Navy Captain Benson Adewunmi Agbaje was appointed Military Administrator of Enugu State

Enugu State

Enugu State is a mainland state in southeastern Nigeria. Its capital is Enugu, from which the state - created in 1991 from the old Anambra State - derives its name. The principal cities in the state are Enugu, Agbani, Awgu, Udi, Oji, and Nsukka....

, Nigeria

Nigeria

Nigeria , officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a federal constitutional republic comprising 36 states and its Federal Capital Territory, Abuja. The country is located in West Africa and shares land borders with the Republic of Benin in the west, Chad and Cameroon in the east, and Niger in...

 from August 1998 to May 1999 during the transitional regime of General Abdulsalam Abubakar, handing over to the elected civilian governor Chimaroke Nnamani

Chimaroke Nnamani

Chimaroke Nnamani is a Nigerian politician from Enugu State. He was Governor of Enugu State from 1999 to 2007 and is currently a People's Democratic Party Senator for Enugu East.-Education:...

 when democracy returned with the Nigerian Fourth Republic

Nigerian Fourth Republic

The Fourth Republic is the republican government of Nigeria. Since 1999 it has governed the country according to the fourth republican constitution. It was in many ways a revival of the Second Republic, which was in place between 1979 and 1983 and suffers many of the same problems, such as multiple...

.
In March 1999, he apparently ordered the arrest of Emeka Mamah, the chief correspondent of the Vanguard newspapers in Enugu, an unusual move during the transition to democracy.
He was forced to retire in June 1999 under a law that affected all military ministers, governors and administrators in the Babangida,
Abacha and Abubakar regimes.