Posted by By SHOLA OSHUNKEYE on
Former Defence Minister, Lt. Gen. Theophilus Danjuma may have inadvertently heaped a coal of fire on his aging head with a recent interview he granted The Guardian On Sunday where he described the assassinated Head of State, Major-General G.T.U Ironsi, as a 'useless", 'desk-clerk" Head of State.
Former Defence Minister, Lt. Gen. Theophilus Danjuma may have inadvertently heaped a coal of fire on his aging head with a recent interview he granted The Guardian On Sunday where he described the assassinated Head of State, Major-General G.T.U Ironsi, as a 'useless", 'desk-clerk" Head of State.
Ironsi, Head of State and Supreme Commander of the Nigerian Armed Forces, between January and July 1966, was assassinated with Colonel Adekunle Fajuyi, the military governor of the then Western Region, at Ibadan, in a counter-coup that watered the ground for the 30-month civil war that engulfed Nigeria between 1967 and 1970.
The Head of State, famous for his crocodile swagger, was reportedly murdered by General Danjuma and fellow coupists. Danjuma was on the Head of State's entourage, and was actually reported to be with him till late in the night of the coup, before turning his gun at his boss at dawn.
However, in what has turned out to be a haphazard attempt to wash his hands off Ironsi's blood, Danjuma denied pulling the trigger in the Guardian interview, reasonably distancing himself from the gory details of disclosing that he had to 'hitch a ride to the barracks (from Government house, Agodi, Ibadan) after the ring leaders had taken Ironsi and Fajuyi away.
He, however, put the lie to his half-baked story when he employed some caustic words to justify the coup, describing Ironsi as a 'useless" and desk-clerk" Head of State, 40 solid years after the assassination, and long after key witnesses to the unfortunate event had bitten the dust.
But Mrs. Victoria Aguiyi-Ironsi, former First Lady, widow of the murdered Head of State, now Commissioner I in Local Government Service Commission in Abia State, would not allow the unwarranted assault on her dead husband go unreplied. And reply she did in a most vitriolic manner when she spoke exclusively to Saturday Sun in Umuahia, the state capital on Wednesday.
'He is a useless man," Chief Mrs. Victoria Aguiyi-Ironsi declared. 'He is a mad man…. That (Danjuma's vituperation) shows how hopeless and wicked he is. After killing a man the way he did, and 40 years later, he will still not allow my husband to rest in his grave. He is using such a wicked and senseless language on my late husband. That means he (Danjuma) is a hopeless man. He is a shameless coward. Danjuma has got no virtue in him other than that wickedness. That is why he can describe Johnny like that even 40 years after he had killed him in such a brutal manner. But as long as there is God in heaven, and I know there is God in heaven, that is how vulture will describe him too."
I don't know whether you read the interview General Danjuma granted The Guardian last Sunday?
My attention was drawn to it.
He said the first military coup of January15, 1966, was an Igbo coup, a coup staged by Igbo officers to eliminate all northern officers and political leaders at the time.
Don't mind that man. He is a useless man. He is a mad man. How can I continue joining issue with a man like that? He is a stupid man. He is just blabbing. He doesn't know what he is doing. He is knows very well that he is just talking about what he does not know, what he is ignorant of. He didn't know Johnny (Gen. G.T.U.Aguiyi-Ironsi, her late husband). He never came near us enough to know my family, to know the manner of man my late husband was. No, he never did. All the officers at the time were Johnny's children. They related to him like his children. They ate together on the same table, played together, shared things together. It was like a big family, except for cowards and irritants like Danjuma.
Danjuma, at the time was an officer too.
I never knew him as an officer. I knew him as Danjuma. While it lasted, there was no officer I didn't know or that I cannot vouch for, except this Danjuma of a man.
Are you saying Danjuma was so inconsequential, you didn't or couldn't recognize him?
I don't mean knowing him in the manner you are portraying, I mean knowing him in the sense of understanding him. Knowing somebody peripherally is quite different from understanding him.
So, what didn't your understand about Danjuma?
He has been a very sly and cantankerous man all his life. He is a loner. He doesn't move with people. He is a dangerous man. We had always suspected him to be a dangerous human being, going by his strange behaviour and the way he kept to himself most of the time.
What were the things he did or did not do as to warrant your describing him as a dangerous man?
For instance, we maintained an open house at the State House. Officers came in and went out the way they liked. They ate on the same table with Johnny. Their ranks didn't matter. It didn't matter where they came from. Every officer would come, Danjuma would not. Even whenever he went to the mess, he only went to the people he can control, people he can use and these were people from his own side of the country. He had serious hatred for the Igbos. He never mixed with Igbo officers. He is a manipulator. He is a terrible Igbo hater.
But why would he hate the Igbos?
I don't know but I was somewhat in the Army and I know when all of them joined the Army. I was in the Army for 20 years before they killed Johnny. So, I knew all of them very well. But Danjuma, I did not because he was never friendly. He is never a friendly person. You can imagine, I will cook and cook in the house for the whole officers who, out of their love for Johnny, frequently visited the house. I will cook and cook. Sometimes, I would go to bed without food because I had given my portion to a guest. But Danjuma never came round. I never saw him in my house for one day. His hatred for us was that much. Now, he is talking rubbish about Johnny.
Ma, I don't mean to hurt you with what I'm about asking you. But while still commenting on the January 15, 1966 coup, he accused the Igbo officers involved in the coup of deliberately eliminating the cream of the Army, comprising mainly of northern officers, and to use his words, leaving 'us with useless officers like Ironsi who was a desk-clerk Head of State". How do you react to this?
That shows how hopeless and wicked he is. After killing a man the way he did, and 40 years later, he will still not allow my husband to rest in his grave. He is using such a wicked and senseless language on my late husband. That means he (Danjuma) is a hopeless man. He is a shameless coward. Danjuma has got no virtue in him other than that wickedness. That is why he can describe Johnny like that even 40 years after he had killed him in such a brutal manner. But as long as there is God in heaven, and I know there is God in heaven that is how vulture will describe him too.
Vulture?
Yes, vulture! (Banging the table…) For making such a wicked statement against my husband in the paper, that is how vulture will describe him. For a man to make that kind of statement like the kind he made in that paper, it's vulture that will describe him. Vulture will eat his corpse.
You are cursing him ma?
Yes, I have to curse him. He deserves to be cursed because I am very, very bitter. Johnny has lived all over the world with people and I have never seen anyone make reference to him that way. Vulture will answer him, not me. He will go before his God and answer for this iniquity. Vengeance is for the Lord.
What do you make of this? He was in your husband's entourage to Ibadan that fateful day to protect him and…
(Cuts in…) He didn't go to protect him. He went like a viper to murder him.
That same night, he said that the adjutant came to bang his door at about 1.a.m saying there was problem in Abeokuta, that the duty officer in Abeokuta saw the Commanding Officer holding meeting with Igbo Officers, excluding non-Igbo Officers, that the duty officer called two soldiers, who cocked their guns and rounded up everybody. That that was the beginning of trouble that fateful July morning (the morning of the second coup). He in fact said he was a stranger in the coup that killed your husband.
Lie! Lie!! Lie!!! Oh, why is this Danjuma such a terrible liar? He is the planner. He is a terrible Igbo hater. He hated Igbos with a passion. He said it in the interview that the Northern officers were just waiting for the right time to avenge the first coup on the Igbos. They planned everything. What is he talking about?
He even said the ADC to your husband lied. That everybody knew that he (Danjuma) didn't do the kind of thing that he said he did, after shooting your husband, tying the body to a Landrover and dragging the body all over the place… He said he never did any of those things.
He is saying this now because he knows that Nwankwo (the ADC) is dead now. Why is he just saying all these things now? Why does he have to wait till the people who knew what happened that morning in Ibadan have died before saying all this? Why couldn't he say all this while they were alive to puncture his lies? The ADC had been alive all these years, why didn't he come out to say all this? Why wait till he is dead? What I'm saying is that mouth he used to desecrate Johnny's name 40 years after he murdered him, it's only vulture that will ask him. He is saying all this rubbish, because he knows that the man who knew the correct history and who would have punctured his lies and told the world exactly what happened is dead. He is talking garbage because Nwankwo is dead. Danjuma is a coward, coward of the highest order. He is not an officer and gentleman that all soldiers should be.
How many years now did they kill my husband, leaving me a widow at a very young age and my children fatherless at a very tender age? But has any of us gone to him to beg for food even as they did not pay him what is due to him? They did not build a house for me. Nobody bothered to care if my children and I were living on the street or in market shed.