Lt.-Col. Adekunle Fajuyi
In a recent interview with Kamarudeen Ogundele of Punch, the
younger sister to late Lt.-Col. Adekunle Fajuyi, Mrs. Remi Ajayi, who
was with him on the day of the coup, has said that Fajuyi's Hausa aides
betrayed him before he was killed.
The counter-coup of 1966 led by Northern officers came as a result
of the January coup allegedly staged by mostly Igbo officers. In
response, Northern soldiers who were not happy with the murder of their
revered leader and Northern Nigeria premier, Sir Ahmadu Bello, and the
Prime Minister, Tafawa Balewa staged a counter-coup that saw them murder
top Igbo military officers including the then Nigeria’s first military
Head of State, General Aguiyi Ironsi, who was visiting the Western
Region. He was killed along with his host, Lt-Col. Adekunle Fajuyi, the
then military governor of the region.
Late Fajuiyi's sister explained what really happened on the night that Colonel Fajuyi was killed.
She said: "I was with him on the night of the incident. I was
with him throughout the six months he was in the Government House in
Ibadan as governor. That night, there was a cocktail party for all the
Obas (monarchs) who came to Ibadan for a meeting and the Head of State,
General Aguiyi Ironsi, was in attendance. I was watching them from where
I was upstairs. After the meeting, everybody departed. Around 4am, I
heard gunshots. It was strange to me because I had not heard gunshots
before.
"I just closed my ears and went back to sleep. When I woke up, I
went to the kitchen to greet the staff and to collect my meal. Then the
staff asked if I heard gunshots. Then I remembered the noise I heard in
my sleep, so I said oh! that was a gunshot. I quickly ran into my
brother’s room because I thought he had been killed. On getting to his
room, I saw him sitting quietly on a chair; that was unlike him.
Nevertheless, I was very happy to see him. I rushed towards him and said
to him, ‘Brother, I’m happy to see you, I heard there were gunshots in
the night. I was afraid something bad had happened to you.’ Then he
asked me,
‘Why are you walking about in the house? Aren’t you going to
work today?’ I said to him, ‘ I am not going to work. I don’t know what
is going on."
She continued: "Then, I left him, but I didn’t go to my room. I
was worried because of the way he looked. I saw him and Ironsi, they
went to his office to make a call in pyjamas. As they were coming, I
dodged. After that, I heard Ironsi saying to him (Fajuyi) that,
‘Francis, but you told me I was safe in your territory yesterday.’ Then
he replied, ‘Yes, I thought you were safe. I didn’t know anything. I
didn’t hear anything. But don’t worry, the two of us will stay together.
Go and dress up and I will dress up.
"Anything that will happen will happen to the two of us.’
Ironsi then went into his room and my brother went to his room too.
Before long, they dressed up and they were in the sitting room
downstairs in their military uniform. My brother was there before Ironsi
and he was pacing up and down in the room. Then Ironsi came down.
Meanwhile soldiers were coming in through the main door. Before they saw
the Head of State, they told my brother, ‘Give us Ironsi, we want
Ironsi. Give us Ironsi, we want Ironsi.’ Then my brother said to them,
‘No, you cannot take him, he is my guest. Why didn’t you take him in
Lagos or elsewhere? You cannot take him here. If you are taking him,
then you are taking me along.’ At that time, Ironsi was already coming
down. The soldiers then went to him and picked him up.
"That was how the two of them were taken away from the
Government House. The soldiers seized the police vehicle that came to
drop those on morning shift and took the two of them in it. That was how
it happened. I wanted to go to the house of the Secretary to the
Government, Pa Odumosu, in company with my elder brother, Sunday, who
arrived the previous night to collect money for his farms. As the two of
us were going towards the gate, soldiers sprang up from the bush using
their guns to direct us and shouting, ‘go back, go back.’ We were
terrified. Soldiers were on top of trees, hiding in the ground, they
were everywhere.
When asked about the people who led the coup, she couldn't
remember."I don’t know. But I remember that when my brother heard the
gunshots, he sent messages to the guard house and the aid de camp, but
they were all not there. They were all Hausa because my brother loved
working with the Hausa, including the driver." she said.
She also said it was possible the brother was betrayed by his Hausa aides. When asked "Could that mean they were aware of the coup?" She said: "Yes, I think they were aware and they did not tell him." and added
"I should think so because, why didn’t they tell him when they got information about the coup?"
You can get the full interview as published by Punch.
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