and he appointed Igbos to
sensitive
governmental positions. Against all advice, Ironsi
promulgated
Decree Number 34 of 1966, which abrogated the federal
system of
government and substituted a unitary system; he argued
that the
military could only govern in this way. Given the already
charged
atmosphere, this action reinforced northern fears. As the
north
was less developed than the south, a unitary system could
easily
lead to southerners "taking over control of everything,"
as a
northern spokesperson put it. It was at the height of
northern
opposition to unitarism that the countercoup of July 1966
took
place. Most top-ranking Igbo officers, including Ironsi,
lost
their lives; the "status quo" of northern dominance was
restored.
Lieutenant Colonel (later General) Yakubu Gowon, a
Christian
from the middle belt, became the head of state after the
coup.
His first act was to reinstate the federal system, along
with the
four regions and their allotted functions. But relations
between
the federal government and the Eastern Region, led by
military
governor Colonel Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu, were very
strained.
In addition to the elimination of many Igbo officers
during the
July coup, a massive pogrom against Igbos occurred in the
Northern Region. In September Colonel Gowon summoned an ad
hoc
constitutional conference to deliberate on the country's
political future. Most regional delegates to the
conference, with
the exception of those from the midwest, recommended a
confederal
system to replace the federal system. The delegates from
the
Eastern Region insisted that any region wishing to secede
from
the federation should be allowed to do so. The conference
was
ended abruptly by increased killings of Igbos in the north
and
the heightening of tensions between the federal government
and
the Eastern Region. A summit of military leaders at Aburi,
Ghana,
in January 1967 attempted to resolve the disagreements and
recommended the establishment of a base confederation of
regions.
The Aburi Agreement became a source of contention, however
(see Civil War
, ch. 1).
In anticipation of eastern secession, Gowon moved
quickly to
weaken the support base of the region by decreeing the
creation
of twelve new states to replace the four regions. Six of
these
states contained minority groups that had demanded state
creation
since the 1950s. Gowon rightly calculated that the eastern
minorities would not actively support the Igbos, given the
prospect of having their own states if the secession
effort were
defeated. Many of the federal troops who fought the civil
war,
known as the Biafran War, to bring the Eastern Region back
to the
federation, were members of minority groups.
The war lasted thirty months and ended in January 1970.
In
accepting Biafra' unconditional cease-fire, Gowon declared
that
there would be no victor and no vanquished. In this
spirit, the
years afterward were declared to be a period of
rehabilitation,
reconstruction, and reconciliation. The oil-price boom,
which
began as a result of the high price of crude oil (the
country's
major revenue earner) in the world market in 1973,
increased the
federal government's ability to undertake these tasks.
The postwar Gowon government issued a nine-point
transition
program that was to culminate in the handing over of power
to a
civilian government on October 1, 1976. The agenda of the
transition included the reorganization of the armed
forces, the
completion of the establishment of the twelve states
announced in
1967, a census, a new constitution, and elections.
Gowon initiated several nation-building policies, the
most
notable of which was the National Youth Service Corps
(NYSC), a
community service institution that required one year of
service
by each Nigerian immediately after graduation from
university or
other institution of higher learning. Each member of the
corps
had to serve in a state other than his or her home state.
More
than 1 million graduates had served in this program by
1990.
The Gowon years also saw the oil boom and a buoyant
economy.
The federal government was encouraged to take on some
responsibilities formally allocated to the states,
especially in
the area of education. It embarked on major
infrastructural
projects to transfer control of the economy from
foreigners to
Nigerians. The Nigerian Entreprises Promotion decree of
1972,
which was expanded in 1977, stipulated that only Nigerians
could
participate in certain categories of business. In those in
which
foreign involvement was permitted, controlling shares had
to be
owned by Nigerians.
The structure of government under Gowon was basically
unitarian. At the apex of government was the all-military
Supreme
Military Council (SMC), which was the lawmaking body for
the
entire federation. Its decrees could not be challenged in
any law
court. Most members of the SMC under Gowon were state
governors.
There was also a Federal Executive Council composed of
military
and civilian commissioners. The states also had
commissioners
appointed by the governor. The states were practically
reduced to
administrative units of the federal government, which in
several
domains made uniform laws for the country. This basic
structure
of military federalism has, with amendments, remained the
same
during all military governments in the country.
Data as of June 1991
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