According to a report by Punch Newspaper on Friday, May 22, 2026, former Nigerian Head of State, Yakubu Gowon, has rejected claims that the 1967 Aburi meeting in Ghana produced any agreement permitting the Eastern Region to secede and form Biafra, insisting that the interpretation later presented by Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu was inaccurate.
Gowon, who led Nigeria between 1966 and 1975, said he was surprised to learn that Ojukwu told audiences in the Eastern Region that both sides had agreed to a political arrangement that would allow Nigeria’s regions to go their separate ways after the January 4–5, 1967 talks in Aburi.
He made the remarks in his memoir, My Life of Duty and Allegiance, which was launched in Abuja on Tuesday in an event attended by former President Goodluck Jonathan and President Bola Tinubu, represented by Vice President Kashim Shettima.
The Aburi meeting, hosted in Ghana by then Head of State Joseph Arthur Ankrah at Peduase Lodge, was part of last-ditch efforts to resolve tensions that later escalated into the Nigerian Civil War between July 1967 and January 1970. The conflict followed political, ethnic and economic disputes after independence in 1960, and resulted in millions of deaths.
According to Gowon, the discussions focused on maintaining unity and avoiding the use of force, rather than agreeing to partition the country.
He recalled being informed shortly after the meeting that Ojukwu had publicly claimed consensus on regional separation. “That was completely wrong,” Gowon wrote, insisting that the resolutions did not support such an interpretation.
He also argued that Ojukwu’s position contradicted the spirit of the talks and said records of the meeting did not support claims of an agreed path toward secession.
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