[a] In response to Igbo demands for secession, Ojukwu reorganised the Eastern Region as the Republic of Biafra, and he declared independence from Nigeria.

The Nigerian military, with support from the United Kingdom and the Soviet Union, blockaded Biafra and cut food supplies, which created a mass famine.

Ojukwu made use of foreign media to highlight the plight of Biafran civilians and depict the war as genocide against Igbos.

Ojukwu subsequently fled to Ivory Coast in exile, where President Félix Houphouët-Boigny, who recognised Biafra as a sovereign and independent state, granted him political asylum.

In 1981, newly democratically elected Nigerian president Shehu Shagari granted amnesty to Ojukwu, allowing him to return to Nigeria without facing political or legal consequences from the war.

Ojukwu spent the remainder of his life unsuccessfully attempting to return to Nigerian politics as a democratically elected politician rather than a military ruler.

He was buried with full military honours, including a 21-gun salute from the Nigerian Army, and thousands of people attended his funeral.

Many Igbo people regard him as a hero and a messianic figure who did what was necessary to ensure the survival of Nigeria's Eastern population while facing the possibility of a genocide after the 1966 coup.

[15] After informing his reluctant parents, Ojukwu joined the Nigerian Civil Service in Udi, as an Assistant District Officer.

[17] He hardly spoke Igbo since he was born in the north, raised in the west, and educated in England, hence, he could speak English and Yoruba fluently, and satisfactory Hausa.

His father, believing the superstition that Efik women casts spell and bewitches young men, he called his friend, the then Governor-general, John Stuart Macpherson, to terminate the appointment, and he did.

It took a month for the paper to be out and during the waiting, Ojukwu was assigned the duty of escorting the wife and daughter of the Colonel in their horse ride and tennis parties.

[25][c] The application was successful, and from Zaria, Ojukwu first moved to Teshie in Ghana and then to Officer Cadet School in Eaton Hall, England in February 1958.

[28] From January 1961 to mid 1961, he worked as a staff of branch A of the new Nigerian army headquarters located within the building of the Defense ministry in Lagos.

[29][d] The British Government informed Lagos about the remaining single vacancy of one Nigerian officer to attend the Joint Service Command and Staff College (JSSC) course in 1962.

This presented problems for Odumegwu Ojukwu, as he did everything in his power to prevent reprisals and even encouraged people to return, as assurances for their safety had been given by his supposed[34] colleagues up north and out west.

Ogundipe could not muster enough force in Lagos to establish his authority as soldiers (Guard Battalion) available to him were under Joseph Nanven Garba, who was part of the coup.

[36] The fallout from this led to a standoff between Ojukwu and Gowon, leading to the sequence of events that resulted in the Nigerian civil war.

[43] During the war, in 1967, some members of the July 1966 alleged coup plot and Major Victor Banjo were executed for treason with the approval of Ojukwu, the Biafran Supreme commander.

As it became obvious that the war was lost, Ojukwu was convinced to leave the country to avoid prosecution, incarceration or even summary execution.

[46] On 9 January 1970, he handed over power to his second in command, Chief of General Staff Major-General Philip Effiong, and left for Ivory Coast, where President Félix Houphouët-Boigny – who had recognised Biafra on 14 May 1968 – granted him political asylum.

Nigerian president Shehu Aliyu Usman Shagari granted a pardon to Ojukwu on 18 May 1982, allowing him to return to Nigeria as a private citizen.

The official tally showed him losing by 12,000 votes, though a court attempted to reverse the ruling in September of that year, citing fraud in the election results.

In early 1984, the Buhari regime jailed hundreds of political figures, including Ojukwu, who was held at the Kirikiri Maximum Security Prison.

Before his final interment, he had an elaborate weeklong funeral ceremony in Nigeria alongside Chief Obafemi Awolowo, whereby his body was carried around the five Eastern states, Imo, Abia, Enugu, Ebonyi, Anambra, including the nation's capital, Abuja.