$Unique_ID{COW02625}
$Pretitle{357}
$Title{Nigeria
Chapter 1F.   The Gowon Regime}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{Robert Rinehart}
$Affiliation{HQ, Department of the Army}
$Subject{fmg
states
government
gowon
muhammed
nigeria
military
public
political
civilian}
$Date{1981}
$Log{}
Country:     Nigeria
Book:        Nigeria, A Country Study
Author:      Robert Rinehart
Affiliation: HQ, Department of the Army
Date:        1981

Chapter 1F.   The Gowon Regime

     In March 1967 the FMG issued a decree formally vesting all executive
and legislative power in the Supreme Military Council (SMC), whose chairman,
General Gowon, was head of state. In addition to the chairman the SMC
included top ranking staff officers, service and police heads, the state
military governors, and the civilian administrator of the East Central State.
Gowon also was head of government in his role as chairman of the Federal
Executive Council (FEC), the cabinet of ministers composed of military
officers and civilian technocrats. Under Gowon the FMG ruled by decree,
although the concurrence of state military governors was sought before decrees
were issued.

     In October 1970 Gowon announced that the FMG intended to stay in power
until 1976, which was set as the target year for the completion of its
political program and the return to an elected civilian government. In setting
the target date Gowon outlined a nine-point program that the FMG felt must be
completed before it relinquished control. Included in the package were: (1)
reorganization of the armed forces; (2) implementation of a national economic
development plan and reconstruction of war damage; (3) eradication of
corruption; (4) settlement of the question of creating more new states; (5)
adoption of a new constitution; (6) introduction of a formula for allocating
revenue; (7) conducting a national census; (8) organization of genuinely
national political parties; and (9) installation of popularly elected
government at federal and state levels. Criticism of the six-year plan was
widespread, because some points were considered so broad that observers could
not imagine their being carried out even in a much longer period, and many
Nigerians concluded that military leaders would seek to retain power
indefinitely. The reaction of civilian politicians was particularly negative.
Muslim traditionalists also feared the effect of military rule, with its
modernizing tendencies, in eroding the social control they exercised in the
emirates.

Foreign Policy

     The priorities in foreign policy established at independence remained in
effect under the FMG. These included active participation in the UN, advocacy
of pan-African solidarity through the Organization of African Unity (OAU),
regional cooperation, support for anticolonial and liberation
movements-particularly those in southern Africa, and nonalignment in the
East-West conflict. The role of Nigeria in world affairs, outside its African
concerns, was not, however, considered dynamic.

     Nigeria had been admitted to the UN within a week of its having achieved
independence in 1960. It was represented on the committees of specialized
agencies and took its turn as a nonpermanent member of the Security Council.
One of Nigeria's earliest and most significant contributions to the UN was to
furnish troops for the peacekeeping operation in Congo (Leopoldville/Kinshasa,
later Zaire) in the early 1960s. By 1964 Nigerian army units formed the
backbone of the UN force, which had been under Ironsi's command.

     The FMG was actively committed to eliminating white minority rule in
Africa and channeled financial and military aid to liberation movements
through the OAU. Despite its usually strong support for its activities,
however, the FMG resented OAU expressions of concern over the civil war as
interference in the country's internal affairs. An OAU statement in 1967
backing the FMG position on national unity assuaged Nigerian feelings to some
extent, but subsequent OAU efforts to bring about a cease-fire were rejected
by Lagos. When the war was concluded, Nigeria's participation in OAU
activities returned essentially to normal.

     Some problems relating to border demarcations existed with neighboring
countries, but these did not constitute serious disputes and were resolved
to the mutual satisfaction of the parties involved. Relations were also
mended with African states that had recognized Biafra. Particularly close ties
were developed with the military regime in Ghana, which gave full support to
the FMG during the civil war. In 1975 the treaty was signed at Lagos creating
the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) to undertake the
reduction of trade barriers among countries in the region. Sponsored
personally by Gowon, the agreement was considered indicative of the FMG's
concern for improved interregional economic ties.

     Another important element in its foreign relations was Nigeria's
association with the Commonwealth, of which it remained a member after
becoming a republic in 1963. The Commonwealth linked Nigeria in a special
relationship with leading developing countries outside Africa and complemented
regional ties to others that were also members of the OAU. Financial and
technical assistance was channeled to Nigeria through the Commonwealth from
Britain, Canada, and Australia, with whom Nigeria also enjoyed profitable
trade preferences. Relations with Britain, which supported the FMG during the
civil war, were cordial and cooperative, although the renewal of arms sales to
South Africa, permitted by the Conservative government in the early 1970s,
produced an adverse reaction from Nigeria. This temporary chilling in
relations between the two countries was sharpened by Nigeria's apprehension at
Britain's coincidental application for entry into the European Economic
Community (EEC).

     The cornerstone of Nigerian foreign policy outside Africa was its strict
adherence to the principle of nonalignment. The great reliance placed by the
civilian government in its economic planning on Western aid-including
acceptance of US$225 million in assistance from the United States-tended to
belie this position, but other actions taken in the early 1960s gave every
indication that the country's leaders were determined to make political
decisions independent of foreign influence. In 1962, for example, Nigeria
abrogated the Anglo-Nigerian Defense Pact, which it had entered into at
independence, on grounds that it gave other African states the impression
that the country was cooperating with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization
(NATO).

     The nonalignment policy was continued by the FMG. The desirability of
keeping all foreign policy options open was confirmed by events during the
civil war. As if to demonstrate the value of independent action, aircraft
and heavy equipment was purchased from the Soviet Union when Britain and
the United States refused to make the type of aid available. No political
strings were attached to the deal, but the quick Soviet response brought a
warming of relations between the two countries. There was no evidence,
however, that through subsequent trade agreements and technical assistance
the Soviet Union had achieved any special influence with the FMG.

     Nigeria's relations with the United States during the postindependence
period were good, resulting in large part from continuing United States
cooperation in the country's economic development plans. The United States
recognized the legitimacy of the FMG and refrained from any political or
military involvement during the civil war, but the use of chartered United
States cargo planes for relief flights to Biafra, as well as United States
economic ties with South Africa and its good relations with Portugal,
caused some friction on the official level and considerable criticism in
the Nigerian press.

Economic Development

     The FMG inherited a six-year development plan inaugurated in 1962 by
the civilian government. The plan anticipated Nigeria's transition from an
essentially agricultural to a semi-industrialized economy based on the free
market but including public participation to compensate for the lack of
locally generated private investment. Follow-up development plans were
instituted in 1970 and 1975, but the goals set in all three plans proved
unrealistic (see Economic Development and Income Distribution, ch. 3).

     About 70 percent of the firms operating in Nigeria were foreign owned
in 1972 when the FMG issued an indigenization decree that barred aliens from
investing further in specified enterprises and reserved participation in
specified trades to Nigerians. Although the federal government bought out 60
percent of the equity in marketing operations of major oil companies in
Nigeria in 1975, the FMG absolutely ruled out nationalization as a means of
furthering its program of indigenization.

     By the late 1960s oil had replaced cocoa as the country's biggest foreign
exchange earner. In 1971 Nigeria-by then the world's seventh largest petroleum
producer-became a member of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries
(OPEC). The success of economic planning depended largely on the manner in
which the federal and state governments were prepared to allocate oil revenues
to meet their goals. The dramatic rise in world oil prices in 1974 caused a
sudden flood of wealth that was described as "dynamic chaos." Much of the
revenue was earmarked for investment to diversify the economy, but it also
spurred inflation and, coming in the midst of widespread unemployment,
underscored inequities in distribution. Production in 1975 fell off sharply as
a result of the sudden depression in world demand, and prices fluctuated
downward until Nigeria late in the year joined in oil price hikes dictated by
OPEC.

     Unemployment also constituted an increasingly serious problem. Large
numbers of farms workers, who had gone to urban areas in search of higher
wage employment, remained in the cities even after they had failed to find
jobs there, while school leavers flooded the labor market at a rate of 600,000
a year. Unevenly distributed across the country, unemployment was highest in
crowded Ibo areas in the east, where the economy was still recovering from the
effects of the war and from which skilled Ibo workers were now reluctant to
leave in search of work. By contrast there was an acute shortage of such
skilled workers in other parts of the country. The dangers involved in
discharging large numbers of soldiers without jobs made demobilization of the
costly military establishment undesirable. Substantial increases in public
sector employment, which already consumed half the federal budget for wages,
were promised to take up the slack. Nigeria's economic problems assumed an
imposing political dimension. Although they reflected a world economic
situation, they were seen in the popular imagination more as the result of
corruption and mismanagement by the Gowon regime.

Crime, Corruption, and Political Turbulence

     In 1972 the ban on political activity in force since 1966 was partially
lifted at Gowon's direction to permit an open exchange of ideas on the form of
a new constitution that would prepare the way for the restoration of civilian
rule. The debate that followed was ideologically charged, Awolowo proclaiming
loudly for a transition to "democratic socialism." When demands for a quick
return to the democratic process became heated and were echoed by the press,
trade unions, and universities, Gowon decided to end the public discussion,
explaining that "peace is more important than politics." On the basis of
opinions voiced during the period of debate, however, Gowon committed the FMG
to create several new states, but in the months that followed their number and
composition became a major point of controversy as dozens of new minority
ethnic movements petitioned for separate states.

     The decennial census was scheduled for 1973. Under the banner "Prepare to
be Counted," the FMG conducted a public education campaign counseling
Nigerians to regard the census as a technical rather than a political
exercise. The procedure was to be supervised by a committee whose members were
carefully selected for geographical and ethnic balance, and computers were to
be used for processing the returns. Despite measures taken to ensure a more
accurate count than had been possible before, the results once again
confounded demographers: the census found that Nigeria's population had
increased by nearly 44 percent in ten years, a rate of growth unprecedented in
any other developing country. The north, according to the returns submitted,
contained 64 percent of the total population as compared to 52 percent in
1963, which was believed to be an exaggerated figure even then. The 1973
census, on which representation in a new, elected parliament would be based,
revived fears that one ethnic group would permanently dominate the others. It
also confirmed that a giant-sized share of oil revenues would be due the
northern states under the allocation system in effect as a result of their
preponderant population.

     Criticism of the Gowon regime focused on the question of corruption in
national life, where it appeared to flourish at every level. Graft, bribery,
and nepotism were an integral part of a complex system of patronage and "gift"
giving through which influence and authority were asserted. Although the
military rulers had pledged to rid the government of corruption, the public
had in fact become more aware of it in the early 1970s. Embarrassed by charges
in the press, the FMG issued a decree in 1973 establishing a special
anti-corruption police-the "X-Squad"-whose subsequent investigations revealed
ingenious forms of extortion and fraud not only in government and public
corporations but in private business and in the professions as well.

     A major scandal, which had international implications and reached to the
highest levels of government and the business community, involved the
uncoordinated purchasing abroad of construction materials by state agents at
prices well above their market value. Rake-offs were pocketed by public
officials and private contractors. In mid-1975, 400 cargo ships-250 of them
carrying 1.5 million tons of cement-clogged the harbor of Lagos, which had
been paralyzed for fifteen months with vessels waiting to be unloaded. To
compound the error, spoiled and inferior grade cement was concealed by mixing
it with acceptable material for use in public building projects.

     Crime posed a threat to internal security and had a seriously negative
impact on efforts to bring about economic development. Armed gangs of bandits
roamed the countryside engaging in robbery, extortion, and kidnapping,
sometimes with the connivance of the police or including moonlighting
soldiers. Pirates regularly raided cargo ships awaiting entry to ports or
unloaded them at the piers ahead of the stevedores. Drug trafficking and
smuggling were prevalent. Punishment was meted out to large batches of
convicted and suspected criminals, who were dispatched by firing squads in
public executions meant to impress spectators with the seriousness of their
offenses and with the government's concern to curb crime. These measures had
no noticeable effect on the crime rate, however, but seemed rather to provoke
a callous attitude among the public at large toward violence.

     In January 1975 Gowon revamped the membership of the FEC, increasing the
percentage of military ministers in his cabinet. But Gowon depended more and
more on a small group of advisers and became increasingly inaccessible to his
military colleagues. Without broad consultation, he backed off from the 1976
date set for a return to civilian rule, explaining that to adhere rigidly to
it would "amount to a betrayal of a trust" and "certainly throw the nation
back into confusion." Serious strikes by public employees in May and June
brought essential services to a standstill. Taking the line of least
resistance, the FMG responded by granting an average retroactive wage increase
of 30 percent, which fed inflation and led to industrial strikes as union
members demanded parallel raises.

     In such an atmosphere Gowon was deposed in a bloodless military coup
carried out on July 29, 1975-the ninth anniversary of the revolt that had
brought him to power-while he was at an OAU summit meeting in Kampala, Uganda.
It involved many of the same officers who had participated in the 1966 coup
and included the guards officers responsible for Gowon's security. Gowon
pledged his full loyalty to the new regime and left for exile in Britain,
where he received a pension from the Nigerian government.

The Muhammed Regime

     The choice of the armed forces to succeed Gowon as head of the FMG was
thirty-eight-year-old Brigadier (later General) Murtala Ramat Muhammed, a
northerner. One of his first acts was to scrap the 1973 census, which was
weighted in favor of the north, and revert to the 1963 count for official
purposes. Muhammed removed from their posts all top federal and state
officials in order to break any remaining links with the Gowon regime and
restore public confidence in the FMG. More than 10,000 public officials and
employees at all levels were dismissed without benefits or retired on account
of age, health, incompetence, or malpractice. The purge affected the civil
service, judiciary, police and armed forces, foreign service, public
corporations, and universities. Some officials were brought to trial on
charges of corruption, and one former military state governor was executed for
gross misconduct in office. Muhammed also began the demobilization of 100,000
troops from the swollen ranks of the armed forces.

     Twelve of the twenty-five ministerial posts on the new FEC went to
civilians, but the cabinet was assigned a secondary role to the executive SMC,
which Muhammed made the seat of his considerable power. He also asserted the
authority of the federal government in areas formerly reserved for the states,
restricting the latitude exercised by state governments and their governors in
determining and executing policy. Newly appointed military state governors
were not given seats on the SMC, but were regarded solely as administrators of
federal policies handed down by Muhammed through the chief of staff of the
armed forces' Supreme Headquarters. The federal government took over the
operation of the country's two largest newspapers, made broadcasting a federal
monopoly, and brought remaining state-run universities under federal control.

     Muhammed initiated a comprehensive review of the third National
Development Plan. Singling out inflation as the greatest danger to the
economy, he determined to cut down the money supply swollen by government
expenditures for public works. The rapid expansion of the private sector into
areas dominated by public corporations was also indicated. Muhammed
reappraised foreign policy, stressing a "Nigeria First" orientation in line
with which the country followed OPEC price guidelines to the disadvantage of
African consumers. The FMG under Muhammed favored the term "neutral" to
"nonaligned" in describing the country's posture in international affairs. The
first test of the new outlook came in Angola, where Nigeria had worked with
the OAU to bring about a negotiated reconciliation of the warring factions in
the former Portuguese colony. Late in 1975 Muhammed announced Nigeria's firm
support for the Soviet-backed Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola
(Movimento Popular de Liberacao de Angola-MPLA), citing South Africa's armed
intervention on the side of the rival National Union for the Total
Independence of Angola (Uniao Nacional para a Independencia Total de
Angola-UNITA) to justify the shift. The realignment caused strained relations
with the United States, which argued for the withdrawal of Cuban troops and
Soviet advisers from Angola. In October the Nigerian air force had taken
delivery of modern Soviet-built warplanes ordered under Gowon, but the Soviets
were not believed to have influenced Nigeria's decision to alter its stance on
Angola.

Preparations for the Return to Civilian Rule

     At Muhammed's direction the FMG set in motion the stalled machinery of
devolution to civilian rule, and it made a definite commitment to hand over
the reins of power to a democratically elected government by October 1979.
The transition, as outlined by Muhammed, would take place in five successive
stages. In the first stage he appointed a five-man panel in August 1975 to
study Gowon's plan for a nineteen-state federation that would "help to erase
memories of past political ties and emotional attachments." The plan,
reaffirmed by the committee, assaulted the ethnic power bases by recommending,
for example, that the predominantly Yoruba Western State be divided into three
states, the Ibo East Central State into two, and the six states of the north
into nine states, only three of which were predominantly Hausa-Fulani.
Accepting the committee's judgment, Muhammed pledged to avoid the
"proliferation of states" that would highlight the problem of the minorities
and warned petitioners that no further demands for new states would be
tolerated.

     Entering directly into the second stage in October 1975, Muhammed named a
blue-ribbon committee, drawn from business, the professions, universities, the
civil service, as well as from prominent civilian political leaders, to draft
recommendations for a new constitution that would be put before a constituent
assembly for approval. Awolowo, who had come to be considered the spokesman
for the Nigerian left, was specifically excluded from the committee. Muhammed
made no secret of his own preferences, and he cautioned the drafting committee
against reopening old wounds. He called on it to provide instruments that
would facilitate consensus politics and discourage the sort of
institutionalized opposition that the former constitution had adopted under
the influence of the British parliamentary system. He wanted executive and
legislative functions clearly defined, preferring a strong executive on the
United States model who would be made publicly accountable for his actions in
office. In his instructions to the committee, Muhammed would have had them
eliminate all political parties, but, sensing the unlikelihood of acceptance
of this proposal, he raised the alternative that parties be limited in number
to those with a genuinely national constituency.

     Once a constitution had been approved by the constituent assembly, the
newly created states would be given time in the third stage to organize local
elections. Only after this was accomplished would the ban be lifted on
activity by political parties on the national level in the fourth stage.
Finally, in the fifth stage, authority would be transferred to a civilian
government by October 1979.

     A Sandhurst-trained Muslim Hausa, Muhammed had been in command of federal
field forces in the final phase of the civil war. He was not involved in the
coup that brought him to power but had played a prominent role rallying
northern officers behind the 1966 coup that toppled Ironsi. In a short time as
head of the FMG, Muhammed's policies won him broad popular support, and his
decisiveness elevated him to the status of a national hero. In February 1976,
however, during an unsuccessful coup attempt in Lagos by a small group of
officers, he was assassinated. Two groups of conspirators had apparently
plotted independently against Muhammed's regime, although investigation after
the fact found that they had points of contact. The first group, composed of
middle-grade officers, was led by Lieutenant Colonel Bukar Dimka, who was
related to Gowon by marriage. Their opposition to Muhammed was both
professional and political, backing their protest against demobilization with
the allegation that the FMG was "going communist." A group of colonels
answering to Major General I.D. Bisalla, the FEC defense minister, planned to
use Dimka's group to overthrow the government, allowing the colonels to seize
power after the coup. Dimka, Bisalla, and thirty-eight other conspirators were
convicted after a secret trial before a military tribunal and were executed
publicly by a firing squad. Evidence published by the FMG implied that both
groups of conspirators had been in communication with Gowon, who was accused
of complicity in the plot against Muhammed. The British government refused to
accede to Nigerian demands for his extradition, however, and protests against
the decision forced Britain to recall its high commissioner in Lagos.

Obasanjo Assumes Control

     In a smooth transition Lieutenant General Olusegun Obasanjo, a Yoruba,
stepped in with the approval of the armed forces to replace Muhammed as head
of the FMG. Obasanjo, who as chief of staff of Supreme Headquarters was his
predecessor's number-two man, had commanded the federal division that took
Owerri, effectively bringing an end to the civil war. Keeping the chain of
command established by Muhammed in place, he pledged to continue the
five-stage program for the restoration of civilian government in 1979 and to
carry forward the reform program instituted to improve the quality of public
service.

     Completed on schedule, the draft constitution was published in October
1976, anticipating the seating of the constituent assembly in 1977. Debates
during sessions of the drafting committee had frequently been ideological in
nature, but divisive proposals, like that to define Nigeria as a "socialist"
state in the constitution, were decisively rejected. But committee members
also disregarded Muhammed's recommendations for a nonparty system. Although
strongly endorsing multiparty politics, the committee insisted that parties
applying for registration have national objectives and executive boards whose
members represented at least two-thirds of the states. Under Obasanjo's
leadership the FMG completed the remaining stages leading to the restoration
of civilian rule in October 1979.

                                     * * *

     Comprehensive surveys carrying the country's history into the 1970s are
not yet available, but Michael Crowder's The Story of Nigeria is an accessible
introduction that brings the narrative up to independence in 1960. C.R.
Nivin's A Short History of Nigeria and Alan Burns' History of Nigeria are
older standard surveys, published in many editions, which remain useful guides
to the country's early history and to the prewar colonial period, even though
superseded in many areas by more recent research. Interpretive scholarly
works, such as J.D. Fage's A History of Africa and An Introduction to the
History of West Africa and selected chapters in the multivolume Cambridge
History of Africa, put Nigeria's past in the context of a broader regional
history. More narrowly focused on crucial topics are David Northrup's Trade
Without Rulers, which studies in considerable depth an aspect of the slave
trade in Nigeria, and E. A. Ayandele's The Missionary Impact on Modern Nigeria
1842-1914, Margery Perham's biography of Lugard is perhaps the best and most
revealing single study of the British side of the colonial experience. Insight
into the origins of the nationalist movements is provided by Richard L.
Sklar's Nigerian Political Parties, while John P. Mackintosh's Nigerian
Government and Politics is an excellent guide to the politics of the early
1960s. Historical background on Nigeria's three dominant ethnic groups-of
particular value for the general reader-is included in Jeremy S. Eades' The
Yoruba Today, Elizabeth Isichei's Igbo Worlds, and a fine monograph by Mahdi
Adamu, The Hausa Factor in West African History. (For further information see
Bibliography.)