Nigerian civil war (1967-70). This was an attempt at secession by the Ibo-dominated Eastern Region of Nigeria suppressed by the federal Nigerian authorities in a bitter three-year civil war. Nigeria achieved independence from Britain as a federal state in 1960. Her 430 different ethnic groups were dominated by three peoples: the Islamic Hausa-Fulbe in the north, the Yoruba, and the Christian Ibo (Igbo) in the south-eastern part of Nigeria. Under British colonial rule, the Ibos had become an educated élite and after independence there was much resentment of them. In 1966 thousands of lbos living in the north were killed in ethnic rioting, and as a result many Ibos fled their homes and moved to traditional Ibo territory in the south-east of Nigeria.
In 1966, after two successive military governments, power passed to Lt Col (later Gen) Yakuba Gowon, who was immediately faced with a move by the lbo-dominated Eastern Region to break away. In May 1967, the military governor of the Eastern Region, Lt Col Odumegwu Ojukwa, declared an independent state of ‘Biafra’. The Biafran army then went on the offensive in a push towards Lagos. Gowon's federal troops stemmed this advance and counter-attacked. In the ensuing civil war, Gowon had the advantage of international recognition and continued to receive regular supplies of arms from abroad. He was determined to bring the oil-rich region back into Nigeria and his troops began a systematic reduction of Biafra. Without Biafra's oil, the financial viability of Nigeria seemed in doubt. The Biafrans, while garnering much international sympathy, received little official recognition for their nascent state. While Biafra was determined to resist federal rule, without international recognition it was at a serious disadvantage. European mercenaries, international aid agencies, and a trickle of supplies on flights from friendly neighbouring states helped keep Biafra in the war, but by 1968 the rebels were landlocked, having lost their coastline and Port Harcourt to federal troops. The cost of the war was immense: the federal blockade and the dislocation of the war led to widespread famine that killed some one million lbos. Biafran resistance finally collapsed following a series of engagements in late 1969 and early 1970. Ojukwa fled to Ivory Coast and in January 1970 Gowon's ‘police action’ ended.
Bibliography
- Jorre, John De St, The Nigerian Civil War (London, 1972)
— Matthew Hughes
