Brigadier-General John Atom Kpera spent 24 years in the Nigerian military, where he served in many key positions. He was the military governor of the Southeastern State between 1975 and 1978 under the Murtala/Obasanjo regime, and later, the military governor of his home state, Benue, under General Muhammadu Buhari (1984-85). He retired 41 years ago , and, remarkably, returned home to Gboko, where this interview was held. Tell us about your early days in this beautiful city. I have been in Gboko since I retired in 1985. On and off, I go to places, but I come back to Gboko. I think my retirement period has been quite satisfactory, as far as I am concerned. How was your growing up, as well as schooling? I was born on January 3, 1941, about 25 miles awayfrom here. I was the fourth child. But I was born not quite good. They called it a soft head. Everybody thought I was going to die before I grew up because I had a soft head. What does that mean? I don’t know what they call it in English. It is a medical condition; and because of that, my father wasn’t thinking seriously about me. I couldn’t possibly become a farming child, the two boys he had before me were helping him. So he sent me to my grandmother at the age of four. The village is not quite six miles from where we are sitting. So I literally grew up with my grandmother, up to the age of seven, then I was sent to school. Who sent you to school: your grandmother or father? My grandmother. My parents simply sent me there. And literally, my father particularly didn’t have much hope that I would survive and be of any benefit to him. I grew up with my grandmother who was a staff of the then Dutch Reformed Church Mission at Mkpar. She took care of me until the age of seven in 1948, when I went to elementary school as we called it in those days. My mother’s brother was staying in Gboko town here, working for the Tiv Native Authority (NA). So at the age of 10 in 1951, I requested to go to him and my grandmother said yes by all means. I was in Elementary Two or something like that when I joined my uncle. He put me in the Tiv Native Authority Elementary School in Gboko here. What I consider as not particularly something to be happy about was the year my uncle stopped working in the Tiv Native Authority. In fact, he was accused of embezzlement and sent to prison. But God has been kind to me. Somehow, I managed until 1956 and I went to the then Benue Provincial Secondary School in Katsina-Ala, which is about an hour or so drive from here. That’s where I stayed throughout my secondary school days, up to 1962. In the middle of that same year, by June when we had a long summer break, the army was Nigerianising.It was all white officers, so they sent one Captain, a British man, to our school to explain how wonderful it would be if you joined the army. They asked for those who would like to join and I gave my name. General John Atom Kpera You had finished mock examination but hadn’t completed WASSCE; and suddenly, this army thing came? Exactly. I had to go to the school and tell the principal that I was not going to come back for WASSCE. The man was almost saying I would not go away, but I told him the offer I had from the army and was required to go to Kaduna for military interview. He said, “Well, if you must go, you can go.” You were recruited into the army and immediately sent to Ethiopia. How was the experience? Of the 20 of us that were sent to Ethiopia, 10 were for the Air Force and 10 for the Army. I was one of those that were sent for the air force. We were in Ethiopia from 1962 to 1965 – three years. The 10 of us knew that they were going to train us as pilots to fight in the Nigerian Air Force, but only four of us succeeded in going. We call it a ticket, I mean a wing; that means you passed and could go for a further training. Was it strange that from Benue you found yourself in that environment? Did you enjoy it? Well, I had no choice; so generally, I must say that I enjoyed it because almost all of us came from places like that. We were young, so we became friends. I started making friends with foreigners. Were there adventures you can remember? I don’t know what you mean by adventure, but I will tell you a story to some level. The only adventure I must say we had was that we had challenges in the military academy. Ethiopian students were there too as cadets. As a military academy, when you finished you would get commissioned straightaway. There was no short service; it was a combatant regular training. Ethiopians became some of our friends. We went out together. Of course we started catching up with their language too – Amharic. When we finished in 1965, the 16 of us came back and were all commissioned as Second Lieutenants. I went to the Nigerian Army Engineers. Everybody chose where they wanted and they sent us there – Infantry, Artillery, signals, everything. Where were you when the coup happened? I was at the Field Squadron En
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