A photograph captures President Shehu Usman Aliyu Shagari being escorted to Buckingham Palace in the State Coach by Queen Elizabeth II’s palace escort, marking the beginning of his four-day State Visit in 1981.

After the 1966 Nigerian coup d’état, Shagari was among the government officials who handed over government to the military leadership of Maj. Gen. Aguiyi Ironsi.

He returned to Sokoto to promote education. He served as the executive secretary of the Sokoto Province Education Development Fund in 1967, where he built many provincial schools. He was later appointed as Commissioner of Establishment and Training and also served briefly as Commissioner for Education in the defunct North Western States before he was invited to serve under the Federal Military Government of Gen. Yakubu Gowon.

Following the Nigerian Civil War, from 1970 to 1971, Shagari was appointed by the military head of state General Yakubu Gowon as the federal commissioner for economic development, rehabilitation, and reconstruction which worked to carry out reconciliation policy of Gowon’s Government.

Shagari began reconstruction and rehabilitation of schools, hospitals, and other infrastructure in the South East. He also undertook the mission of persuading South Easterners to rejoin the civil service while negotiating the release of Biafran political prisoners after a letter written to him by Pius Okigbo was smuggled for him from Enugu Prisons.