- Reno Omokri has tackled some “revisionists” who he accused of attempting to revise Nigerian history
- Omokri disagreed with the claim that Major Emmanuel Ifeajuna plotted the 1966 coup to make the late Obafemi Awolowo the prime minister (PM) of Nigeria
- According to Omokri, when the 1966 coup appeared to be succeeding, Ifeajunaunder whose arrest prime minister Abubakar Tafawa Balewa diedmade no moves to free Awolowo
On January 15, 1966, rebellious soldiers led by Kaduna Nzeogwu and four others carried out a military putsch, killing 22 people, including the prime minister.
Photo credits: @AmeerLookman, @renoomokriSource: Twitter”Some revisionists claim that late Major Emmanuel Ifeajuna plotted the coup to make Chief Awolowo the Prime Minister. That attempt to revise history does not hold water because when the coup appeared to be succeeding, Ifeajuna made no moves to free Chief Awolowo. He neither sent soldiers to Calabar prison nor made any calls. “Moreover, Major Ifeajuna was from the same village as late Nnamdi Azikiwe (ex-president of Igbo extraction), then a political archrival of Chief Awolowo and one of those who instigated the treasonable felony trial that sent him to prison. He was close to late Azikiwe, a regular visitor to his house and a friend to his son.”Reno Omokri tackles those he calls revisionists of the January 15, 1966 coup amid claim it was meant to out Obafemi Awolowo in power.
Photo credits: @OgbeniDipo, @247IGBOSource: Twitter”His (Azikiwe’s) ADC Orho Obada, who later rose to become a Major General, kept asking Chief Azikiwe when they would return to Nigeria as his leave was over. He eventually abandoned Chief Azikiwe in Haiti and returned to Nigeria. “The actions of Chief Azikiwe left some people feeling he was aware of the coup. But that is conjecture. Nobody really knows. But that suspicion became even more heightened when Haiti provided support for Biafra when war broke out.””Lt Colonel Emeka Ojukwu (who later agitated for Biafra) did not release Chief Obafemi Awolowo. Colonel Ojukwu was Military Governor of the Eastern Region, and Chief Awolowo was convicted and later imprisoned by the Central Government in a federal prison in Calabar on September 11, 1963, for charges of conspiring with the late Kwame Nkrumah administration in Ghana to overthrow the democratically elected government of Nigeria.”He was ordered released by the Gowon-led Federal Military on August 2, 1966 (the release took effect the next day). Gowon had become Head of State on August 1, 1966.”
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