Category: Military
-
Murtala Muhammed; Head of the short-lived military government whose face adorn the twenty naira note. Muhammed became Nigerian Head of State on July 29, 1975 following the overthrow of General Yakubu Gowon, who had ruled the country for nine years. A civil war hero, Muhammed was assassinated on February 13, 1975 on his way to…
-
Sani Abacha; Nigerian Head of State from November 1993 to June 1998. Abacha was the first officer of the Nigerian Army to rise to the rank of General without skipping any rank. He was also the first to become a full four-star general before becoming Head of state. Abacha who was Babangida‘s de facto number…
-
Yakwubu Gowon; War time Head of State of Nigeria, who reigned for nine years from 1966. Gowon became Nigeria’s youngest head of state ever at the age of 32 years. When civil war threatened the very foundation of the country between 1967 and 1970, he in a mature manner kept Nigeria together after which he…
-
Ibrahim Badamosi Babangida; Army General who ruled Nigeria as military president from 1985 to 1993. As a key member of the group that overthrew Shagari’s government in 1983, Babangida was rewarded with an appointment as head of the army. That post helped him establish a network of officers that ultimately helped him unsit Muhammadu Buhari…
-
James Johnson Oluleye; General in the Nigerian army, who served During the Nigerian civil war, he was general staff officer 1, Nigerian Army Headquarters, from 1967-1970 and previously with the United Nations troops in the Belgian Congo, 1961-62. Oluleye was General Officer Commanding, GOC. 2 Infantry Division, Nigerian Army 1970-75; federal commissioner for establishment, 1975-…
-
Abubakar Abdulsalami; Nigerian military Head of State from 1998 to May, 1999. Following the mysterious death of Abacha on June 8 and a month later of Abiola, the undeclared winner of the presidential elections five years before, the emerging General Abdulsalami Abubakar’s administration considered it expedient for a Yoruba to emerge as president ostensibly to…
-
Sarki Mukhtar; Major General of the Nigerian army, appointed in 2006 as as the National Security Adviser. Mukhtar served before as head of the Directorate of Military Intelligence, DMI, under General Sani Abacha, and was also Nigeria’s envoy to Russia. Mukhatar, a hard-nosed soldier, started an impressive military career that spanned 31 years at the…
-
Aikhomu Augustus; Nigerian Naval Officer who served as the de facto Vice-President of Nigeria during the Ibrahim Babangida military junta from 1986 to 1993. Also once a Chief of General Staff, Aikhomu was the first naval officer to be promoted as an Admiral in black Africa. He was the first signatory to the document which…
-
Raymond Chilaka Ejiogu, World War II veteran and community leader, also father of public intellectual and activist, E.C Ejiogu. Ejiogu Raymond left Enugu with other new enlistees in the Signal Corps on 7 November 1941 by train to Lagos enroute Gold Coast, now Ghana, then Freetown, Sierra Leone, mindful of the dangers of encountering German…
-
Mike Okhai Akhigbe; the second in command in the military government that midwifed Nigeria’s return to democracy in 1999. The Admiral was between 1994 and 1998 the Chief of Naval Staff and became the Chief of General Staff in 1998, during the General Abubakar’s military government. His reported suggestion against a Government of National Unity…