Reflections Without Mirror….Niyi Aborisade
Col. Victor Adebukunola Banjo: A Genuine Revolutionary Part 5
*The meeting*
Wole Soyinka met Obasanjo as agreed. Part of the agreement was that they should not come with anybody and they should not be driven there by anybody and there should be no weapons . Both violated their agreement because both brought escorts or lookouts. They, of course, managed to lose their lookouts so that they could discuss it alone. It was supposed to be an oral message for security purposes . Obasanjo, in fact, came with a gun concealed under his cloth but big enough for Wole Soyinka to notice. His excuse was that he was a military officer and he must be armed for protection as a military commander and particularly, it was in the war time.
*The Message*
Wole Soyinka delivered Banjo’s message to Obasanjo, who was the Garrison Commander at Ibadan. According to Wole Soyinka in his book ‘ *You must Set Forth at Dawn* ‘ He delivered the message in accordance with the way Banjo told him and there was no inducement of money or financial promise . (Please see part 4 of this piece) for the quote of the message from Soyinka. Obasanjo listened carefully and declined . He advised Soyinka to tell Banjo that he may use water ways to reach Lagos and that he needs not come through Ibadan . They parted their ways but Soyinka in meeting Obasanjo had put himself in trouble. A trouble that will cause him his freedom of movement for sometimes.
*Obasanjo’s Options*
At this juncture, Col Obasanjo had many options and I propose to deal with the options here and see why he chose the option he chose
The message from Banjo through Soyinka was to solicit for co-operation from Obasanjo for easy passage to Lagos for him and his army , Banjo did not want and did not need to fight in Ibadan to avoid unnecessary loss of lives and destruction of properties in the capital of Western Region apart from lacking adequate weapons to do so. Furthermore, He had no grouse with Obasanjo and his army, the Yorubas were not his problem he was one of them, he himself was not a Biafran but the commander of the Liberation Army of Nigeria. He represented a third force in a way. One of the reasons for the disagreement
between Gowon and Ojukwu was that Gowon was not the most senior military officer, and he should not take over the army, Brigadier Ogundipe and Col. Robert Adeyinka Adebayo were his seniors and so why should he be the head of states. So the enemy was the Northern Oligarchs headed by Gowon in Lagos, if there will be any serious fight in Yoruba land it has to be in Lagos which was the capital of Nigeria and the seat of the the head of state. In short, if Gowon could be removed , it may bring an end to the war, so reasoned Banjo with all sincerity. The reasoning of Banjo was ideological in principle and tactical in concept.
. However, Ojukwu had another secret plan to capitalise on Banjo’s success, which was to combine the Yoruba land with Biafra and he Ojukwu would rule over them and Banjo had to do the dirty work for him. Sending the offspring of fire to fire ( omo ina la ran si ina). Ojukwu, in one of the three conditions that he gave to Banjo, had reserved to himself the power to choose the governor of the Western Region should Banjo capture the place.
One of Obasanjo’s options was to co-operate with Banjo but ——-
Any co-operation from Obasanjo to that simply meant one thing ‘ Treason’ because it would have amounted to sabotage, he was on the federal side and his loyalty must be to his commander in chief. Obasanjo was a professional soldier, he cannot compromise his country.
2nd option was to deny him the passage and to tell Wole Soyinka that it was mission impossible and kept quiet but should it eventually leaked out, Obasanjo would still be liable for ‘ Treason’. In the military, if you heard of a sabotage or a coup, you must report it to your commander immediately unless you are a party to it, any failure to report a sabotage means you are complicit and you are as guilty as the conspirators or the saboteurs.
The third option was to tell the commander in chief, Gowon, of the meeting he had with Soyinka and the proposal from Banjo. Obasanjo took the last option and divulged what was told in secret and confidence to Gowon but according to Soyinka, he added some lies to it because, Banjo did not promise him any money and he, Soyinka did not tell Obasanjo of any financial inducement . This is a difficult one, since it was only the two of them that were present in the meeting. However, having considered the statements of the two of them on the matter, I prefer Wole Soyinka version to that of Obasanjo for the simple reason that Soyinka had been punished already for the alleged offence and so there is no reason why he will not say it as it was. Soyinka was the one that had meeting with Banjo and he knew the message he was given to deliver had no monetary reward. On the other hand , Obasanjo had convinced Gowon of the monetary inducement so that Gowon would take him serious and promote him, he has to maintain it lest he should look like a bad man before the people. In any event , Soyinka was arrested and spent over 24 months in prison, he was not released until 1969.
Later in life and long time after the War, when Soyinka met Gowon, the latter was a bit awkward but Soyinka embraced him and told him that if the boots then were on the other side, he Soyinka would have done the same thing. This concession put Gowon at ease, and they have been good friends since then.
During the stalemate when Banjo by necessity due to lack of adequate weapons and heavy bombardment from the federal side halted his advance , he was quickly labelled a saboteur because he refused to commit suicide and waste the lives of the soldiers under him. Captain Gbulie confirmed in his book in respect of why Banjo halted his movement to Lagos, ‘ *The Fall of Biafra ” To those of us who had known the talented Yoruba Officer(Banjo) while behind prisons bars on account of Nigeria’s first coup d’etat, he had merely acted in obedience to his own conviction.” .* Banjo did not believe in wasting the lives of people placed under him the way Ojukwu did and this personal conviction destroyed the relationship between them as friends since their military career started in the 50s. Perhaps one should ask why Ojukwu fled before the end of the war and did not die in Biafra but deserted his army unbefitting of a war general. This is not to undermine Ojukwu at all but Banjo had followed the yoruba proverbial sayings ” to know when to fight and when to retreat is the hall mark of a true warrior, a warrior who knows how to fight and did not know when to retreat will die in battle . Banjo knew that the weapons he had were not sufficient to carry him to Lagos. His political calculations of using Soyinka as a mediator between him and Obasanjo would have been a mark of a genius if Obasanjo had played ball and keyed into it. Unfortunately, Obasanjo did not key in to his plan.
*The Spies*
Ojukwu invited Banjo to a meeting in Enugu but prior to that time, Ojukwu had raised some Spies whose duties were to just visit some commanders at the war front and secretly interviewed them on the State of things. Anyone who expressed himself against the commander in chief on his poor handling of the war and tactics were penned down as saboteurs . Col Achuzia was one of Ojukwu favourite spies.
According to Phillip Effiong, it got to a stage when even advice must be carefully given lest one was labelled as saboteur. Ojukwu spies were everywhere.
It was, therefore, easy for officers like Banjo, who was outspoken to fall into the net of Ojukwu spies. The truth was better placed by Phillip Effiong ( an Ibo officer and next to Ojukwu)in his book , ‘ *The Cage Bird Sang No More’* he maintained that Ojukwu ‘ *Military appreciation was amateurish…. he indulged in debate and seminars while the collapse of Biafra was staring us in the face. No saboteurs could have been more effective'”.* In other words Ojukwu was responsible for the fall of Biafra and indirectly sabotaged himself but he needed a scapegoat and who was better to be a scapegoat than the Yoruba senior officer who stand taller above all the other officers and who was too independent for the Oxford graduate commander in chief.
*Banjo’s Arrest*
On arriving at Enugu, Banjo telephoned his excellency to announce his arrival but he was told to wait. He was disarmed and arrested on account of planning a coup against commander in chief of Biafra. The newly promoted col Ifeajuana, Major Alale and Agbam had been arrested earlier and Banjo was not aware of that.
According to Alexander Madiebo in his book ‘ *The Nigerian Revolution and Biafra War* ‘ Banjo stated in his defence ” *My stay in Biafra, after having been released from prison has been due to my friendship with Col Ojukwu ……I came to the war at a moment of temporary collapse of the Biafran fighting effort, when it became quite clear to me that the fighting effort of Biafran Army was not only being incompetently handled, but also being sabotaged . Since then, it has been my fortune to command the Biafran troops on their successful exploits”.*
Banjo was a victim of his own successes. His position in Biafra as a Yoruba man and his unqualified success in taking Midwest without losing a single soldier, his disagreement with Ojukwu on the choice of governor in Mid -West , his refusal to proceed to Lagos without adequate weapons,his request for equal partnership had marked him out for elimination already. Ojukwu would still have tried to eliminate him anyway even if he was successful in taking Lagos because Ojukwu had his own secret plan unknown to Banjo and It appeared he was being used by Ojukwu to tread where no other Ibo Officers can tread but now that he had expressed his independent personal conviction to Ojukwu and demurred from proceeding to Lagos, there was no two way, he must die. The allegation of planning a coup was just a formal way by Ojukwu of justifying his inordinate desire of murdering an innocent man to cover his failings . See Major General Phillip Effiong comments above
Banjo denied the allegation of planning any coup ——- to be continued
Niyi Aborisade is a lawyer a Human Rights Activist and a historian
