Fifty three years ago, “Five Majors” and a group of subalterns predominantly of Igbo or eastern extraction struck with Nigeria’s first coup and by the time their guns were silent, several prominent politicians and military officers of Northern, Hausa and or Fulani origin lay dead murdered in cold blood, including:
Politicians:
1. Prime Minister Abubakar Balewa (North)
2. Premier Ahmadu Bello (north)
3. Premier Samuel Akintola (west)
4. Finance Minister Festus Okotie Eboh (Midwest)
Military Officers:
1. Brig. Samuel Ademulegun (west)
2. Brig Zakariya Maimalari (north)
3. Col. Kur Mohammed (north)
4. Col. Ralph Shodeinde (west)
5. Lt. Col. Abogo Largema (north)
6. Lt. Col. James Pam (north)
7. Lt. Col. Arthur Unegbe (east)
Due to the ethnic origin of the “five majors”, the coup was generally perceived as an Igbo coup and viewed as a conspiracy by the Igbo to seize power and dominate the federal government aided by the seemingly selective nature of the killings because no prominent eastern politician or military leader was killed.
As events were unfolding reports about the way Sir Ahmadu Bello, the Northern Region Premier and spiritual leader of the Muslim North, was shot in front of his wives filtered to the masses, fueling the thirst for vengeance and they need to stop the Igbo.
It did not help that Major General Ironsi, an Igbo became Head of state and his field promotions of some Igbo officers to command positions in the Army where viewed as further proof of Igbo plans to dominate the military as well. That, followed by the promulgation of Unification Decree 34 which centralized federal control was the seen as the conclusion of these plans and the last straw.
Eventually the need for vengeance gravitated under the leadership of Major Murtala Mohammed, a firebrand Northern extremist, who was very vehement about the North’s anger at the killings at military meetings to reduce disquiet amongst the troops by the Ironsi administration, but he was not brought to heel as the regime was still trying to placate the military, in the interim plans to avenge continued clandestinely.
The Nigerian Army had its origins in the North from the old colonial West African frontier force and most of the Junior Officers and enlisted men were of ethnic northern Muslim origin. They did not take the killings of their charismatic commanders like Maimalari lightly and the primary motivation of many soldiers was to avenge the deaths of their military leaders and restore the old status quo.
On July 29, 1966, the Northern counter offensive, Operation Aure, to regain power was launched and “Within three days of the July outbreak, every Igbo soldier serving in the army outside the East was dead, imprisoned or fleeing eastward for his life”, observed Professor Ruth First in The Barrel of a Gun: The Politics of Coups d’états in Africa [Allen Lane The Penguin Press, London, 1970, p317.].
Northern soldiers systematically and savagely executed Igbo soldiers across all the major commands in the Nigerian Army particularly Zaria, Kaduna and Kano were most of the army establishments were located. Some soldiers like Major Okafor, former commander of the federal guards was marched out of Gboko prisons and buried alive. Other officers were executed in officer messes and others were called out from parades or through rouses, and executed.
Search parties were conducted to find Igbo officers and many were intercepted at the Makurdi bridge rail link and shot, their bodies were tossed into River Benue.
Following the coup, the pent-up fury of northern civilians against many easterners in their midst exploded and riots and mass lynching’s broke out targeting many easterners who were set ablaze forcing thousands to flee back to the Igbo homeland.
The combined killings by the Northern controlled military and mobs in the north was the prelude to the Nigerian Civil war led by the Northern Officer command against the beleaguered Igbo people in the east manned by former officers of the Nigerian Army who escaped eastward.
There has been no official roll call of all the soldiers executed or killed in the months following the counter coup but a couple of historians have been able to piece together the following incomplete list of soldiers of eastern extraction, particularly Igbo, who died during Operation Aure and they include the following all of Igbo or eastern extraction:
1. Major General Aguiyi Ironsi (Head of State)
2. Capt. G.N.E. Ugoala
3. Major C.J. Anuforo
4. Major D.O. Okafor
5. 2/Lt. A.D. Mbadiwe
6. Lt. A.D.C. Egbuna
7. Capt. A.L. Orok
8. Capt. A.O. Akpet
9. Major B.E. Nnamani
10. Major Christopher Emelifonwu
11. Capt. Chukwueke
12. Lt. E.C.N. Achebe
13. 2/Lt. E. Ogbonnaye
14. Lt.Col. G.O. Okonweze
15. Lt. G.O. Mbabie
16. Capt. H.A. Iloputaife
18. Lt.Col. I.C. Okoro
19. Capt. I.U. Idika
20. Major J.I. Obienu
21. Major J.O.C. Ihedigbo
22. Lt. J.D. Ovuezirie
23. Lt. J.U. Ugba
24. Capt. Jonathan Egere
25. Lt. K. Day Waribor
26. Capt. L.C. Dillibe
27. Major Obi
28. Major O. Isong
29. Capt. P.C. Okoye
30. 2/Lt P.K. Onyeneho
31. 2/Lt. P.D. Ekediyo
32. Lt. S.E. Onwukwe
33. Capt. S.E. Mmaduabum – East
34. Major T.E. Nzegwu
35. Lt. P.O. Ibik
36. Capt. R. Agbazue
37. W.O. 1 Elijah Anosike
38. S/Sgt. Ewom Ejiogu
39. W.O. 11 Ndarake Uyah
40. S/Sgt. Davison Njoku
41. S/Sgt. Sylvanus Ezekwu
42. Sgt. Evan Jim Udoh
43. Cpl. Pius Dike Orlu
44. Cpl. Michael Akwudike
45. Cpl. Johnson Agwu
46. L/Cpl. Gabriel Okezie
47. L/Cpl. David Ishikwuma
48. Pt. Fidelis Onyekwe
49. Pt. Mba Iroha
50. Sgt. Celestine Okafor
51. L/Cpl. William Omani
52. Pt. Innocent
53. L/Cpl. Josiah Onyejiaka
54. W.O. 1 Joseph Mba
55. L/Cpl. Mathew Njumike
56. S/Sgt. Joseph Ibekwe
57. S/Sgt. Afogboro
58. S/Sgt. Peter Bassey
59. Sgt. Robert Bassey
60. Sgt. Michael Uche
61. Sgt. Boniface Njemanze
62. Cpl. Timothy Isienyi
63. Cpl. Sunday Amaoli
64. Cpl. Anthony Amaoli
65. Cpl. Paul Udakwu
66. Cpl. Festus Nwaodika
67. Cpl. William Agbata
68. Cpl. Okorie Agwu
69. Cpl. Wilfred Azubuike
70. Cpl. Reginald Green
71. Cpl. Joseph Adaka
72. L/Cpl. Silas Uzomba
73. LCpl. Maurice Ibekwe
74. Pt. Joseph Ibe
75. Pt. Conelius Uwuoha
76. Pt. John Ekejuba
77. Pt. Egbu Ogbukagha
78. Pt. Gaius Ezinilo
79. Pt. Donatus Ngadukwu
80. Pt. Simon Anigbogu
81. Pt. Augustus Obasi
82. Pt. Joseph Chukwu
83. Pt. John Okpe
84. Pt. Wilfred Ugwu
85. Pt. Puis Egbe
86. Pt. Emmanuel Okorafor
87. Pt. Blessed Okonkwo
88. Pt. Samuel Chukwu
89. Pt. Frederick Ogbuchi
90. Pt. Rufus Okolo
91. Pt. Frederick Egbo
92. Pt. Alphonsus Nwaosu.
This disproportionate response, especially the execution of these Igbo soldiers who had nothing to do with the first coup has never been fully addressed or appreciated by the public or the planners of Operation Aure and the Nigerian Army and the North has remained silent about the issue.
Similarly, none of these victims were given military funerals, except for a few like Ironsi, as some of their corpses were never recovered or fully identified.
Besides some of the senior officers, families did not receive any official communication informing them of the death of these soldiers and no spirited efforts have been made to pay any pensions or gratuities to their surviving kit and kin.
No tribunals or board of inquiries have been instituted to give a full accounting or to bring the officers and men who committed these murders to a court of military justice either, and the Oputa Commission skirted around the Revenge coup.
Similarly, none of the five majors or subalterns who launched Nigeria’s first coup were brought before a court of military justice, but they all were either killed, or died and were dismissed without pensions from the Nigerian Army while the ring leaders of Operation Aure, the bloodiest coup in Nigeria’s history, went on to the pinnacle of military and political power.
With the passage of time, faded memories, retirements and deaths it is unlikely justice will be served, but there is still time to bring all the perpetuators of the first and revenge coup to justice as some are still alive today.
Centre for Nigeria Progress 