the collapse of the first republic Flashcards
the collapse of the first republic
Until the mid-sixties, the interest of academics in the African political change was concerned mainly on the role of political parties, pragmatic leadership, political and democratic institutions. There was no focus on the military as an alternative political force because of the peaceful manners by which most African countries were granted independence by the imperial powers. Oyediran (1979:1) posits: Unlike in many Latin American countries, independence in most African countries was granted through constitutional negotiation rather than through military action. This peaceful transfer of power gave considerable advantage to other political forces in the task of nation-building. The failure of these forces helped to prepare the way for the military. The systemic failure in the Nigeria s First Republic, therefore, paved the way for the military intervention on January 15, 1966.
how did the first military coup happen
The first military coup took place in Nigeria on January 15, 1966 when the five military officers in the rank of Majors led by Major Nzeogwu Kaduna, announced the military take-over of the civilian government led by Sir Abubakar Tafawa Balewa. The young military officers claimed to have come, among others, to bring to an end, gangsterism and disorder, corruption and nepotism. However, with the benefit of hindsight, it has been revealed that there were more to it than the stated reasons for the military putsch. In the opinion of A.H. M Kirk-Green (See Kurfi, 1983:23) the tragedy of 1967 (civil war) is that many of its seeds were not, as is often claimed, sown in October or even July 1966, but in the 1950 s or, as some see it, in 1914 or may be even in 1900 itself.
Remote Causes
i) Unbalanced Federal Structure
Political analysts are of the opinion that the genesis of the 1966 military coup was the 1914 amalgamation of the Northern and Southern Protectorates of Nigeria with one of the regions bigger in size and population than the other two put together. The bringing together of diverse people with different socio-cultural background, level of education and development is seen as an unbalanced structure which naturally provoke suspicion and fear of domination by the minority ethnic groups in the country. This phenomenon found expression in Oluleye (1985:p.xvii) that the Nigerian Army was Northern-dominated to the magnitude of 70% in both cadres, officers and other ranks. This structural dilemma of the Nigerian Army as an integral part of the body politic, made it difficult to be completely free from the influences of politics in the country.
Tribal/Regional Parties
Another remote cause of the 1966 military uprising could be traced to the seed of tribalism and nepotism embedded in the formation of the three major political parties by the three major ethnic groups that were later to control the regional governments of their origin. The ethnic rivalry which began in 1941 between the Ibo and Yoruba members of the Nigerian Youth Movement over the Ikoli-Akinsaya crisis resulted in the Igbo members leaving the party en mass and thus, reducing the NYM to a Yoruba organization. This, in the opinion of Schwarz Jr., (1965:51), was the beginning of the plague on Nigerian politics ever since. Between 1941 and 1950, the unhealthy rivalry between the Ibo and Yoruba became so intensified even beyond the political turf that by 1948 Azikiwe had ceased to be Zik of Africa but Zik of the Ibo nation (Oyediran, O., 1979:7).
Lack of clear-cut ideologies by most of the First Republic major political parties was also identified as a remote cause of the 1966 coup. The NPC was feudalistic and aristocratic which cont rasted to its political bed mate (the NCNC) that embraced, to some extent, egalitarian temperament while the Action Group preached democratic socialism . But it was only the latter that showed some degree of commitment to its avowed ideology through the populist s programmes which the party introduced in the Western Region. Closely related to this was the role of the official opposition played by the AG which made the party s leadership become vulnerable for political elimination because opposition which was a core element in the Westminster system practised in the First Republic is alien to African politics.
Remote Causes
Intolerance of Opposition The AG literally became a thorn in the flesh of the ruling parties especially with the ferocious criticisms and eventual defeat of the Anglo-Nigeria Defence Pact of 1961 with the support of the students of the University of Ibadan. The NPC-NCNC foreign policy also came under the sledge hammer of the AG that also championed the cause of the minority ethnic groups who were agitating for additional state creation in the country. The party was doing these in order to gain the people s support so that it could win the next election and form the federal government. This threat, reasoned by the NPC-NCNC coalition government, had to be nipped in the bud somehow. Controversies over Population Census Yet another contentious issue identified by analysts as a remote factor for the 1966 crisis was the results of the 1962/63 population census. In Nigeria, census data are used as basic determinant of Constituency delimitation, allocation of seats at the Legislature, sharing of revenue accruable from the federation pool and distribution of social amenities, among other uses. Therefore, little wonder that census has been one of the sensitive political issues in Nigeria. For instance, the 1952-3 census figure was used to allocate the 312 seats in the House of Representatives to the regions as follows (Oyediran, 1979:16): Northern Region 174 Eastern Region 73 Western Region 62 Lagos 3
The census result which gave a total of 30.4 million, out of which 16.8 million were in the North, 7.2 million in the East, 6.1 million in the West and 0.27 million in Lagos (See Kurfi, 1983:17), which was used for the above allocation of seats was seen by the southern political leaders structurally defective and it was hoped that the 1962-3 head counts would be used to redress the perceived lopsidedness which was not to be because of the controversy that attended the results of the exercise from every sections of the country except the North. The cacophony over the 1963 census led to a big crisis that led to the break- down of the alliance between the NPC and the NCNC and paved the way for new political alignment and realignment.
immediate Causes
Action Group crisis of 1962
The Action Group, the party in the government in the Western region, was plunged into serious crisis early in 1962 over a number of irreconcilable differences between the Leader of the party, Chief Obafemi Awolowo and his Deputy, Chief Samuel Ladoke Akintola who by then, was the Premier of the region after Chief Awolowo had assumed the position of the Leader of the Opposition at the federal level. The crisis blew open at the party s National Conference at Jos when Chief Akintola, Ayo Rosiji, the party s Secretary and a few others who were Regional Ministers in Akintola s government, staged a walk-out. They were summarily charged with anti-party activities and got dismissed from the party. This led to a vote of no confidence passed on Akintola as the Premier which led to his removal from office and his replacement with Chief Dauda Soroye Adegbenro. This led to an open fracas on the floor of the Western Region House of Assembly in which the Mace (the House s symbol of authority) was broken. The Federal government, under the pretext of exercising its powers to maintain law and order in the country, declared a state of emergency in the region and appointed Chief Mathew Adekojo Majekodunmi (a Senator and Federal Minister of Health) as Sole Administrator with wide powers leading to heavy clampdown on the opposition party leaders which included the setting up of the Justice J. B. O. Coker Commission of Inquiry to probe certain parastatals in the Western Region.
The Trial of Action Group Leaders
The report of the Coker s Commission of enquiry which indicted Chief Obafemi Awolowo but exonerated Chief S. L. Akintola, seemed to set the stage for a final showdown by the Federal authority against the opposition group and in particular, to sing the funeral dirge of the Action Group. During the emergency period, the Police was asked to search the houses of the opposition leaders in the Region, the outcome was that a large quantities of arms and ammunition which some AG members illegally imported into the country to be used, illegally, to overthrow the Federal government were found (See Iroanusi, 2000:38). This led to the arrest of Chief Obafemi Awolowo, Chief Anthony Enahoro and other leaders of the AG. They were charged with treasonable felony and conspiracy to overthrow the Federal Government. They were sentenced to various prison terms, ranging from 10 to 15 years.
immediate Causes
The Controversial 1964/5 Federal Elections
The massive rigging of the 1964 Federal elections was the last straw that broke the camels’ back because of the total breakdown of law and order and wanton destruction of lives and properties in protest against the results. The elections became a straight battle between two major political alliances viz: the Nigerian National Alliance (NNA) which was a conglomeration of the Northern Peoples’ Congress (NPC); Akintola’s Nigerian National Democratic Party (NNDP); Dr. Chike Obi s Dynamic Party and the Mid-West Democratic Front. The second alliance was the United Progressive Grand Alliance (UPGA) which was an amalgam of the NCNC, the AG, NEPU and the United Middle-Belt Congress (UMBC). On the eve of the election, December 8, 1964, the federal parliament which was elected on December 12, 1959 was dissolved to pave the way for a new House. There were accusations and counter-accusations of political harassment in the North by opposition group (UPGA) during electioneering campaigns. This prompted UPGA leadership to direct its supporters to boycott the election to protest the unlawful arrest, persecution, kidnapping and in some cases, killing of its members. As a follow up, its members in the Federal Electoral Commission resigned but all these did not deter the election from holding. The results of the election showed the NNA sweeping the polls despite the alleged irregularities by the opposition.
The 1965 Western Region election riots
Western Nigeria is the cockpit of Nigerian politics particularly between 1962 and the time of military takeover of political power in 1966 (Mackintosh, 1966:550). Western Nigeria can be regarded not without some justification as the problem area of the Nigerian federation. Even though it is the most homogeneous of the regions (after the creation of the Mid-West region in 1963); it has not been easy for the peoples to unite in the same way that the Ibo of the East or the Hausa of the North have done. The tenure of office for the Western Region House of Assembly members had lapsed and the time for another election had b een fixed for October 11, 1965. The reality on ground in the West proved that Akintola s NNDP cannot win in any free and fair election but with the assistance of the federal might, the NNA was hell-bent on retaining the control of the region to the exclusion of the AG and its allies.
In any case, the NNDP members were bus y boasting about whether or not the people voted for them, they were going to win the election. Therefore, the ruling party resorted to rigging and political gerrymandering. After receiving nomination forms from one party, Electoral Officers deserted their offices to deny the opposition from submitting their nomination papers so that the government candidates could be returned unopposed. The swearing in of Chief S. L. Akintola as the Premier of the Western Region based on the flawed election sparked off a violence of an unprecedented dimension. Arsons, maiming, killing and destruction of properties became the order of the day in what was called operation we tie which gave the Region the soubriquet Wild, Wild West.
