In a recent interview with Diary of a Naija Girl, Nollywood actor Daniel Etim Effiong revealed that his father, Retired Lt. Col. Moses Effiong, spent 34 years in prison after being wrongly implicated in the 1986 Vatsa coup plot. Daniel was just one year old when his father was arrested in 1985.
The 1986 Coup Plot
General Ibrahim Babangida had seized power from General Muhammadu Buhari on August 27, 1985. Within months, a counter-plot was allegedly being hatched. The alleged mastermind was General Mamman Jiya Vatsa, a poet, Minister of the Federal Capital, and Babangida's childhood friend. In December 1985, over a hundred army, air force, and naval officers were arrested. Vatsa and 16 others were tried before a Special Military Tribunal beginning January 27, 1986.
Moses Effiong's Arrest
Moses Effiong was not a plotter. His closest friend in the army had confided in him about the plans to remove Babangida. When the coup was exposed, that friend, under pressure, gave up Moses' name. He was arrested, tried, and sentenced to death by firing squad.
According to Daniel, a man walked into the room with a list of three names, including Moses Effiong's. Those three were pulled aside while the others were taken to the back of Kirikiri prison and shot. Daniel described this as miraculous. Moses' sentence was later commuted to life imprisonment.
Pardon and Release
Vatsa was executed by firing squad on March 5, 1986, alongside nine other officers. In 2025, President Bola Tinubu granted him a posthumous pardon. Moses Effiong received his own presidential pardon in 2020, after 34 years. Daniel Effiong was 35 years old when his father was finally released.
Daniel shared that his father spent eight years on death row before the commutation. He emphasized the injustice of his father's long imprisonment for a crime he did not commit.
