The Middle Belt Factor in the Nigeria-Biafra War, 1967–1975

The Middle Belt factor in the Nigeria-Biafra War is a new perspective in Nigerian historical scholarship. The intra-elite competition for power in the Middle Belt resulted in the Tiv revolts of the early 1960s which eroded the legitimacy of Nigeria’s post-independence government. This study is a knowledge-building effort to analyse how the pendulum of the Middle Belt politics from 1967–1975 factored the Zone’s participation in the Nigeria-Biafra War, its influence in the war-time policies, as well as the post-war policies. The thrust of this study, therefore, is to demonstrate how the Middle Belt politics shaped the success of the war and the formulation of war policies during, and after the war in Nigeria. The argument from this perspective is that the crises in the Zone precipitated the coup and subsequent events that snowballed into the war, and their cumulative contributions to the end of the war.