Covering the war front is no mean achievement but doing so at a time when the out going theatre Commander believes the non-kinetics are as important as the kinetic and works with all to help his course makes the job easier.
Many Generals have come and gone from the theatre and even the theatre criminals knew that that no nonsense General passed through their terrain. When it comes to the kinetics there has not been a better time that the north east Nigerian war theatre has been most peaceful as it is now.
There has been many periods in which residents have been kept on edge before the advent of this infantry General who would use his expertise to think outside the box to achieve success and almost ended the 13 year old war. In this final review interview of 2022, conducted in December, the theatre Commander who spent his Christmas with his troops spoke to Sam Kayode in his Maiduguri office explaining the few challenges that are standing between complete peace in the war theatre such that residents in the deep hinterlands can be allowed to heave a sigh of relief from the choking sounds of bombs, bullets and myriads of sorties from jet bombers of the Nigerian Airforce.
As a matter of fact, his over one year stay in the theatre brought more synergy and comradeship between the entire military and security battling the remnants of ISWAP in the theatre.
Since the war theatre is no longer being choked by the insurgents, as it were some years back, the State is looking up to a peaceful election in a couple of weeks from now. And that has made a lot of watchers here to pray for this general as he assumes another sensitive role in his calling.
We started the review of the year 2022 with his reaction to the grievous accusations against the Army by a foreign media name withheld that they were complicit in deliberate abortions committed some years back and he was obviously miffed by the mere mention of the incident he described as lies. Lies all of it, he said during the chat. He started with his reaction to the wrong timing of the bombshell from that foreign media.
Hear him:” I mean that is the question everybody is asking and even why are they bringing a case of 2013 now? Something that never happened. You said 2013 and you didn’t do anything and it is 2022, nine years after that you are reacting. So for us I think they are not just happy that we are succeeding for whatever reason. Because the issue of abortion, giving birth and all these things, the military has no business with that. It has never been part of us I wonder why even associating such a thing with the military. And like I said, I think they have their own motive for doing it. And it is something for Federal Government to also take up, I am happy the chief of defense staff (CDs) mentioned that the human rights people should investigate. And we want that to take place so that when they finish we are sure that nothing like that happened. And they should be called to order. They must apologize to the nation, because this is an embarrassment to us. They just tried to malign the armed forces for whatever reason. You know not long ago there was an alarm about security alert that the United States embassy gave alarm about terrorist in Nigeria but you all know what it turned out to be.
But Abuja is not as full proof as you think General. Look at what the same insurgents allegedly did to Kuje prison.
You see the question you should be asking is why were the guys even kept at Kuje? Such heavy criminal issues, why were they kept at Kuje?. Kuje is a minimum prison why are you putting high profile people there, those are the questions we should have asked. And why were they not prosecuted, they have been there for long years. That is the failure we are talking about, you kept them there for so long why?.
But the military is equally believed to be contributing to the delay in producing evidence for the prosecution process.
You know we cannot prosecute, we can only keep the criminals….. even that again keeping them for too long is not our responsibility. You know whatever it is we do its just that we have to and that is why we are over stretched. That is not the military’s responsibility. The police and the prison warders will have to take responsibility.
On Boko Haram insurgents in cells in Borno
They have done all the investigation on the ones here, they have confirmed which of them are boko haram. The idea of the investigation is to find out which ones are culpable which ones are not, they’ve been able to do that. Now its for the cases to start, for the trials to start, that’s what we have been waiting for and its still not a military thing. Because we are not in charge of that, we are just keeping them and the legal system together. The Attorney General is in charge like you mentioned. So those are the issues on ground. We are in charge of their feeding and their administration but in the investigation the legal aspect is handled by the federal government
I know you were not there but, did the Army conduct abortions as accused?
No, like I told you, the abortion thing is a deliberate act to just malign the nation that’s all. They are not happy that we are succeeding. I mean they’ve denied us equipments over all this while, you can imagine the last equipment we got was from China. We couldn’t get from the western world and now they are coming with this. Now if you remember, there is an NGO, called Mary Stopes. Their main focus, is on abortion. It is not possible with us to do that. The military does not work that way. You can’t….. nobody can do that, nobody. Never.
Fifth columnists in uniform
Even Jesus Christ with his disciples out of 12 still had a fifth columnist. So it’s a human thing. You can’t have everybody 100 percent . There is nothing that is 100%. Nothing is absolute. So it’s up to you what you do with them. Our court marshalls have sent a number of people to jail from here, we have dismissed, we have jailed them. We have done those things and as soon as we get them we will do more.
On the allegations in the publication of the use of 33 ladies for their investigations on abortion
Where are the ladies? Did they carry people and covered their faces? why are you afraid and hiding them. They didn’t say, so they shouldn’t be scared. Who are the ladies let them bring them up. And like we said look…. the military has shown over time that we are open. All we are saying, if you have such allegations, come down to Nigeria, show us those things and lets investigate. But you are sitting down somewhere, after 9 years. And then these are indictments against the UN because if the UN has been operating with us for all these years, 13, 14 years and the UN has not found anything, that means they are saying that the UN knew and then kept quiet all these days. We have told them that the Nigeria media is very versatile. Will the Nigeria media hear this and keep quiet. Will NGOs hear this and keep quiet? We have over 200 NGOs in Borno State alone, will they hear this and keep quiet? So how comes they have not even discussed about Mary stopes that they are into abortion and all those things. It’s the military they think are their victims, we have never handled such. Out of the 82,000 that have surrendered, over 41,000 are children why didn’t we kill them and why are we going after children that don’t know anything and yet we are keeping their fathers?
Out of those that surrendered, I think almost 1000 or 1000 plus of the surrendered have given birth. What have we done with them? You see this kind of accusation is a deliberate act just to malign the military and indirectly Nigeria. So for us there should be a thorough investigation, the CDs has mentioned it and after which. we should take them to the international court. They must be prosecuted on this issues. You know over time Nigeria will just keep quiet and watch. No we should act now so that they should learn how to respect us.
The entire report on abortion was a complete lie. What are we going to gain from it? This is our nation. I mean we should kill our own people for what and we have told them culturally, religiously, abortion is not something we encourage. Why should we come and do such a thing. And 10,000 for heaven sake. That is heartless..
Sector one updates
Well like I said, we analyze the security situation and together with other security agencies we are working closely so that we enhance security situation working with a lot of NGOs. And we are glad things are working very well. You know the way insurgency is, it’s always serving as criminality, then it goes to terrorism, insurgency and then if you are able to defeat it, it goes back the cliff like that. So as it is now we are entering back into the course of criminal activities, abduction, stealing, you know all those things. Those are the things we are back into now. Now we are working with the Police again and the Civil Defense and other Security agencies to address those issues.
Farmer harder clashes in southern Borno
We heard about it and the police is handling it, we are giving them support. We have called the Miyati Allah their leadership and I have told them that we don’t want any fracas. Northeast has suffered enough, we wouldn’t want anybody again to start bringing this Herder Farmer’s clash again to add up on these issues. We are lucky the rain this year was good, harvest was fantastic, you know. So now we shouldn’t go and bring animals to start destroying peoples’ farm. You know that will bring us backwards. We don’t want hunger to affect the people, because hunger is bad, they say an angry man is the devil’s workshop.
Army report on the shooting of a foreign health worker in Damboa by an irate soldier
The report is ready, we are just reviewing it to make sure that it is well captured. Because we want to ensure it is detailed because it has to do also with international organizations so we don’t want anybody to feel that we are hiding anything. And then we are transparent. Nigerian Army is over a 100 years old, this is the first time we are getting such a situation and its just a young man that has just arrived the theatre less than a month. So it was not like…… but what we feel happened to him is that, I think he just came in and couldn’t handle the pressure and then suddenly he snapped. But you can see that it is our own soldiers that also neutralized him. That he also killed our own personnel. So it was not a compromise we don’t want anybody to feel that way.
It was a senior non commissioned officer NCO officer that tried to calm him down, that he stabbed, he killed that one. Then it’s one of our soldiers that had to neutralize him.
One year plus and post traumatic stress disorder
You know we do a lot of work with the NGOs. We have a lot of NGOs that come to do training, come to look at our troops. We make sure that the medical center too is up and doing, we have the trauma center and then you know again, we do a lot of durba meeting where we talk to soldiers and then whoever it is that has any problem we encourage them to come out if they have any challenge. Allowances you know some of these things that bring it to pressure of work so they get allowances. The allowances are paid, nobody is owed any salary and feeding we make sure that it is good, and then most importantly you know the chief introduced the welfare flight. Here we fly soldier every two weeks. Normally what used to caused it, is when somebody sits down and nobody listens to you. You can’t go on pass because of public situation on ground and all those things but now we make sure all those things are taken care of.
On communication and welfare of soldiers
You see one thing I said is, I speak with my soldiers directly. They have my number, any of them that has an issue that is not been treated I encourage them to report. And they do and we take it up quickly., I think it’s just pressure, he was just under pressure. He was just a young man, 22. He just graduated from training. Then this is his first. A private soldier. He is just 1 month in the theatre not even up to a year in the army.
The private soldier’s insults to non Governmental organizations ngos before shooting
When you see a mad man, he can say anything. You know people have different levels of how they can sustain pressure. I think, he just got snapped. And then normally before they come here, there is a psychological orientation they take, even before recruitment. When they are inducted into the theatre, they go to Buni Gari with the NACFS, Nigeria Army Situation Forces School, where they also have psychologists they look at them, they finish training before they come in. When they finish before they go we take them back, they also do psychological debriefing before they are released back into the barracks. So just to make sure that we don’t have such issues. They first do the six months, when they finish the six before they are deployed, they go for another 3 months. So just to brief you up, before you are deployed. We have our own in theatre training too, where we also, train apart from there when they come out, we still carry them here again to do same. And then when they go back to the unit, they still train consistently. Because training is a continuous process.
Complete year end review of sector 2
Sector 2 is ok, you know every day we talk. Here we discuss on daily basis, so sector 2 is equally good. Yes, we do video conferencing. I was with the Governor Buni 2 days ago. I went to see him. just to make sure there were other issues that we needed to handle.
Still on the abducted Chibok ladies and Leah
Well like you said, we will continue with our operations, once we get to wherever they are, because we don’t know. You know we hear speculation like Mandara Mountain, you hear Sambisa you hear every where. So we are hoping that by the time we get in, we will finish the…, operation. So once we get them, we will definitely bring them home . We are lucky this year, we have brought in more than 11 chibok girls so far.
Sector 3, Mongunu, Gudumbali, Nganze and others believed by their leaders to be infected according to the speaker of the house
One thing I don’t understand with him is that we have seen severally we have explained to him that there is no local government that is under anybody under any of them. The challenge that we are having is that the infrastructure is down, the infrastructure is not yet ready. So you know even taking anybody back there, there is nowhere for them to go and stay. The roads are bad, the houses are dilapidated. So the Governor is making effort as we have….there is a committee that the Governor have set up for them to return people to those places. But they need, the road now, the rain, this year the rain has caught off the road completely around that area. So they need to put those things, go back repair where the people will go back. So for him to make such strong comments would be unfair. He can’t even get there because the roads are bad, bridges have been blown up. The bridges……..rain has scattered all these things he can’t go there. This flood that came this time around has affected the road.
So no election in those areas?
No definitely. Look… now if they are able to fix those things we are ready to go back.
The Governor was at Rann any challenge?
Yah he was there. He goes there you know periodically to see how they are doing. This things are back fully, fully in place. You know the challenge we are having with all those things, what is actually delaying most of the movements, bad road. That is why you see every morning all the roads, we have to go and scan the road make sure there is no improvised explosive device IED. Because our greatest threat still remains IEDs. And we don’t want a civilian to go, when he climbs IEDs becomes our own problem. So we need to take the pains to do all these things.
You can but you know normally every morning we go and scan it before we allow anybody to pass. look, all this location we are talking, if they fix the road, 60% of the security challenge we are facing is gone. Bama, Banki those ones are free. Those ones are good. We do the clearance, then you can move. The the IEDs are our problems.
Tumbus Islands
We have done so well, now we are trying to increase our platform out there. The Navy is coming in on stream. The challenge we are having is our own part, the Nigerian side of the Lake Chad has a lot of weed. So our boats cannot move. The army chief spent over a hundred million around June/July, on this so we create pathway so that the bus can get to the main water ways. When the rain came, covered this back. So now the Navy has approved swamp bibi, because its supposed to be actually a federal government project. It’s even beyond the Navy alone. You know it has never been done before. Its a big boat like a barge and that is why we have a lot of fish and those things. So now the Chief of Naval Staff has released, cash to procure a swamp buggy. So they have to go and start work by next week, so that we can clear that way. Once we open that way, the Navy will be able to flow the Army Aviation too, Amphibious. So that we can occupy, because that is where they are getting to pass their logistics.
Swamp Bugy is an equipment that float on water and clears the weed. It’s like an excavator, that can float, and work on water.
The weed has never been cleared. So the weed is really much. You can climb on top of the lake and you can play football, it’s thick. But once they open it up, it will enable our people get there and they will be able to block that area. That is what is affecting us in the Tumbus.
Input from the navy
The Navy chief is coming, he said. They are coming, they’ve been coming. Is this challenge that didn’t. But now that they have gotten the Swamp Buggy it will make it a lot easier. I know the rain this year too there is flood at Baga too. Baga, Damasak and Mallam Fatori.
Recent flood in Northern Borno
Is the flood, they said the dam, they said there is a dam they opened in Cameroon. You know the flood, flooded all the IDP camps. All the IDP’s had to move out and all these things. But we have cleared them, we cleared them completely from that area. The flood covered up to almost 1.8 meters high.
Lagdo dam. When I visited them, I had to enter canoe. So they have told the state government he had visited them too. So he is going to start repairing the main Mallam Fatori town, because that area is still good. So it’s not flooded, so if he does that, they can now move back there. And like I told you, if we have roads, it will make all this places easier. From Baga you can come to Arigi metele like that to Mallam Fatori.
We have Army Engineers, if you cannot do it give Army Engineers they will do it for you. I know it’s challenging because here all the items equipments you need, you have to go and bring it. Stone and everything so it makes it extremely expensive but its worth it.
Involving the military in building the roads
No; we have, the army does, yes, yes, the army does a lot of contract for states in this country.
We have discussed with ministry of works, we told them that. And I think they are discussing. So we are hoping that something else will come in. Its only the road that is challenging us+, do you know if we do this 60, 65% of our security challenge will be gone.
Can the Army run its own farms to produce food for troops?
Yes its allowed, we have Nigerian Army farms.Yes we have a department of Agriculture. In fact I was the first executive director there.
New happenings for troops welfare
The chief is doing everything possible to ensure that the welfare of everyone is intact.Welfare like I said, is still going on and first and foremost we make sure that salaries are paid which is key, allowances, feeding is good. You get your equipments to use for the job and so on. We are getting a lot of fighting equipments that is helping us. And then the synergy between the Army, Airforce, Navy is wonderful. We are getting the best of cooperation from the civil populace. Which is why from the state government to the traditional rulers, religious leaders everybody is giving us the support we require. So I think it’s making our work easier, that is why you see that things are really improving gradually. we provide boots for them. However, you can buy if you want to buy to add to your collection.
Promotion of personnel
Yes it’s more rapid. As part of welfare, if you do well, you know the whole thing about soldiering its the kinetic effort. So if you do well. You take out Boko Haram, you capture gun trucks, you do those exceptional things you get commendation. So you get commendation based on these conditions you can be considered. We don’t just give ranks like that, you must deserve it here.
Up coming military referral hospital to assist the well being of the personnel
Well you know, the issue of funding is everywhere, it is the structure that is ready now. They have access to the equipments required. So the process of procurement, I know we don’t produce them in Nigeria. You know dollar scarcity, COVID and all those things. So all those things added to delaying but they are working on it. I am sure very soon. And I will be the best, because its going to have the modern equipment for everything.
Collaboration with the UMTH
Yes definitely we are working together. We have to really look at the record, we have to look at the current output of the military hospital now compared to the crowd. But again the good thing is that it has really, drastically reduced from how it used to be before. Now you can go to the medical center and see maybe one or two people. In those days it used to be a mammoth crowd, especially in December. But now you go there, the doctors, everybody is even resting. All those things have improved. The greatest challenge we are still having now is from IEDs.
You don’t have sweeping machines for these irritants
Well no, because IEDs does more damage now, yes IED. Because they even have the command one, they can put and hide and detonate when you get there. They will wait when you are coming and then detonate it.
Now they don’t have those organized factories like before, they only have the one they can quickly use maybe when they get an unexploded explosive, they just put wire and denote that’s all.
Farming with fertilizer
No the good thing about this area is that, you can farm even without fertilizer, most of the farm is done without fertilizer and you will get good produce.
Even they too, they have to look at the security aspects. MPK is ok by us, its Urea we don’t want, because Urea is what is used for IEDs. We don’t want Urea, its Urea that we banned. We leave NPK, NPK can come in, no problem. And again remember that those fertilizers, those artificial fertilizers they also destroy the soil. It’s good you do organic fertilizer, organic fertilizer will keep your soil. But if you use those synthetic ones over time, your soil will become barren.
Commercial fishing by soldiers
No, no, more…. we dealt with them last year. Anybody we catch on any illegal thing you go for it. The court marshals are waiting for you.
Moral status
High I can say. I am going round to see them and encourage them. That is why. We are visiting going all round to see them. You know, just talking to them helps a lot, they see their theatre commander he talks to them and tries to appreciate them. You know that is one thing most people don’t do, to tell them thank you. But I notice when you tell them thank you they appreciate, you will see them happy at least.
