Emmanuel Ifeajuna

Emmanuel Ifeajuna ( Emmanuel Arinze Ifeajuna; * 1935 , † September 25, 1967 in Enugu ) was a Nigerian high jumper and major in the Nigerian Armed Forces .

At the British Empire and Commonwealth Games in Vancouver in 1954 , he won with his personal best of 2.03 m. He was the first black African to win a gold medal at a major international sporting event.

In the same year he ended his athletic career and began studying at the University of Ibadan . He then worked as a teacher before joining the army in 1960.

In 1966 he was part of a group of officers who put into a coup against the government dominated by northern Nigerians . According to the official police report, Ifeajuna was the one who killed Prime Minister Abubakar Tafawa Balewa . After the coup failed, his friend and poet Christopher Okigbo helped him to flee abroad. He returned after the military governor of the eastern region Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu guaranteed his safety.

On May 30, 1967, Ojukwu, like Ifeajuna an Igbo , declared independence from Biafra . Ifeajuna planned with three other officers of the Biafra military (Victor Banjo, Phillip Alale and Sam Agbam) to negotiate with the central government in the now flaring Nigerian civil war . Their conspiracy was exposed and all four were executed for treason on Ojukwu's orders .

Web links

• Emmanuel Ifeajuna: Commonwealth Games gold to facing a firing squad , article by Brian Oliver in the Observer , July 13, 2014