The Senator representing Abia North senatorial district, Orji Uzor Kalu has presented a fresh perspective on the controversial 1966 coup, arguing that it was not an “Igbo coup” as widely perceived and alleging that former President Olusegun Obasanjo was involved but distanced himself from it.
Naijaonpoint reports that Kalu made these remarks while reacting to the newly launched book Journey in Service, authored by former Head of State Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida (IBB).
The book, which has stirred debates across Nigeria, challenges the long-standing narrative that the coup led by Major Kaduna Nzeogwu was an Igbo-driven plot.
Speaking on Channels Television on Monday, Kalu suggested that Babangida’s account, though revealing, did not capture the full story.
“When I said the stories are not complete, I wanted President Babangida to write more. It’s not that Babangida just wants to tell a story. There’s more to the story,” Kalu stated.
“There are officers who told Babangida ‘no, you cannot hand over to this man.’”
He further argued that Babangida should be credited for setting the record straight about the coup and the unfair treatment of Igbos regarding the incident.
“Nigerians are not fair to Babangida. He came out to say what no one had ever said. We’ve expected people to say, for example, what he said about the Igbos—that the military coup was not an Igbo coup.
“And people had held the Igbo on ground for this particular incident which they never committed. Major Kaduna Nzeogwu never spoke Igbo although he is from Igbo land; he was born and brought up in Kaduna.
“And he was just a forthright officer who wanted a new Nigeria with other people. Let me be honest with you, President Obasanjo was part of the coup, but he exonerated himself as normal.
“If you ask people, most of those top military officers knew about the coup. He [Obasanjo] came from India…how would he have not known about the coup and he came back to Nigeria from his school?
“So, many of them knew about the coup. But it was when a few officers refused to do what they were supposed to do that it became a problem.
“Few officers didn’t do what they were supposed to do. If they had gone ahead to execute the coup in Eastern Nigeria, there would have been no problem,” the former Governor of Abia State said.