Time Up For Our Service Chiefs

Sin

ce President Muhammadu Buhari came to power about three and half years ago, he has not deemed it necessary to reshuffle his cabinet. He continues to keep everybody on board, whether or not they are performing.

These include those who forged the NYSC discharge certificate and would not be prosecuted, but are allowed to travel overseas to enjoy themselves, those who evaded the NYSC scheme and continue to sit tight in the cabinet, those who soiled their hands in some corrupt practices, etc. That’s why the country is not moving in the right direction, why everything is going topsy turvy.

Of course, we can appreciate the predicament of our President. Since it took him six long months to form his cabinet, it could, as well, take him another six months to form another cabinet, were he to dissolve the present one. That’s why he has allowed everybody to continue to warm their seats, not that they are doing anything spectacular.

As with members of President Buhari’s cabinet, so also are with his Service Chiefs. He has continued to retain them, not minding their obvious pitfalls.

When Buhari was campaigning for votes in 2015, he told us that he would end insurgency in no distant time. We believed him and gave him our votes, after all, he is a retired Army General.

True, there was a truce, a temporal peace, immediately on assumption of office of the Service Chiefs. That was when they began to celebrate that Boko Haram had been decimated, that the insurgents had been completely defeated.

On our part, we were sceptical. We knew that the danger was far from over, that there was nothing yet to celebrate. We knew that the insurgents were merely pushed back, not completely defeated. We knew that Boko Haram had not vacated the Sambisa Forest, that they had not returned all the Chibok girls, and that they had even struck at Dapchi and took away some girls, while still keeping Leah Sharibu. That was why we did not celebrate.

In the military, intelligence gathering is as important as anything else. Thus, while some people were celebrating that Boko Haram activities in the North East had subsided, they did not know that the group had transformed into Fulani Herdsmen, wielding AK47 rifles, rampaging, maiming and killing people at will, both in the North Central and in the Southern parts of the country, burning down their houses and farmlands.

Before our military chiefs could wake up from slumber and begin to fight back, hundreds of people have been dispatched to the world beyond, with several of their properties lost.

While still battling the “Fulani Herdsmen”, Boko Haram resonated in the North East, targeting mainly military facilities. An analyst had claimed that the group had launched as many as thirty attacks on military facilities within a space of just three months.

Unfortunately, what our military men have been doing is to fight back. That would be long after the group had launched their own attacks. They don’t initiate or preempt any of the attacks. They are usually taken by surprise, unawares.

Three and half years down the line, we seem to have returned to where we were in 2015. Nigerians are now being slaughtered in their numbers, including military personnel. Boko Haram insurgency has become intractable, a lingering problem.

There is the fear that there are some people who may not want the war to end, those who indeed are benefiting from the system. Upon all the billions of naira which Nigeria has been budgeting for defence, our military men in the field are still complaining of lack of arms and ammunition with which to fight Boko Haram. That’s why they are being outgunned.

Now, we want to ask: where have all these billions of naira being budgeted for defence gone to? Does it mean that Boko Haram has more money than Nigeria to procure more sophisticated weapons? Who, in the first place, has been supplying arms to Boko Haram? These are worrying issues.

Keeping somebody in one place for too long makes him to become complacent, no new thinking, no new ideas, no new initiative, etc. It is therefore time for us to try some new hands and let our current defence chiefs take honourable exit.