Ahmed Yahaya – Joe
I will never subscribe to the notion that Nigeria’s security and military architecture is so hamstrung and too clueless that it cannot effectively take down insurgents and bandits anywhere in the nation. The Federal Govt has always had infinite capacity.
I also do not accept that Northern military officers would so brazenly remove President Shagari from office unless it was in overall interest of Arewa in the long term.
I also affirm OBJ’s 1999 prison to Villa transformation was another “Army Arrangement” not fundamentally different from Shagari’s becoming president in 1979.
That is why I find the attached photograph that was taken in early May, 2015 during the transitional period of President-elect Muhammadu Buhari ahead of being sworn into office at the hilltop Defence House located in the highbrow, Maitama in Abuja very instructive.
It features the late President Shagari and his eldest son, Captain Mohammed Bala Shagari (rtd) on a congratulatory visit. It exemplifies the unusual candor, cohesion and solidarity within the big picture of the political North despite personal differences.
As Commander in Chief of the Nigerian Armed Forces from 1979 to 1983 President Shehu Usman Aliyu Shagari, GCFR had a provincial proclivity of fostering his fellow Northerners over our nation’s security and military architecture.
Paradoxically, the same people he trusted and depended upon not only sabotaged and undermined his administration but eventually removed him from office barely three months into his second term.
The historian, Max Siollun notes on the inner security and military circle of President Shagari, “Assuming that senior officers held on to regional and ethnic loyalties, Shagari ostensibly did not seem in great danger. His personal security was entrusted to individuals from his home state of Sokoto (now Sokoto, Zamfara and Kebbi States) in the northwest.
The commander of the Brigade of Guards, Commissioner of Police in Lagos, the GOC 2nd Division (overseeing Lagos), and director-general of the NSO (now DSS) were all like Shagari, from Sokoto State. Shagari had also been the NSO boss’ teacher when the latter was a school boy. In addition, all four divisions of the army had northern GOCs.”
On Shagari’s outer circle based in Lagos there were, “Major-General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida (Director of Army Staff Duties & Plans), Brigadier Sani Abacha (CO, 9th Mechanized Brigade, Ikeja), Brigadier Tunde Idiagbon (Military Secretary, Nigerian Army), Major Sambo Dasuki (Military Assistant to Army Chief, Lt. General Mohammed Inuwa Wushishi). The Director of Military Intelligence, Colonel Mohammed Aliyu Gusau contributed funding to the plotters (against Shagari) from his official budget.”
Outside Lagos across the nation were, Brigadier Ibrahim Bako, Lt. Colonels Halilu Akilu, David Mark and Tunde Ogbeha with Majors Abdulmumuni Aminu, Lawan Gwadabe, Al Mustapha Haruna Jokolo and Abubakar Dangiwa Umar.
The only non-Northerners in President Shagari’s hierarchy were IGP Sunday Adewusi and Navy chief, Vice Admiral Michael Adelanwa.
The game of smoke and mirrors started from October 1, 1979 when President Shagari was sworn into office for his first term. According to Dr. Chidi Amuta, the official biographer of IBB in Prince of the Niger: The Babangida Years (1992), “Even in the four years that Alhaji Shehu Shagari was to reside and work at Ribadu Road, those in charge of his security (mainly soldiers) pointed to the presence of many high-rise buildings surrounding the State House on Marina as excuses for not allowing the new civilian president to move away from Dodan Barracks!
What was perhaps unknown to the civilian leadership of the Second Republic was that by acquiescing to that logic, they had facilitated the next coup. Not only were the movements of the new civilian leadership closely monitored, their telephone conversations and other electronic based communications were routinely under military surveillance.”
IBB would confirm the opportunistic conspiracy against Shagari in his own words in the ThisDay newspaper edition of February 12, 2009; “We could have toppled that government in 1982. But then, we said no, because the people might go against us. You see, to stage a coup, there is one basic element that everybody looks for, there must be frustration in the society.”
The coup against President Shagari was therefore planned first and its planners waited for the right timing to justify it. This modus operandi is pertinent if we are to presently review the serial insecurity increasingly pervading Nigeria. Is it being contrived to a particular political end?
Nigerians should endeavor to keep their eyes on the political big picture rather than on the diversionary small scenes.
Agreed the coup against Shagari was carried out by ambitious merchants in uniform but was there a political grand strategy behind it all?
After a successful eight years of the Shagari presidency the issue of power shift particularly to his loyal and competent VP, Dr. Alex Ifeanyichukwu Ekwueme would have been on the nation’s agenda. That same issue is still topical decades later particularly ahead of 2023 when PMB would have rounded off eights on the saddle.
Is the political North that sacrificed one of its own as a pawn 38 years ago ready to relinquish power in just 2 years time? Karl Marx admonishes us that, “Men do not make history exactly as they please but, in circumstances directly encountered, given and transmitted from the past.”
After his removal from office on December 31, 1983 Shagari senior was kept incommunicado in Benin until the Justice Samson Uwaifo panel declared his good self and erthswhile VP as having “No case to answer” concerning any corruption charge or abuse of office on January 17, 1986.
While under custody the former president lost his much elder brother, Magajin Shagari, Muhammadu Bello and two of his wives gave birth. Malam Muhammadu had been like a father to the former president ever since their own father died when the future leader was just five years old.
Shagari junior, an NDA 18th Course officer was based in Zaria when his father was overthrown, but actually in Jos playing polo when the change guards took place. Ferried to Sokoto, he was detained for six weeks and retired from service. He would subsequently enter into business with Aliko Dangote. Unlike the rest of us the Shagaris have kept their eyes on the big picture instead of personalizing issues.
Adopting the IBB template is another frustration being deliberately engineered across Nigeria?
“Paddy paddy, Wayo wayo, add am together, give me the answer……..Army Arrangement” – Fela Kuti (1985)
