Former Head of State, Gen Yakubu Gowon (retd.), said desperate financial circumstances almost left him, his wife, Victoria and their children homeless in the aftermath of the July 1975 coup that ended his nine-year regime.
Gowon also revealed that his entire life savings from the moment he was commissioned as a young officer in 1954 to the day he was overthrown as Head of State in 1975 amounted to just N41,000.
He also stated that his pension was stopped and that the family came perilously close to homelessness in London.
The revelations are contained in Chapter 29 of Gowon’s 859-page autobiography, ‘My Life of Duty and Allegiance,’ titled ‘The Search for a Home: Victoria’s Ordeal,’ obtained by our correspondent.
In the chapter, Gowon described himself as a former Head of State with no access to cash, sheltering in a friend’s renovated house in North London, selling several of his possessions to raise a house deposit, and writing to his successor, Gen Muhammadu Buhari (retd.), to ask for help in paying his children’s school fees.
