The term coup d'etat describes the sudden overthrow of a government by the military. A coup usually involves a small group of officers who change government by removing the president and the cabinet. This change of government can either be calm and bloodless or violent and precarious. It is therefore an act of changing state power from civilian to military. When military officers come to power, they form a ruling council that rules by decrees without following normal procedure of law making. A coup can be politically, ethnically or militarily inspired. Coups are common in the third world.

A military government is one, which is formed by army officers and comes to power through a coup d’etat. The soldiers overthrow a ruling civilian or military government by force. Military governments always suspend the constitution immediately they come to power. The parliament and other political councils are also suspended.

Soldiers always use tanks and other modern weapons to attack State House, parliament and the Nation’s official radio station to announce the coup.

The first coup on the African continent took place in Egypt in 1952 when col. Abdel Nasser overthrew the government of king Farouk. This was followed after six years by another coup in Sudan when Army Officers led by General Ibrahim Abdoud seized power from Prime minister Abdallah Khalil. In the sixties the first coup that took place in the independent black Africa was in Togo where a force of only 250 men overthrew the government shortly after independence in 1963.

Military governments are action-oriented regimes with no bargaining but only orders. The major problem is that military men who have little understanding of the country’s politics and civilian interests form the top leadership of military government.

With the advent of independence in the early 1960's excitement and new hopes swept through Africa as nation after nation attained self-government. There were new dreams and expectations as the colonial masters packed their bags and handed over the instruments of power to the indigenous peoples. To most Africans this was the end of a long freedom struggle in which so many had suffered. It was the end of slavery, human degradation and exploitation.

However, these dreams were soon shattered as government after government fell victim to the coup d'etat across the continent. The new military rulers accused the civilian government of everything from corruption and incompetence to mismanagement of the national economy.

However, experience in Africa has shown that the military are no better than civilians when it comes to running governments. Rather than solve African contemporary political and Socio-economic problems, military coups d'etat in Africa have tended to drive the continent into even further suffering and turmoil. This has been the case in Uganda, Ghana, Nigeria, Togo, Congo and several other African states. “The future trend is that coups in Africa will remain a common phenomenon as long as political and economic instability prevails”.12

At the time of independence in March 1957, Ghana had probably the highest standard of education in the entire black Africa. In spite of this impressive position, however, only a mere 10% of the commissioned officers was local. The Belgian Congo had a total force well in excess of 24,000 men at the time of independence. Yet there was not a single Congolese officer in the entire force.

This state of imbalance or rather inequality was to contribute towards inciting a mutiny after independence. The army mutinies in Tanganyika and Uganda in 1964 were provoked by similar situations, besides the issue of salaries.

The newly independent African nations took over what were essentially colonial armies. In the majority of the cases the army was relatively small and ill-equipped. One major priority was to eliminate the colonial mentality that existed in the military by giving the armed forces a more national outlook. This obviously called for instituting clearly visible changes. The uniforms had to be redesigned to reflect a more national character. The names of the regiments, the names of the barracks and even the tunes of martial music had all to be modified to identify with the new nation.

As pointed out earlier, there existed a noticeable tribal imbalance in the national make-up of the military as a result of the colonialists' belief in 'martial tribes' or natural warriors. In order to rectify this situation recruitment had to be conducted on a national scale with every tribe represented, on a pro rata basis, according to the known population figures at the time. Only in this way could tribal tension and rivalry be minimized. It was humanly impracticable, certainly, to totally eradicate tribalism due the ethnic customs and traditions so permanently intra-woven in African society. This inherent African character of tribal ism that is so much imbedded in local culture is a potentially explosive social phenomenon that was later to cause civil war in Nigeria.

As the military was struggling to attain a national character in order to gain national acceptance, the politicians were becoming more self-seeking, power-hungry and ambitious. Some were out seeking instant wealth for themselves, their friends and relatives. Nepotism became rampant, common-place and a norm. Others were out experimenting on new and foreign ideologies in the name of African socialism.

These were ideologies that had no bearing or relevance to the improvement of the lives of the ordinary man. Some of these governments started openly courting the Eastern bloc for advice and guidance. It did not take the ordinary citizens long to realize that these so-called progressive governments were not delivering the goods fast enough. Corruption had become an accepted way of life.
Mismanagement of the economy coupled with sheer incompetence had led to galloping inflation and unaffordable prices. Unemployment and crime rates were on the increase. Yet the greedy get-rich-quick politicians continued getting richer. These were the kind of situations to be found in Ghana, Sudan, Somalia, Uganda and other countries when their governments fell to the military.

In the majority of the coups that have occurred, the military has deemed it a national and patriotic obligation to rescue the country from total collapse and thereby restore lost national prestige. Although these coups d'etat have been executed in the guise of national interest and patriotic duty, more often than not, military regimes have turned out to be more corrupt, oppressive and downright inefficient than the civilian governments they deposed.
The period between 1960 and 1970 and slightly beyond has generally been called the decade of coups' in Africa. Once coups started in Africa they became like a wild African bushfire. They swept through the entire continent at an alarmingly high speed. They leapt through national borders as if those boundaries did not exist anymore. During this decade of coups the scoreboard read something like this:

Congo-Kinshasa, 1960. General Mobutu seizes power temporarily.

Togo, January 1963. Coup deposes President Olympio, who gets killed in the process.

Congo-Brazzaville, August 1963. Government of Abbe' Youlou overthrown.

Dahomey, December 1963. Colonel Sogho overthrows President Maga.

Gabon, February 1964. Coup d'etat occurs but is reverted by French forces.

Algeria, June 1965. Colonel Boumedienne overthrows President Ben Bella.

Dahomey; December 1965. A second coup is staged.

Burundi, October 1965. The monarchy is overthrown by Army officers.

Central Africa Republic, January 1966. President David Dacko is ousted by Colonel Jean Bokassa.

Upper Volta, January 1966. Colonel Lamizana deposes President Yameago.

Nigeria, January 1966. General Ironsi is installed after a coup led by young officers.

Ghana, February 1966. President Kwame Nkrumah is over-thrown by the military led by General Ankrah.

Nigeria, July 1966. General Gowon overthrows General Ironsi.

Burundi, November 1966. Captain Micombero takes over in another coup.

Sierra Leone, March 1967. President Margai deposed by Lieutenant Colonel Juxon-Smith.

Algeria, December 1967. A second coup attempt is made.

Sierra Leone, April 1968. A coup from the ranks over-throws Lieutenant Colonel Juxon-Smith. Civilian government re-installed under President Siaka Stevens.

Mali, November 1968. Young officers led by Lieutenant Moussa Traore depose the government of President Keita.

Sudan, May 1969 led by Jeffery Niemery with Free Officers' Movement seizes power.

Libya, September 1969 led by Gadaffi, the monarchy is deposed.

Somalia, October 1969. A revolutionary Council led by the military overthrows the government.

The list of these coups in large numbers across the African continent goes on.
The mere mention of coup d’etat, the unconstitutional and violent overthrow of incumbent governments, sends down shivers and evokes traumatic memories from any country’s nationals. It recreates those anguished images that overwhelmed the populace when the finger pulled the trigger.

Every citizen is haunted by mortal fear of the day’s uncertainty and discusses it in hushed tones, cautious that nobody eavesdrops. The penalty for participation is maximum: death. It, therefore, makes it a condemnable high risk venture. But some initiators still damn the consequences. It is all because it possesses limitless attractions and guarantees inexhaustible opportunities.

Its charm is almost irresistible. Those who get hooked hardly would divorce their other collaborators. They, somewhat, lose every sense of reason and would muster whatever resources to actualise such a dream. When successful, they become instant heroes.

Conversely, they are society’s villains once the plot is aborted by superior strategies or gun-power of the man in the saddle. Curiously, the coupists seek escape routes. Once arrested, investigated and convicted, they begin the final journey to the firing range or long periods of incarceration.

Suddenly, the world invokes sympathy from all quarters to avoid blood-letting. Coups have their prizes and the other prices.

Usually, in every attempt, there are victims and the survivors. Afterall, human beings in authority are the targets. The mission is almost always to eliminate the regime’s henchmen and take over power or to simply shove them aside without wasting lives. In this case, a coup can either be bloody or bloodless.

Coup making is, certainly, not a Nigerian creation. Neither is it an African origination. According to Encyclopaedia Americana, one of the first modern coup d’etats was initiated and executed by Napoleon Bonaparte 200 years ago, precisely on November 9, 1799. Showing awesome trickery, he deceived the first French Republic to a Paris suburb where they were surrounded by battle-ready soldiers and the council sacked.

Africa was initiated into the coup cult 47 years ago. The ugly monster reared its ugly head on July 23, 1952 when Lt. Col Gamal Abdel-Nasser led the putsch which terminated the reign of King Farouk in Egypt, ironically the cradle of civilization. Two years later, Gen. Mohammed Neguib’s administration became history, no thanks to Nasser again.

Suddenly, the flood-gate of coups had been thrown wide open. Sudan embraced it in 1958 before Gnassingbe Eyadema, a sergeant pushed aside the government of Mr. Sylvanus Olympio. Thus, mutinies found their ways into the West African sub-region in 1963. The whirlwind was to swirl to the Central African Republic two years after to allow East Africa taste the bitter pill.

Between 1952 when Nasser’s experiment put the continent on world focus and September 1, 1969 (a period of 17 years), African nations had incredibly witnessed 26 forceful take-overs! There were expressed worries: Is Africa, indeed, the Heart of Darkness or is it being taken back to the dark age?

From Sudan to Benin Republic (then Dahomey), Algeria, Zaire, Burkina Faso (then Upper Volta) and on to Liberia and Ghana among others, the nationals woke up to martial music highlighting the coming of a new government.

In 1980, Sergeant Samuel Doe had stormed the stage to "liberate Liberians" but the whole globe was perplexed when the octogenarian former President, William Tolbert and members of his family were tied to the stakes and primarily executed! Nine years later, Doe was killed in such ridiculous fashion. Within the same period, Capt. Thomas Sankara who commanded amazing followership from Burkinabes, was similarly killed in a coup that brought the incumbent President, Blaise Compaore to power.

Thomas Sankara became the head of state of Upper Volta in 1983 after his friend and fellow soldier Blaise Compaoré overthrew the government. Sankara instituted numerous liberal reforms and, in 1984, changed the name of the country to Burkina Faso, meaning “land of upright people.” He was gunned down in a 1987 coup led by Compaoré.But these aborted plots, as declared by the last two military administrations, did not herald the introduction of coup making in Nigeria’s political lexicon. Rather, it all began in the early hours of January 15, 1966 when Chukwuma Kaduna Nzeogwu conspired with four other majors to strike. And with the summary sacking of the First Republic by these Five Revolutionaries, the course of Nigeria’s political history was irreparably altered. Soon after that intervention, Nzeogwu offered reasons to justify their action.

His broadcast identified as enemies "the political profiteers, the swindlers, the men in high and low places that seek bribes and demand ten per cent, those that seek to help the country divided permanently so that they can remain in office as ministers or VIPs at least, the tribalists, the nepotists, those that make the country look big for nothing before international circles, those who have corrupted our society and put the Nigerian political calendar back by their words and deeds."

Nigerians, today, harbour sundry perceptions about the Nzeogwu coup which marked the beginning of a new era in Nigeria’s history, certainly negatively. However, there is still an agreement that before the putsch, there were barely tolerable acrimonies and dichotomies along tribal lines.

Commentators continue to question the propriety and timeliness of that action even as the topic remains open to individual interpretations and rationalisations.

However, ascertainable facts can only aid our collective appreciation of where coups have left Nigeria as a nation. Prior to January 15, 1966, there were blatant electoral malpractices. There was palpable distrust and tribal hatred. The future was uncertain. Then dramatically, five army majors decided that it was time to effect change at the centre. When they finally struck, it was damn bloody.