The Coup that Removed Gowon

On 29 July 1975 Yakubu Gowon was deposed in a bloodless coup while he was attending a summit of the Organisation of African Unity in Kampala, Uganda. According to the Library of Congress country study, the political atmosphere had deteriorated, and many of the officers involved had taken part in the July 1966 coup that brought Gowon to power; the coup fell on its ninth anniversary. The armed forces chose Brigadier Murtala Muhammad, a northerner trained at Sandhurst who had commanded federal forces in the civil war, to succeed him.

In October 1970 Gowon had announced that the military would stay in power until 1976, the target year for completing its programme and returning to elected civilian government. According to the Library of Congress country study, the oil boom that followed the price rises of 1974 brought rapid inflation and wide inequalities, which the public blamed on corruption and mismanagement under Gowon's government. The north also suffered a severe drought between 1972 and 1974. The country study records that the political atmosphere deteriorated to the point that Gowon was deposed. His government had ruled by decree through the Supreme Military Council, although the agreement of the state military governors was sought before decrees were issued.

Murtala Muhammad committed his government to hand power to an elected civilian government by October 1979, and in 1976 Nigeria came to have nineteen states. Murtala was assassinated during an unsuccessful coup in February 1976; his deputy, Lieutenant General Olusegun Obasanjo, continued the programme (country study).

The coup brought to power a government that set a firm timetable for the return to civilian rule, which was completed in 1979. Murtala Muhammad's policies won him broad popular support in a short time, and his assassination in February 1976 caused deep national mourning (country study).