My reflections on Chief Olusegun Obasanjo
America, under Richard Nixon, was prepared to recognise Biafra if Col. Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu could hold Port Harcourt, the oil capital of Nigeria. This exposed the city to some of the fiercest battles in the Biafra-Nigeria War that left few buildings intact.
Houses belonging to Rivers’ indigenes not destroyed in the fight were selectively torched by the retreating Biafran soldiers. One such building was the world-class Graham-Douglas Library. Another was the Kingsway Store. It was the selective destruction of their estates that produced an opposite emotion in the victims who seized houses owned by Igbos. The unfortunate abandoned property incident started that way.
Commander Alfred Diete-Spiff, governor of the newly created Rivers State, intervened by instructing his Attorney-General, Nabo Graham-Douglas, to craft a bill establishing the Abandoned Property Authority (APA). This institution was saddled with two core functions, namely, to (1) Collect rents for absentee Igbo landlords pending their return at the end of hostilities, and (2) Avoid direct confrontation between the returning landlords and indigenes occupying the houses.
Least to say, Commander Diete-Spiff’s intervention did not go down well with his subjects. Their argument was that since they were made homeless by Biafran soldiers who discriminately burnt down estates belonging to Rivers’ indigenes, there was no moral ground why Rivers government should collect rents from them for taking over Igbo properties.
But the point is that the Port Harcourt of 1969 was the Fanonian native town on its knees without adequate light, water and accommodation. The fog of war shrouding it was too ominous for comfort. Deep craters made by exploding shells made the roads unusable and the streets and sidewalks were overtaken by tall grass.
As the first Commissioner for Finance, like other commissioners, I had no accommodation and was patching up in a chalet at the Catering Rest House, now Delta Hotels. The entire premises were overgrown with bush and a small path was cut out to help me access my room.
But somewhere at Amadi Flat I was lucky to stumble upon a damaged building with its roof still in place. Not minding that it had no doors and windows, I set about renovating it. The renovation was almost completed when my joy was cut short. A white oil worker turned up claiming that he had come to take the house for British Petroleum-(BP)’s operations.
What…. British what? I was so incensed that I walked him out of my office with the warning for him never to come back. Where was British Petroleum (BP) when we needed it most? I was still livid when I attended the state executive council meeting of that day where I narrated my encounter to my brother commissioners, famously known as Rivers First Eleven.
Months later I was reasonably surprised when young Col. Olusegun Obasanjo, the new Commander of 3rd Marine Commando representing the army in the great Commander Diete-Spiff government, offered me his own accommodation on Forces Avenue. He had taken note of my accommodation problem and decided to act.
In making his offer, he explained that he had decided to move over to Link Road as his presence there would ensure security. Instead of one of his own officers taking over his lodge he had decided that I should have it. Humourously adding, “Don’t go and punch anyone on the nose.”
Another name for Link Road was MAN-MUST-WHACK ROAD. It was the abode of highway men where murders and abductions were a daily occurrence. Known today as Olu Obasanjo Road, in honour of the gallant officer who purged it of vice, it was to this swampy forest of raffia trees and decomposing corpses that Col. Obasanjo relocated to and I gratefully moved into his official lodge. Can you imagine such generosity?
Col. Obasanjo’s gesture was not a favour done me as an individual. Rivers people were the beneficiary of his magnanimity as the house he gave me passed on to other commissioners. Today I say to Chief Obasanjo, “Thank you for that act of kindness, sir.”
When on 16th May 1969, Col. Obasanjo assumed command of the 3rd Marine Commando, the vile propaganda spewing from Radio Biafra did everything to denigrate him. In vitriolic monologues meant to sow moral panic among war-weary Rivers population, Okokon Ndem of Radio Biafra jubilated that a woman had taken over the command of 3rd Marine Commando from Col. Benjamin Adekunle. It was a disingenuous measure meant to cause maximum psychological damage on Rivers and South Eastern States’ listeners considering that Col. Ojukwu had earlier warned Rivers would remain a paper state none would live in.
Col. Obasanjo himself understood what was going on. Only a decisive military victory would reassure Rivers people that their young state was here to stay. He set about defending the coastal states with a singleness of purpose.
In my contemplation of Chief Obasanjo, therefore, my best definition of him, considering the near half a century I worked closely with him, is that he is a kind-hearted and unassuming man. Humane even under permissive war condition when he could get away with cruelty, his uprightness encouraged the Biafran leadership to stop fighting and surrender. Tell that to posterity. Also tell posterity that his magnanimity notwithstanding, he was a lion when the occasion called for it. His raw bravery won the war for Nigerian unity.
The day Biafra fell I was in his office and what I saw convinced me of his nobility of character. With Generals Alani Akinrinade and Olu Obajowa assisting, Col. Obasanjo frantically mobilised his soldiers in putting down the last resistance while, at the same time, assembling and sending relief materials to refugees trapped in East Central State. His bold intervention saved thousands, put mildly.
Following the July 1975 coup I went back to my students at the University of Ibadan. The new Mohammed/Obasanjo regime appointed me, in addition to my lecturing job, a member of the first Governing Council of University of Illorin, Kwara State. I was also appointed a foreign policy adviser, which made me a member of the General Shehu Musa Yar’Adua-led Foreign Policy Advisory Council.
The Advisory Council had three of us from the academia, namely, Dr. Ibrahim Tahir from Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, Professor Alaba Ogunsanwo from the University of Lagos and my humble self. In addition, it also had the following ministers as members: The Foreign Minister, Brigadier-General Joe Garba; the Ministers of Defence, Economic Development and Reconstruction, and Finance. As a member of this council I again worked with General Obasanjo who was the second man in the Supreme Military Council (SMC).
The Mohammed/Obasanjo regime was a watershed in the sense that Africa became the centerpiece of Nigerian non-aligned policy. Afro-centricism, according to informed opinion, marked the Golden Age of Nigerian diplomacy that brought the regime into direct confrontation with the West. Considering the deadly dagger and cloak diplomacy of the Cold War era, the courage these maverick generals exhibited defying Super Powers is better imagined. I give two instances.
One, in 1975 there was a deadlock in the Organisation of African Unity, OAU, over whether the body should recognise the American puppet called Jonas Savimbi or nationalist Augustino Neto as the legitimate leader of Angola. American Secretary of State, Henry Kissinger, who was my professor of International Politics in Harvard famed for his Shuttle Diplomacy, was in African capitals trying to sway the impending second vote to Savimbi’s favour. Failure to install Savimbi, Kissinger was prepared to fly the kite of coalition government.
The Federal Government was sufficiently briefed on the true state of things in Angola and responded by taking the following emergency measures: (a) It cancelled Kissinger’s visit to Lagos (b) General Murtala Ramat Mohammed himself led the Nigerian delegation to Addis Ababa where Nigeria led the OAU into recognising Neto, and (c) Nigeria saw to it that the continental body also rejected a coalition government in Angola as that was the trap the West used in destroying Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba of Congo when they yoked him with Joseph Kasavubu in a diabolical coalition.
Two, in 1979 British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher toyed with Zimbabwean independence. General Obasanjo promptly retaliated by nationalising British Petroleum. From India to America the world held its breath and watched but the heavens did not fall. Iron Lady Thatcher wobbled and called for a face-saving Lancaster House Conference. Zimbabwe under Robert Gabriel Mugabe won its independence the following year.
Chief Obasanjo’s statesmanship shines through. On 10th August 1985 there was Conference of All Nigerian Ambassadors, where Nigeria’s one hundred ambassadors gathered to review our foreign policy, at the National Institute for Policy and Strategic Studies, Kuru. I had the singular privilege of being elected chairman of the Conference Drafting Committee, CDC, that produced 500-page document on Nigerian foreign policy with every country, United Nations, UN, and OAU. In my committee were highly experienced Ambassadors E. Abuah, E.G. Dimko, B.A. Adeyemi, B.G. Kingibe, M.O. Ononaiye, J. Iroha, B. Yusuf and M.B. Ekpang.
As a dedicated former head of state, Chief Obasanjo not only came down to brief the conference but displayed additional kindness and encouragement by inviting us to his Ota Farm where he treated us to a sumptuous chicken lunch. I stand to testify that (1) The chickens we ate were not imported frozen chickens but home-grown hatched and bred in Ota Farm (2) The visit brought us face to face with an exemplary leader who practised outside Dodan Barracks the Operation Feed the Nation, OFN, he preached while in it. His humility and rare sense of duty was overwhelming as he could have gone abroad in 1979 after handing over power to President Shehu Shagari. He decided to stay and farm, and (3) Chief Obasanjo’s love for the intellectual life saw him on Sabbatical at the University of Ibadan where he coped with inadequate electricity.
Lawrence Baraebibai Ekpebu
Remarks by Ambassador (Prof) Lawrence Baraebibai Ekpebu at Foundation-laying ceremony of Azikel Refinery, Obunagha, Yenagoa, by former president Olusegun Obasanjo, marking the sixth year in office of Henry Seriake Dickson, Bayelsa State governor.