The story of my book

Let me tell you the story of my book, The Six Military Governors, Voices of History, published about two months ago by MayFive Media Limited. It tells you how I began my 50-year odyssey in journalism. I had a lot of fun writing it. I hope you too will read it with some pleasure.

My only condition is you do not read it chuckling to yourself that I am a forgotten son of Methuselah, the biblical man with the unenviable record of living for more than 900 years. He was the first man who nearly lived for ever. I refuse to imagine what he looked like and how his joints conducted their orchestra by the time he was permitted to take his bow. His longevity was punitive, I tell you.

Not long after I stepped into the hallowed halls of that once powerful national newspaper, the New Nigerian, to begin my career, its editor, Mallam Adamu Ciroma, gave me an intimidating reportorial assignment. It was part of his unique mentoring system to make me learn by doing. My assignment was to interview the six military governors of the six northern states. In his remaking of the Nigerian federation on May 27, 1967, General Yakubu Gowon broke the country into twelve states - six in the north and six in the south. The towering northern region was broken into six states: Benue-Plateau, NorthCentral, Kano, Kwara, North-East, North-West and West-Central, later renamed Kwara.

I had no media interview experience of any type. So, my experience should impress itself on all young and aspiring reporters who feel oddly and faintly intimidated by journalism. Former President Goodluck Jonathan once put it nicely when he said that when he was growing up, he had no shoes; and if he, a shoeless kid could make it through the crooked twists and turns to the pinnacle of political power in the land, all those who grew up or are growing up shoeless, should be inspired by his achievements. They too can do it. So, if you entered journalism not knowing how to operate the tape recorder like I did, you too can become an editor.

Sometime last year, as the twilight zone of my career loomed and looms menacingly still, I began to reminisce on my early years in the profession that has meant so much to me. My mind settled on that my first major reportorial assignment in the New Nigerian for one good reason. I wanted to go back and hear the voices of the six military governors as they tried to settle down and grapple with the challenges of the office thrust upon them in a truly delicate and turbulent political period in our national life.

None of them had political management experience. They were all professional soldiers and police officers who had no ambition to be players in any shape or form in our national politics. They took office as the drums of the dismemberment of our country sounded louder and harsher in the ears by the day. Those were the days that tried men’s souls and their commitment to the survival of the fatherland. Nigeria survived because those men too played their part and helped to save the nation.

But they are now forgotten behind the fog of history. The present generation knows little, if anything, about them because our nation has no sense of history. It chooses to condemn its past leaders to the have-been dump of faceless men and women indistinguishable from the rabble. The names of Commissioner of Police, Alhaji Audu Bako, Commissioner of Police, Joseph D. Gomwalk, Brigadier Abba Kyari, Brigadier Musa Usman, Brigadier David Bamigboye and Deputy Commissioner of Police, Usman Faruk ring bells no more. They were put out of pasture in the July 29, 1975 coup that ousted that gentleman officer from office, General Yakubu Gowon.

The more I thought of them as forgotten actors on our political stage for more than eight years, the more I was moved to help revive their names if only to let this generation know something about them and their contributions to our national development. It has been some 50 years since the interviews they granted me were published in the New Nigerian over a six-consecutive Mondays from January 29 to March 1, 1968. But I still hear the clipped British accented voice of Musa Usman; I hear the quiet laughter of Usman Faruk; I hear the cool, diplomatic voice of Audu Bako; I hear the playful teasing of Abba Kyari; I see the contemplative facial expression of Joseph Gomwalk and I see the bright smile of David Bamigboye on his ebony face. I hear the voices of history. I am moved by them.

By the time I thought of publishing the interviews in one volume in my latest book, only three of them, Kyari, Bamigboye and Faruk were alive. Bako and Usman died of natural causes; Gomwalk was implicated in Lt Col Dimka’s murderous coup of February 13, 1976, and was shot along with the other convicted coup plotters.

The book then began the run of poor luck even before it trudged its way into bookshops. My plan was to present a copy along with copies of my other books to the man who made it all happen, Mallam Adamu Ciroma. But the man died and I lost the chance to show him what I have made of his mentoring me.

Six weeks after the book was published, my friend, Femi, to whom I sent a copy, suggested I should give him a copy for Bamigboye who lived in the same area of Ikeja where Femi has his offices. I discussed this with my colleague, Yakubu Mohammed, and we agreed that it would be more honourable for us to present copies of the book to Bamigboye in person. He was Yakubu’s military governor too when the former Kabba Province was part of Kwara State. I requested Femi for the general’s phone number so we could formally book an appointment with him.

A couple of weeks later on September 21, Femi called me back. That morning he called Bamigboye’s younger brother, Theophilus, a retired colonel and a former military governor too like his elder brother, to request for the general’s phone number.

The colonel said to Femi, “Sorry, you can’t talk to him.”

“And why not,?” asked Femi. “He is my elder brother too you know.”

And the colonel dropped the bomb shell of bad news. “Because, he died last night.”

I next turned my attention to Kyari and Faruk. I was in Abuja November and tried to contact both men through the assistance of my friends. We were still at it when the bomb exploded again. Kyari died in Abuja on November 25. How awfully unfair can the grim reaper get?

Now, five of them would never read my book and relive their early days in office. I just hope Faruk would end the run of poor luck for my book. At least, let one of them know that I dedicated my book to them for what they meant to me in my journalism career. I hope someone reading this would be kind enough to drop a word in Faruk’s ears.