Yesterday made it exactly 22 years after the demise of Shehu Musa Yar’adua (March 5, 1943 – December 8, 1997).
He was a retired Nigerian Army major general who served as the Chief of Staff, Supreme Headquarters under General Olusegun Obasanjo’s 1977 – 1979 military government.
Early life and education
Yar’Adua was born in Katsina into a titled Fulani family. His father, Musa Yar’Adua, was a teacher who later became the Minister for Lagos Affairs from 1957 to 1966 during Nigeria’s First Republic. His father held the traditional title of Mutawallin Katsina (keeper of the treasury).
Yar’Adua’s grandfather, Mallam Umaru, was also the Mutawallin, and his younger brother, Umaru Musa Yar’Adua, became the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria in 2007.
Yar’Adua attended Katsina Middle School and then Katsina Provincial School (now Government College, Katsina) for his secondary education; at the provincial school, he was classmates with current Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari.
At the urging of his father and his father’s friend, the defense minister Muhammadu Ribadu, Yar’Adua took the entrance exam of the Nigerian Military Training College.
He passed and was enlisted in the army in 1962 as part of the course 5 intakes of the Nigerian military training school. Yar’Adua was selected for further training at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst in Sandhurst, England.
Military career
In 1964, after he returned from Sandhurst, Yar’Adua was posted to the first infantry battalion of the Nigerian Army in Enugu under the command of ColAdekunle Fajuyias second lieutenant. From 1964 to the end of the Nigerian Civil War, he held various positions including platoon commander in 1964, and from 1965 to 1966 adjutant of the First Infantry Battalion in Enugu.
He was a battalion commander in 1967, and in 1968 became a Brigade Commander. During the civil war, he commanded the 6th infantry brigade under the leadership of Murtala Mohammed, commander of the second division.
In October 1967, Yar’Adua was given the responsibility for the capture of Onitsha after two (2) unsuccessful attempts by the Nigerian troops.
Yar’Adua became a Lt Col in 1972. In 1975, he was an active participant in the coup that deposed Yakubu Gowonas Nigeria’s Head of State. After the success of the coup, he served as Transport Minister in General Murtala Mohammad’s regime. As Transport Minister his major task was to decongest the Lagos port. Prior to the coup, officials of the previous regime had ordered 16 million tonnes of cement to build military barracks around the country. However, the berthing facilities of the port were inadequate.
The financial implications became more striking because the Nigerian government was liable to pay demurrage fees by the shippers. The Mohammed regime decided to transfer some of the cargoes to neighboring ports and introduce cement management firms to clear and sell the cement and build the new Tin Can Island Port.
Chief of Staff, Supreme Headquarters
In 1976, Yar’Adua became the Chief of Staff, Supreme Headquarters after the assassination of Murtala Mohammed in an abortive coup. His office was assigned the task of managing operations of Operation Feed the Nation, a self-reliant agricultural policy of the new Obasanjo regime.
Operation Feed the Nation, known as OFN, was an initiative to boost local production of agricultural produce, especially staple crops such as rice and wheat, so as to improve the self-sufficiency of food crops and reduce growing food deficits.
Mechanisms used to promote the objective included the distribution of heavily subsidized fertilizers and seeds to farmers, loans to small scale farmers to enable them to purchase equipment, and an educational outreach program manned by Corp to teach peasant farmers how to use modern agricultural equipment. However, by 1979 the policy had not achieved its primary goal of self-reliance and self-sufficiency.
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