Assassination, disguise and a foreign embassy sound like the typical ingredients of an underwhelming action film, not tales from the life of Pele.
But that is exactly what they are. During a February trip to Nigeria in 1976, one of football’s greatest players found himself holed up in a hotel alongside tennis legend and reigning Wimbledon champion Arthur Ashe as they plotted an escape from a volatile situation.
Tensions had been bubbling away under the surface in Lagos for weeks before his Pepsi-sponsored visit, which coincided with the first professional tennis tournament to be held in Nigeria.
The large number of American players descending on the city was an aggravating factor; at the time, the US and Nigerian governments were at loggerheads over the latter’s continued support for the People’s Movement in Angola, a group backed by Soviet Russia. But up until that point, little direct action had been taken.
An attempted coup was imminent, however. On February 13, what was supposed to be the fourth day of the tennis tournament and another day of Pele’s promotional work, Nigerian Head of State, General Murtala Mohammed, was gunned down in his car by a group of rebel soldiers while on his way to the country’s army headquarters.
The leader of the group was the head of the Nigerian Army Physical Training Corps, Lt. Colonel Bukar Dimka. After the shooting, he led the way to the Nigerian Broadcasting Corporation. There he announced over the radio that the government had been overthrown; a broadcast that Pele and the American tennis players heard at the Federal Palace Hotel.
It is crucial to remember that by this point, Pele had been plying his trade in the United States for over a year and would have no doubt been viewed as an ally of the Americans in a country which was home to plenty of anti-American sentiment. Such demonstrations outside the US Embassy had punctuated the months prior and had led to concerns being raised about the tournament and the visit of Pele, but they were quickly dismissed by those in the Nigerian government.
So Pele had proceeded with his Pepsi-sponsored campaign in Lagos, flying to the city to play an exhibition match and aid in the running of new soccer schools in the area.
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READ: The Aston Villa reserve who stole Pele’s thunder in his final professional match
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After the coup, however, broadcasting stopped at around 3pm that day as a fight for power ensued. Following a gunfight,…
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