By Tiko Okoye
In a few weeks – July 6, to be more precise – it would be exactly 55 years since then-Nigerian military Head of State and Commander-in-Chief (C-in-C) of the Armed Forces of Nigeria and Chairman of the Supreme Military Council (SMC), then-Lt. Col. Yakubu Gowon, declared war on the short-lived Republic of Biafra.
The United States State Department recently declassified top-secret diplomatic dispatches. They are spread over 21,000 pages and provide previously unknown information about the Nigeria/Biafra civil war. This columnist would be making use of copious excerpts from the declassified dossier to more objectively link the dots embedded in the potpourri of information in a four-part series.
Part 1 encapsulates the high-wire tension, intrigues and power play enveloping the discussions and negotiations between the Nigerian and Biafran representatives up to when the first shot was fired about 5a.m. on Thursday, July 6, 1967. Part 2 lays out credible arguments as to why the Biafran invasion should be contextually better perceived as an attempt to complete the ethnic cleansing that started in July 1966.
In Part 3, I will discuss what I adjudge to be wrong decisions made, and golden opportunities missed, by Ojukwu that completely changed the course of the war. Part 4 is an epilogue that attempts to analyse the Igbo situation in Nigeria today – and proffer a way forward.
According to the declassified secret reports, “a high-powered Nigerian delegation led by Gowon’s trusted civilian deputy and adviser, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, and including super-civil servants like Philip Asiodu and Okoi Arikpo, met with Shell-BP top directors, with the British Ambassador (American phrase for High Commissioner) to Nigeria, Sir David Hunt, in attendance.”
This is what Sir Hunt reportedly said in confidence to his American counterpart, Elbert Matthews, after the meeting: “Awolowo is very firmly in control of the Ministry of Finance and he is giving Stanley Gray (Shell-BP’s General Manager) and other experts from London a very difficult time for the past three days.” Why and how?
“Shell-BP,” one of the dispatches goes on to reveal, “had frozen royalty payments due to the Federation Account on June 1, 1967 after the declaration of the Republic of Biafra. Ojukwu had ordered all oil companies to (immediately) start paying all royalties to Enugu because they were (now) operating in a new country (Biafra), else risk heavy sanctions and penalties. He was demanding a minimum of £2million from Shell-BP.”
Both the Nigerian and Biafran administrations desperately needed the royalty payments from the global oil giant, Shell-BP, to stock up on war supplies. The challenge was that while Biafra controlled the land on which the oil installations sat, the Nigerian government had imposed an economic blockade barring all merchant vessels and seagoing tankers from sailing to and from the coastal areas of those lands that Ojukwu had declared part and parcel of Biafra. The Catch-22 stalemate confronted Shell-BP with a dilemma over whose order it should obey.
According to one dispatch, in a spirited effort to safely navigate between the devil and the deep blue sea, officials of the Anglo-Dutch oil conglomerate “tried to convince Awolowo to accept a deal deemed highly favourable to Nigeria, and one that will simultaneously not predispose oil workers and the £150 miilion investment (in 1967 prices) to danger and sabotage in the hands of Biafran military forces. The deal would see Shell-BP pay Biafra (the relatively paltry sum of) £250,000 and pay the lion’s share of the royalty amount to Nigeria. Awolowo bluntly refused, arguing that anything short of the status-quo amounted to recognition of Biafra and concession to the rebels.”
In the week leading up to the SMC meeting of Tuesday, July 3, 1967, both nations of Nigeria and Biafra were on tenterhooks. Virtually everyone knew by now that war was a matter of ‘when’ and no longer ‘if.’ Col. Mohammed Shuwa’s First Area Command had moved its headquarters to Makurdi; the 2nd battalion relocated to Adikpo; and the 4th battalion garrisoned in Oturkpo. By this time, members of the SMC had begun meeting twice daily and it was simply a matter of waiting for the Nigerian C-in-C to give the marching orders. The Republic of Biafra, which was already on a high level of alert, equally waited with baited breadth.
So, why was the 30-year-old bachelor HOS and C-in-C still dragging his feet? There was only one plausible reason – and it was an open secret. Gowon was very besotted, and in love, with a Jos-born dashing Igbo beauty named Edith Ike – a scion of the renowned Ike family of Ikelionwu Town in present-day Anambra State (remember one-time Registrar of the West African Examinations Council, Prof Vincent Ike, who later became the traditional ruler of Ikelionwu kingdom?).
According to a declassified secret US document dated July 1, 1967, “Edith’s parents, having lived in the North for 30 years and where she was born, had fled back to the East in October 1966 because of that year’s massacre of the Igbo.” Edith relocated from Jos in March 1967 to be with Gowon in Lagos. The handsome C-in-C was walking a very tight rope.
“He was not the most senior officer in the army (after the assassination of Ironsi). He was not a Muslim Hausa or Fulani (from the core North). He was a Christian from one of the small minorities that dot the North and yet, events had promoted him to the position of HOS and C-in-C – to the chagrin of many northern (military) officers, politicians and emirs.”
There was no gainsaying that Gowon was facing a pressure cooker scenario: save the treasure of his heart by continuing to delay relaying the order to start the war or risk being violently toppled by resentful top Muslim officers already openly sniggering that their supreme commander had gone AWOL and cavorting with his Igbo lover. The implication was ominous: how could such a C-in-C be trusted to adopt the appropriate measures against his “in-laws” in a major dogfight!
Love – that strong romantic feeling of affection for somebody else – has brought down kingdoms, created bitterness and feuds among families and organisations, and even caused wars between nations. King Edward V voluntarily abdicated the throne of England in favour of marrying his American-divorcee lover and going on self-exile to France where love fantasies are given free expression. But not Gowon. The actions he next took proved that while he loved Edith, he was not madly in love with her neither was she the love of his life. Self-preservation was his top-most priority. And so, Edith, who was prepared to risk her life for her love-interest by refusing to return with her parents to the East was suddenly left high and dry.
Still, Gowon was bent on arranging for Edith’s safety prior to giving the green light for the invasion to commence. According to the declassified document, “Gowon called the West German Ambassador in Lagos to broker a deal to guarantee the security of Edith. The Germans were eager to be in the good books of the Gowon administration. A war loomed. And in wars, buildings, roads, bridges and other infrastructure are destroyed. These would need rebuilding.
“The contract for the 2nd Mainland Bridge (later called Eko Bridge) was signed two years earlier by the (German) Ambassador (and) CEO of Julius Berger Tiefbau AG and Shehu Shagari (remember him?), Federal Commissioner for Works and Survey. That was Julius Berger’s first contract in Nigeria…and they wanted more bilateral cooperation.
The Ambassador assured Gowon over the phone that he had taken care of all the details and guaranteed the safety of Edith, the nation’s ‘First Girlfriend.’” As soon as Edith arrived in Frankfurt, she phoned her ‘Jack,’ as she fondly called Gowon.
Edith’s safe arrival was the signal to finally let loose hell. And with that, Gowon unleashed his impatient troops to transform the lands of the ‘rebels’ into killing fields. The general's ‘Police Action’ aka ‘Operation Unicord’ was well underway!
*Ichie Okoye is a commentator on public issues
*Next week: Why an analytical perusal of the declassified secret US dossier inevitably leads to the conclusion that finishing the uncompleted task of ethnic cleansing was really Job No.1 and not the hollow slogan of keeping Nigeria nation united…
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