Buhari reveals how Gowon instructed his commanders to treat Biafran troops like brothers not enemies

PRESIDENT Muhammadu Buhari has revealed how former head of state General Yakubu Gowon directed all military commanders serving under him during the Nigerian Civil War to show restraint with Biafran soldiers because they were fighting their brothers not enemies.

Between July 1967 and January 1970, Nigeria fought a brutal civil war as the federal government engaged the army of the breakaway Biafran Republic, which tried to secede from the country. At the time, President Buhari was a captain in the Nigerian Army, serving under the then Col Olusegun Obasanjo, who in return reported to General Gowon.

Aware of the fact that the Biafran soldiers would be integrated into the Nigerian Army after the war, General Gowon warned his commanders that the troops they were fighting were not enemies but their brothers. President Buhari disclosed this yesterday during his investiture as the grand patron of the Nigerian Red Cross Society (NRCS) at the Presidential Villa in Abuja.

During the ceremony, President Buhari praised general Gowon for that decision and described him as a committed Nigerian. President Buhari also commended the NRCS for bringing succour to victims of the war even in dangerous circumstances, noting that the pathetic pictures of war-ravaged Biafrans were always heart-rending.

President Buhari said: “Earlier in my profession, during the civil war, I know how much sacrifice members of the Nigerian Red Cross and their international counterparts did both in the real front of operations and at the rear, on both sides. I think it is a lot of sacrifice because anything can happen to you in the operational areas.

“I remember with nostalgia the performance of the commander-in-chief, General Gowon. Every commander was given a copy of the commander-in-chief’s instructions that we were not fighting enemies but that we were fighting our brothers and thus, people were constrained to show a lot of restraint."

He added that international observer teams were allowed to go as far as possible within and outside the war front, which was generous and very considerate of General Gowon. President Buhari promised to help the organisation to secure a permanent office accommodation in Abuja.

Chief Bolaji Anani, the national president of the NRCS, said the organisation had over 800,000 trained volunteers based in communities across the 774 local government areas of the federation. He pleaded with the president to assent to the bill amending the Red Cross Act of 1960, whenever the National Assembly, which is debating it, eventually gave its approval.