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| Revisionist History: Gowon alledges that Ojukwu lied about Aburi Accord |
Gowon, yesterday accused the late Biafran leader, Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu, of misrepresenting the Aburi Accord to Nigerians.
Speaking yesterday at the launch of a four-part biography on President Goodluck Jonathan, Gowon said he had to correct an impression created in the book by the author, Charles Imokhai, a reverend father.
Gowon said Ojukwu’s statement on the Aburi Accord was contrary to what was discussed.
He said: “I have seen that you (Imokhai) have gone back in history in your research when Ojukwu and myself had the Aburi Accord.
“I was fascinated by that because I can assure you that that meeting was to break the ice and for all of us, the military leaders at the time, be allowed to be able to agree to be discussing our problems in Nigeria and to solve them.
“What happened to us at Aburi was that I couldn’t make it down (to Nigeria) because I was unfortunately down with a fever. “Ojukwu got back (before me) and made a statement and that wasn’t what we discussed and that was the beginning of the misunderstanding. “Since you presented that we had a meeting, I thought I should make that comment and to correct that.”
The accord was reached at a meeting held between January 4-5, 1967, in Aburi, a Ghanaian town, between delegates of the then federal military government of Nigeria and the then eastern region as part of efforts to prevent the looming war in the aftermath of the massacre of Biafrans in the northern and western part of Nigeria.
Essentially, the Aburi Accord would have led to adoption of confederacy in Nigeria — a political system in which every region would essentially be a country on its own with only a symbolic national government.
Gowon reneged on the agreements, which subsequently led to the Biafran-Nigerian War. The Biafran presents the true facts of the Aburi Conference in the following reports:
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