Nigerian History Series – Olusegun Obasanjo

Olusegun Aremu Obasanjo – Born in 1937

Olusegun Obasanjo was born to Amos Adigun Obaluayesanjo Bankole and Bernice Ashabi Bankole on 5 March, 1937 in the village of Ibogun-Olaogun in Owu, southwest Nigeria.

Early life

His father was a farmer and the young Olusegun helped with agricultural labour until he was eleven years.

Obasanjo grew up Baptist and attended the local village primary school. He also attended the Baptist Day School and Baptist Boys’ High School in Abeokuta.

At secondary school, Obasanjo became a member of the Boy Scouts. He also rejected his forename of “Matthew” as an act of anti-colonialism. 

Olusegun’s mother fell on hard times when his father abandoned her. She began trading to make ends meet, while the young Obasanjo worked on cocoa and kola farms, fished, collected firewood, and sold sand to builders to pay his school fees. During the school holidays he cut grass and did other manual jobs at the school.

In 1956, Obasanjo took his secondary school exams. He moved to Ibadan, where he took a teaching job and sat the entrance exam for University College Ibadan.

However, he could not afford the tuition fees. Therefore, in order to fund this chosen career in Civil Engineering and as an opportunity to continue his education, he responded to an advert for officer cadet training in the Nigerian Army in 1958.

Obaanjo’s Military Career

He joined the Nigerian Army in the period before independence. At this time, there were plans in place to get more native Nigerians into the higher ranks of its military. Obasanjo then attended Regular Officers’ Training School in Ghana.

In September 1958, he went for six months of additional training in Aldershot, southern England. Obasanjo disliked England, finding it difficult to adjust to the culture and weather. However, he received a commission and certificate in engineering. His mother died while Obasanjo was in England and his father died the following year.

Obasanjo returned to Nigeria in 1959 and served in Kaduna as an infantry subaltern with the Fifth Battalion. Nigeria became an independent country in October 1960, while he was in Kaduna. 

Shortly after, the Fifth Battalion went to the Congo as part of a peacekeeping force. In the Congo, Obasanjo and others were responsible for protecting civilians against soldiers who had mutinied against Lumumba‘s government.

In February 1961, mutineers captured Olusegun Obasanjo while he was evacuating Roman Catholic missionaries. The mutineers released him, and a few months later in May, the Fifth Battalion left the Congo and returned to Nigeria. During the conflict, he became a temporary captain. 

On his return, Obasanjo transferred to the Army Engineering Corps. In 1962 he was stationed at the Royal College of Military Engineering in England.

That year, his fiancee – Oluremi Akinlawon – joined him in England to attend a training course in London. The couple married in June 1963 at the Camberwell Green Registry Office. Obasanjo was ordered back to Nigeria later that year, but his wife remained in London to complete her course. 

Once in Nigeria, Obasanjo took command of the Field Engineering Squadron based at Kaduna. He steadily progressed through the military ranks, becoming a major in 1965. 

1966 Military Coup

In 1965, Obasanjo went to India to study at the Defence Services Staff College in Wellington and also at the School of Engineering in Poona.

Obasanjo returned to Nigeria in the midst of a military coup in January 1966. He was among those warning that the situation could descend into civil war. And so, he offered to serve as the liaison between the coup plotters and the civilian government, which had transferred power to the military Commander-in-Chief Johnson Aguiyi-Ironsi. 

In late July, there was a second coup. Troops of northern Nigerian origin rebelled and killed Ironsi, along with about two hundred Igbo soldiers. General Yakubu Gowon took power.

At this point, Obasanjo was still based in Kaduna and was the most senior Yoruba officer present in the north. He served there until January 1967 when he moved to Lagos as the Chief Army Engineer.

Nigerian Civil War

In May, the Igbo military officer Odumegwu Ojukwu declared the independence of Igbo-majority areas, forming the Republic of Biafra. On 3 July, the Nigerian government posted Obasanjo to Ibadan to serve as commander of the Western State.

The fighting between the Nigerian Army and the Biafran separatists broke out on 6 July. Gowon chose Obasanjo to lead the attack on Biafra despite his lack of combat experience.

Obasanjo arrived at Port Harcourt on 16 May 1969 to take up the new position in charge of more than 35,000 troops. He toured the war front and was wounded. Obasanjo played a major role in combating the separatists, accepting their surrender in 1970.

His role in ending the war made him a war hero. Gowon’s government made Obasanjo responsible for reintegrating Biafra into Nigeria, a position which earned him respect. As an engineer, he oversaw the restoration of water supply. And by May 1970, all major towns in the region were reconnected to water supply.

Obasanjo’s Post Civil War Career

Shortly after, he served in Lagos as the Brigadier commanding the Corps of Engineers. He also sat on the committee which recommended dramatic reductions of troop numbers in the Nigerian Army over the course of the 1970s. 

Obasanjo returned to England for a course in 1974. He served as Commissioner for Works and Housing when he returned in January 1975. During this time, he was largely responsible for building military barracks.

In 1975, a coup established a military government with Obasanjo as part of its ruling triumvirate. Obasanjo was not informed of the plans because of his critical opinion about coups. It is well documented that Obasanjo was the most eager of the triumvirate, for a return to civilian rule.

They introduced austerity measures to stem inflation, established a Corrupt Practices Investigation Bureau, and replaced all military governors with new officers who reported directly to Obasanjo.

From 1970, Obasanjo began to plan for his retirement from the military. He registered a business in 1973 and invested in property. His marriage to Oluremi became strained and was dissolved in the mid-1970s. He married Stella Abebe in 1976.

Olusegun Obasanjo received a promotion to the rank of Lieutenant General in January 1976.

Head of State

After Murtala Muhammed‘s assassination the following month, the Supreme Military Council appointed Obasanjo as Head of State. He continued Murtala’s policies by overseeing budgetary cut-backs, expanding more access to free education and spending more on health, housing and agriculture.

Committed to restoring democracy, Obasanjo oversaw the 1979 election and he handed over control of Nigeria to the newly elected civilian president, Shehu Shagari. Before he left office, in April 1979, Obasanjo promoted himself to the role of general and he continued to receive a salary from the state.

He retired to Ota in Ogun State, where he became a farmer and an author. He also took part in international initiatives to end various African conflicts.

Olusegun Obasanjo’s Legacy & Policies

His government set up an anti-inflation task force, and inflation fell to 30% within a year. To counteract the disruption of labour strikes, Obasanjo’s government introduced legislation that classified most industries as essential services, banned strikes and authorised the detention of disruptive union leaders. It merged 42 unions into the Nigerian Labour Congress in 1978.

Obasanjo continued with various projects in northern Nigeria that were first announced under Murtala. These include irrigation schemes, agricultural development and reforestation initiatives to stall the encroachment of the Sahara desert.

To meet the country’s growing demand for electricity, Obasanjo oversaw the launch of two new hydroelectric projects and a thermal plant. The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) was formed as an amalgamation of the Ministry of Petroleum Resources and the Nigerian National Oil Corporation. Obasanjo also continued the planning of the Ajaokuta Steel Mill.

In May 1976, Obasanjo launched Operation Feed the Nation, a project to revitalise small-scale farming and which involved students being paid to farm during the holidays. The project also involved abolishing duties on livestock feed and farm implements, subsidizing the use of fertilisers, and easing agricultural credit. In March 1978, Obasanjo issued the Land Use Decree which gave the state propriety rights over all land. This was designed to stop land hoarding. Obasanjo saw it as one of his government’s main achievements.

Despite a push for free primary and secondary education, Nigeria cut back on university funding; in 1978 it ceased issuing student loans and increased university food and accommodation charges. This led to student protests in several cities, resulting in fatalities in Lagos and Zaria.

Obasanjo’s government demobilised 12,000 soldiers between 1976 and 1977. They all went through rehabilitation to help them adjust to civilian life.

Nigeria’s state-directed development gave rise to rapid growth in the public sector. However, his government suffered accusations of extensive corruption and political repression.

Nigeria: Giant of Africa

Obasanjo was eager to establish Nigeria as a prominent leader in Africa. He revived Gowon’s plan to hold the second World Black and African Festival of Arts and Culture in Nigeria, and so FESTAC 77 took place in Lagos in February 1977.

To promote Nigeria’s role internationally, Obasanjo involved himself in various mediation efforts across Africa. In 1977 he persuaded Benin and Togo to end their border dispute.

He failed in attempts to settle quarrels among several East African states; in a dispute between Ethiopia and Somalia and in another between Angola and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Obasanjo held a conference in Kano on behalf of the OAU, to mediate the Chadian Civil War. They agreed to a ceasefire, to form a government of national unity, and to allow Nigerian troops to act as peacekeepers. However, the war continued and Nigeria responded by cutting off its oil supply to Chad. A second conference on the conflict took place in Lagos in August 1979, resulting in the formation of another short-lived transitional government. In the final year of his military government, he headed an OAU mission to resolve the conflict in Western Sahara.

Obasanjo angered Francophone members of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) by insisting that, as the largest financial contributor to the organisation, Nigeria should host the organisation’s headquarters in Lagos.

Relations with neighbouring Ghana also declined when in 1979, Nigeria cut off oil supplies to the country to protest the execution of political opponents by Jerry Rawlings. Increasingly distancing Nigeria from the United Kingdom and aligning instead with the United States, he also emphasised support for groups opposing white minority rule in southern Africa.

An Unapologetic Critic Of Underperformance

Obasanjo grew critical of Shagari’s civilian government as Nigeria entered economic recession due to fluctuations in global oil prices. In December 1983, Muhammadu Buhari overthrew Shehu Shagari. Obasanjo was initially supportive of Buhari’s government, stating that representative democracy had failed in Nigeria.

In August 1985, Ibrahim Babangida overthrew Buhari. Obasanjo criticised some of Babangida’s economic reforms.

In 1993, Sani Abacha seized power in a military coup. Abacha arrested and convicted Obasanjo of being part of a planned coup in 1995, because he was openly critical of Abacha’s administration. He was released only after Abacha’s death in 1998.

Obasanjo’s Political Career

Olusegun Obasanjo became the People’s Democratic Party candidate for the 1999 presidential election. He won comfortably and as president, he de-politicised the military. Olusegun Obasanjo also expanded the police and mobilised the army to combat widespread ethnic, religious, and secessionist violence.

He won a second term as president in 2003. Olusegun Obasanjo supported the formation of the African Union and served as its chair from 2004 to 2006. His attempts to change the constitution to abolish presidential term limits attracted much criticism and was unsuccessful.

In retirement, he earned a PhD in theology from the National Open University of Nigeria.