An Army officer writes TheNEWS, counsels President Umar Yar’Adua
Dear Sir,
I read your expose on the corruption in the Nigerian Army(NA) and the “concerned majors letter.” It is because of this and subsequent issues that I need to make your acquaintance. For those who cannot speak, you have spoken all. However, Sir, I wish to contribute in my very small way, to the greatness of this country, not by carrying arms, but by conveying the conscience of an oppressed people to you.
The issues I have to raise are quite numerous, I pray my essay makes interesting reading. Once again, it is a pleasure to make your acquaintance. Please be patient with me as I build up.
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1. Nigerian Army and Military Coups:
As an insider I tell you the possibility of a military coup succeeding in modern day Nigeria is like that of a snowball in hell. We realize that the same thieving generals that have misled us in the past to illegally acquire power, do so only to benefit themselves and their immediate families. A large majority of the military suffered hell during military rule. The Nigerian people should know that we the junior officers will protect democracy with our blood and for this reason they should be more concerned about our plight, for they are many. Mr. President should know that he needs have no fear of the thieving generals. The politicians fear that if they touch the generals, then the Army will revolt. This is a very pathetic joke, because we despise them utterly for all they have done and for all they are doing to us, our lives and the future of this nation.
Have no fear, the warning of the Majors is not directed at the nation or its leaders. Remember Ghana and Jerry Rawlings, and it will be a night of very long knives. For once in the living memory of my generation, I have a President and a nation worth dying for. Please Nigeria, do not let us down, we are your Army, you are beginning to enjoy democracy, whereas we are under brutally corrupt dictatorial regimes of “generals” who are supposed to oversee us. We are the ones for once who require rescue !
2. Having said that, let me highlight certain issues your paper did not bring out, issues that are stoking hatred, apathy, disenchantment and mutinous emotion.
a. The bastardization of the training institution, specifically the Armed Forces Command and Staff College (Jaji), where instructors (directing staff) collect bribes from student-officers and indulge in tribalistic sentiments in order to award marks and consequently grades.
b. The wholesale deployment of Hausa Fulani and Yoruba officer stock to the Niger Delta.
There, they all become millionaires, whereas Niger-Delta and Ibo officers are deployed to training schools and other units in the far flung corners of the northern states. The idea being to have officers and soldiers who would have no qualms in committing mass slaughter of the ethnic stock they have no interest in. Only their people benefit from the rape of the Niger Delta, its inherent carnage and suffering. One would think it would have made sense to deploy more officers of the local ethnic stock, if there was a genuine desire to contain the crisis. They, however, desire its perpetuation, as this benefits them financially. I have personally lost a father and two brothers to these crises. Nobody wants an end to these crises more than me. Some of us warned about this turn of events. In the Nigerian Army, nobody listens to the young officer. Listen to me now sir, and mark well my words: The Nigerian Army is on the threshold of disintegration along tribal lines, we have seen the cracks, and they are ever widening, such that would make my paragraph 1 useless.
3. We are actually quite used to being robbed by these generals. We pay for electricity (deducted from source), yet today alone I saw a power bill of about N5 million for just my unit ! Poor Nigeria, are you still wondering why the PHCN cannot function? We also pay for water, yet same thing apllies. I pay N4,500/mth to have a tanker deliver water to my house! Compare and contrast between the paycheck of an officer in the Finance Department and his colleague of the same rank outside the department. The Finance Deparment we know is a cult group, what would it take government to conduct a very simple peep into some of their account books? The figures will get you wishing you joined the Army!
4. You interviewed General Giwa- Amu. Well, if you wanted truthful answers you should have asked someone who hasn’t spent most of his military life abroad. How many of us can say we have even smelt the airport? People like him have benefited so much from the system, there can be nothing wrong with it. His claims about the achievements of his boss are true but bloated. I will soon address these issues. Gen. Luka Yusuf we believe, genuinely wants a progressive change in the status quo. However, his hands are tied by some Army top brass. The Majors also complained of the failure of the NA Games and military ex-Eagle Ring. Well that was thanks to some past public figures.
5. Sir, permit me to let you in on a secret. During the last NA Exercise Eagle Ring, I heard the Minister of Defence speaking wonderfully of the operational preparedness of the NA. You will weep bitterly if only you and Nigeria knew the truth. For that exercise to hold ( a brigade i.e. 3 battalions, simulated battle), the Nigerian Army was almost functionally paralyzed. Mostly dysfunctional vehicles and equipment had to be borrowed from units all over the country. Our training exercise almost failed to hold in Jaji then because we had borrowed out three of the six personnel carriers for the exercise. The Nigerian Army today cannot defend this country against Cameroon. You can take that to any bank. Most units do not even have a single transport vehicle to convey troops! Mr. President should know, that if the Villa is attacked by a trained, competent force, the so-called Army he has around him will be worth less than traffic wardens. I have served in the Presidential Guard and I tell you dear sir, we do not even have a rehearsed evacuation/protection plan for Mr. President. As a member of Special Forces, I seriously suggest Mr. President to revisit some of these issues. Do not let the Army break or else what will follow is better imagined. By the way sir, have you heard of the mass exodus of mostly regular combatant officers? This is dangerous sir. Please speak as you have done before. I heard you, who knows who might be next, perhaps Mr President.
I wish to contribute in any way I can to the greatness of this country and its democracy. I ask for NOTHING; instead, I place myself at your service.I have been serving a bunch of thieves with my sweat and blood all this while. Now I want to sweat and bleed for truth, justice and a greater Nigeria.
I trust you.
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A Lameduck Army?
Debate on the fitness of the Nigerian Army rages on, in the wake of massive discontent within
ADEMOLA ADEGBAMIGBE
The Ghanaian approached the immigration official at Heathrow Airport, London, nervously. “Your stay expired 24 hours ago. Why?” the Briton asked. The Ghanaian almost went on his knees, begging, reasoning with his interrogator that he was on his way out. Then a Nigerian walked in with an exaggerated swagger and shoved his international passport under the nose of the British official. What the white man saw raised his adrenalin. He queried the Nigerian: “Your visa expired two years ago. Why are you still in this country?”
If the Briton thought he could cut the Nigerian to size so much that he would start genuflecting or fidgeting, then he made a mistake. Like a shaggy bear, the Nigerian bent double and slammed his palm on the table, his eyes blazing and the veins on his neck stretching to breaking point. With an emotion lazed with napalm, the Nigerian challenged the Briton to explain whether his grandfathers required visa to travel to and colonise Nigeria. “What nonsense are you telling me? Did my forefathers give you travel documents before you invaded their land, colonised them and appropriated their resources?”
While other passengers at the airport departure point chuckled at the outburst, the British official was short of words. He just slammed his stamp on the passports and waved in the two men through the turnstile and metal detector.
Like a good public speaker, interested in arousing his audience with appropriate anecdotes, former President Jerry Rawlings of Ghana narrated this story to illustrate the position of Nigeria in Africa and how other countries looked to it for political, economic and military leadership. He did this when he delivered the Annual Media Trust Lecture, entitled “The Challenges of Democracy in Africa” on 16 January 2007 at Abuja.
“Nigeria,” Rawlings asserted, “is one of those few developing countries that deal with the western world from a position of strength. We, the rest, deal with them from the position of weakness and sometimes, subordination.”
However, critics say though Nigeria may have some strength in its economic potential, the same cannot be said of its military power, whatever perception other African nations may hold. How powerful is Nigeria? How ready is the army for an unexpected war? How motivated is the army in the face of ill-treatment?
These and more questions are being asked more feverishly since TheNEWS published the story, “Anger In The Army” in its Vol. 30 No. 05 of 11 February 2008 edition. Its welfare theme aroused interest outside and within the army.
An army officer provoked by the story wrote a piece and sent it to TheNEWS, providing fresh perspectives about the rot within the army, far more than the issue of welfare. “For those who cannot speak, you have spoken, “ he commended the magazine. And he then highlighted issues that, he said ‘’are stoking hatred, apathy, disenchantment and mutinous emotion.” The issues he highlighted are the army and past military coups, bastardisation of training institutions, especially the Command and Staff College, Jaji, and deployment of soldiers from certain ethnic groups to the restive Niger Delta, who go there with a hunger for pecuniary gains. The officer also raised the allegation of corruption against army generals and the dearth of equipment.
As an insider, the army officer made bold to say that the possibility of a military coup succeeding in modern day Nigeria is “like a snowball in hell”. This is because, those who he referred to as “thieving generals” misled them to illegally seize power in the past to feather their own nest.
It is like the notion of being once bitten twice shy and once ambushed, twice wary. He advised President Umar Yar’ Adua not to fear any possible coup by those he called the thieving generals because we (officers) “despise them utterly for all they have done and all they are doing to us, our lives and the future of this nation.”
The officer appealed to Nigerians who had been enjoying democracy not to let them down, because they (the officers) are under what he called “brutally corrupt dictatorial regimes of generals our president has placed to oversee us.”
From his letter, palpable was a thick pall of suspicion between the leadership of the Nigerian army and the lower ranked officers. The rank and file and the low cadre officers tend to believe that their bosses are not allowing the different welfare packages approved for the army to trickle down.
Top among the issues the junior officers will want tackled is the problem of their unpaid salary arrears. Former President Olusegun Obasanjo had approved the payment of the arrears of a new salary structure approved during his tenure for the military and the police. But it was gathered that while the Navy had paid the arrears to its men, the Army finance department has only paid its men three months. The unpaid arrears have been a source of disquiet in the Army, as junior officers believe that their bosses may have embezzled the funds meant for the payment.
To find a solution to the problem, Chief of Army Staff, Lt- General Luka Yusuf, some weeks ago summoned a meeting of all the General Officers Commanding – GOCs – in the Nigerian Army and Principal Staff Officers to the Army Headquarters. The Director of Army Finance and Accounts, Major-General Joe Lartey, was also redeployed in suspicious circumstances to the Nigerian Army Corps of Logistics.
There are reports that though the sum of N11billion was released to the Army Finance Department for the payment of the arrears, only N5billion was paid to the soldiers for the arrears of three months. The remaining part of the money was allegedly used to pay furniture allowances of officers and for other projects.
The disenchantment over the unpaid salary arrears was the peg of the story by this magazine. Reactions to the story revealed that the junior officers are still seething with rage over the unpaid arrears. This is in spite of the fact that Brigadier-General Giwa-Amu, Director, Army Public Relations, recently promised that the arrears of the consolidated salary would be paid this month. “The amount required for the payment has been secured. By February, all the balances for both the salary and the allowances will be cleared,” Giwa said during a visit to News Agency of Nigeria, NAN.
But it seems not many of the men in green khaki are ready to take him at his word. “The thieving Generals will just promise but I don’t think they can perform any wonder,” a soldier said in a text message to a reporter of this magazine. Some of the soldiers are also calling on President Umaru Yar’Adua to ask the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, to probe activities of the Nigerian Army Department of Finance.
TheNEWS had reported that the widespread disenchantment in the Army over the unpaid arrears four weeks ago led to the booing of Lieutenant-General Luka N. Yusuf, Chief of Army Staff, COAS, during a visit to Rukuba Barracks of the Third Armoured Division in Jos, Plateau State, early January, an action that would be considered gross insubordination in normal times. Major-General Lartey received even a worse treatment from soldiers who openly called him ‘a thief’ when he went to represent the COAS at Ojo Military Cantonment some weeks later.
The soldiers reportedly not only openly grumbled, some refused to stand at attention when the General started reading his speech. Lartey was spirited off the scene as junior officers booed him with shouts of (Ole!) thief. The soldiers complained that the officers were pocketing money voted by government for their welfare. Apart form this, there is also the complaint that while some of the officers are acquiring gleaming cars, the rank and file are living in run-down barracks, most of which have not been rehabilitated for more than a decade. They particularly cited the Rukuba Barracks which, according to them, was last renovated 10 years ago.
The feeling of the soldiers is reflected in the words of one of them: “Let me show you my pay slip. My gross pay for January, as a corporal, is N17,707 and the net pay is N16,894.57. My mates in the Air Force receive N35,000 monthly. These Generals are just eating our money.”
A visit to the officers’ quarters at Adekunle Fajuyi, Ibadan, Oyo State, reveals the class division between the officers and the rank and file. While the officers’ quarters looked well appointed, the lower ranks live under sub-human condition. The two-storey buildings spread across the barracks are dilapidated with parts of the roofs caving in. Although the military authorities painted parts of the structure, soldiers were advised to execute the remainder.
The health centre at the Second Division of the Nigerian Army in Ibadan is what a soldier called “a mere consulting clinic” because it lacks facilities to take care of sick soldiers. An angry soldier complained to this magazine: “We buy our drugs. After attending to us, military doctors will say there is no drug and that we should pay money for them to get us prescribed drugs. Even panadol, they don’t give us. It is as bad as that.”
An Army officer told TheNEWS in Enugu that welfare in the Nigerian Army is nil. As big as India is, soldiers are fed three times a day. For non-vegetarians among them, the authorities give meat rations once a week. He revealed that in the past, military authorities issued toiletries. “Officers,” according to him, “lack accountability. Thus, it is difficult to make a case for improvement because they cannot account for the little they get.”
However, a retired army top brass told TheNEWS that it is not wise to wave off the possibility of a military mutiny, just because of welfare problem. “Why do people celebrate the first (1966) coup in the South and people mourn it in the North?” the retired officer asked, saying that it appears people like it in the South. But he advised that whatever the preference, there should be a total rejection of illegality.
There is a general perception that 99 per cent of the army would not support the coup, but, as he put it, the 1 per cent remaining could seize power because of their injured ego. The reason for this is that it is generally vaunted by civilians that they humiliated out the army “Some people may want to restore their honour,” he argued.
On bastardisation of the training institutions, the army officer who wrote to this magazine alleged that at the Armed Forces Command and Staff College, AFCSC, Jaji, instructors collect bribes from student officers and use tribal sentiments to award marks and grades.
Established in 1976, the college is a joint service institution offering what it says is capacity for academic and professional training of military officers. It was set up with the help of the British Army Advisory Team, BAAT. Although its Course One started with only army officers, over time, the courses accommodated other branches of the armed forces – Navy and Air Force.
A retired general argued that corruption in the military is a reflection of the larger society. “The military could be worse because there is no check and balance,” he emphasised. However, the general argued that from the beginning, only 10 per cent of intakes into Jaji distinguished themselves. Those who worked hard received merit. He maintained that the last phases of the military regime, headed by General Ibrahim Babangida, eroded intellectualism in the Army. In fact, it promoted mediocrities to higher positions.
The same problem of corruption, according to him, affects the Nigerian Defence Academy, Zaria, and other corps schools – of Artillery, Engineering, Military Police etc. The officer, in his letter, bemoaned what he called the wholesale deployment of Hausa Fulani and Yoruba officer stock to the Niger Delta “where they become millionaires”. On the other hand, Niger Delta and Ibo officers are, according to him, deployed to training schools in the North. Apart from the monetary gain, these strangers, as the officer maintained, commit mass murder of the ethnic stock they have no interest in. He warned: “The Nigerian Army is on the threshold of disintegration along tribal lines. We have seen the cracks and they are widening.”
Nigerian Army generals, as the petitioner puts it, rob the officers and the rank and file blind. He added that despite being made to pay electricity and water bills, from source, army units receive unsettled bills that run into millions of naira.
He further accused those running the finance department of the Army of operating like a cult. He threw a challenge at the Federal Government: “Compare and contrast between the pay cheque of an officer in the Finance department and his colleague of same rank outside the department. What would it take government to conduct a very simple peep into some of their account books?”
The major concern today is the welfare of the army and this is affecting every sphere of their lives. Indeed, the morale of the Army personnel that became high with the announcement sometime in January 2007, by the immediate past Minister for the Federal Capital Territory, FCT, Malam Nasir el-Rufai of the Consolidated Armed Forces Salary Structure which entails that certain allowances would be paid soldiers at 15 per cent increment has since ebbed.
The high morale was first dashed when the issue of arrears of the increment came. The Army authorities alleged that though the arrears of the Harmonized Armed Forces Salary Structure, HAFSS, for October to December 2007 at 15 per cent increment was paid on 7 December 2007, it was however paid in error since it was discovered that the said announcement had not been implemented a year after it was reportedly projected.
So deductions on the payment of three backlog of arrears allegedly made in error are being made on the monthly salaries of the Army personnel and will continue. These deductions leave the take-home pay of junior officers miserably low, too low to effectively cater for their families and dependants.
Last month, soldiers were paid the old Army Consolidated salary minimum of N21,000.00, without the much expected 15 per cent increment.
Another issue discovered by our correspondent is the non-regularisation of the soldiers’ promotions. In the officer cadre, promotion to new ranks are regular provided the officer concerned passes the examination or training set for promotion to the next rank, whereas in the other ranks cadre, a soldier who got recruited in 1990 (90NA) might serve up to 15 to 20 years before getting promoted to the rank of Lance Corporal. However, there are some who get favoured and get swift promotion. A soldier, who disclosed he was enlisted into the Army in 2003, was promoted to the rank of corporal in 2006, within three years of service.
But there are exceptions, especially in the military police, where some are promoted within six months after their training into the Army.
“This criminal marginalisation is what frustrates most soldiers who now see no reason to remain in the service of defending the nation. No wonder, there is a barrack parlance that ‘the Nigerian Army has nothing in stock for the future of her soldiers’.
‘‘A Nigerian soldier has no future in the service,” a soldier lamented.
Another source said, “Soldiers who might have been useful to the Army in both military skills and academic training, having acquired higher university degrees, are still marking time in various formations where they are more or less made redundant and underutilised. Army Generals in Nigeria operate with impunity as if they are untouchable, since no government has mustered the courage to probe them, regardless of their offence.” On solutions to the looming crisis in the Army, soldiers interviewed by our correspondent are of the view that the Army Finance Corps, AFC, charged with the responsibility of paying the salaries and allowances of soldiers, should be scrapped and its duties taken over by the Federal Ministry of Finance.
“Since the federal government can afford to publicly disgrace a one-time Inspector-General of Police, IGP, over alleged corrupt enrichment, why can’t the same government bring to book many Army Generals who steal army personnel salary, allowances and sundry entitlements with impunity,” a lance corporal with the Army Medical Corps lamented.
He continued: “In the Army Finance Corps, soldiers deployed there operate in utmost secrecy like cultists without letting other colleagues know their modus operandi. They are often exempted from much military training. A lance corporal or a private soldier deployed to the Army Finance Corps fares better than most Colonels and Brigadier-Generals in the barracks.’’
Soldiers spoken to by our correspondent in Benin City on condition of anonymity expressed surprise that they do not know how the computation of the three months arrears was done, in that a private soldier was paid a paltry N19,263.00 only for three months.
Lance Corporals were paid only N22,896.00, Sergeants - N28,495.00, Staff Sergeants N34, 145.00, Warrant Officers N39,684.00, MWOs N46,209.00, while AWOs got N23,709.00 as their three months pay arrears of the 15 per cent pay package.
Computation of the three months arrears of CONAFSS October to December 2007 for officers are: 2nd Lieutenants - N49,329.00; Lieutenants - N55, 552.00; Captains - N76,965.00; Majors - N83,405.00; Lt. Colonels - N104,818.00; Colonels - N118,570.00, Brigadier Generals N182,728.00; Major Generals - N598,657.00; Lt. Generals - N638,512.00, and Generals N685,308.00.
A circular marked restricted referenced NA/FIN/1/A/VOL.3/42 from the office of the Chief of Army Staff, COAS, signed by Major General J.O. Lartey which annexed the purported computation of the three months arrears of Consolidated Armed Forces Salary Structure, CONAFSS, and the Harmonized Armed Forces Salary Structure, HAFSS, stated that salaries of the Nigerian Army personnel for October – December 2007 was paid based on HAFSS at 15 per cent increment.
The circular added that, “It has been, however, observed that Nigeria Army personnel were entitled to payment of arrears between the newly approved Consolidated Armed Forces Salary Structure, CONFSS and the HAFSS. This paid in 7th December 2007.”
Since the backlog of the three months salary increment of 7th December last year was paid, nothing has been heard from Army Headquarters about payment of further salaries to soldiers.
Many soldiers spoken to are at a loss, as they do not know what sum exactly to expect as monthly salary, with the ongoing deductions.
“We do not know what is being owed us, when it will be paid and what will be paid after the deductions. Why the slashing of our salaries? Does it mean that the operatives of Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, have no power to investigate the anomaly in the salaries of soldiers,” a military police officer attached to the 4 Brigade Headquarters, Benin City, Edo State wondered.
There are noticeable indications and fears that soldiers and junior officers up to the rank of Colonel are already pushed to their limit of endurance. “If you are defending the nation and you are being denied your salary and entitlements will you be able to give your best?” A soldier asked rhetorically.
Some soldiers confided that there is so much anger among the Army personnel who now remind themselves of what happened in the Republic of Benin in the mid 90s, when soldiers blocked the country’s borders, both entry and exits, to demand their entitlements.
TheNEWS correspondent in Benin City who visited the different barracks under 4 Brigade Headquarters of the Nigerian Army revealed that more than half of the Military Officers Quarters, MOQ, in Ekehuan barracks lack potable water.
This may not be unconnected with the near absence of sewage services in the barracks. As a result, soldiers quartered there dig ditches and physically transfer the raw sewages from the over-filled, overflowing soak-ways to the ditches with buckets, since most old sewage pipes are broken.
With regard to the operational preparedness of the Nigerian Army, the officer who wrote to TheNEWS said Nigerians would weep if only they know the truth. He cited the Nigerian Army Exercise Eagle Ring where a battle was simulated. The officer revealed further that for that exercise, carried out by three battalions, the Army was almost functionally paralysed. He added that their training exercise almost failed to hold in Jaji because three out of the six personnel carriers had been lent out for the exercise.
In the event of war, the officer expressed his fear that Nigeria could not defend itself against Cameroun. This he said is because, apart from other equipment, most units do not even have a single transport vehicle to convey troops. “We do not even have a rehearsed evacuation/protection plan for Mr. President” the officer lamented, waving off the soldiers that defend the Nigerian leader as “worthless as traffic wardens”.
A retired brigadier general extended the argument by categorising the level of preparedness into two: levels of personnel and equipment. He submitted that it is not right to assume that Cameroun could defeat Nigeria in war. This is because, it is Nigeria, not its army alone, that would fight the war. He said that in terms of personnel, Nigeria cannot be waved off.He cited the civil war when Nigeria deployed 10,000 soldiers. “When the war ended” the general maintained, “Nigeria had 350,000 men.”
But in terms of equipment, the general agreed with the officer that wrote a letter to TheNEWS that Nigeria is deficient. He revealed that machine guns owned by the Nigerian Army were obsolete. “We used to ship these guns to Angola,” he revealed. The general queried how the Niger Delta militants could carry such guns in cartons from Kaduna without being discovered. He told the military authorities to tell that to the marines.
He added that the Vicker tanks were last imported for the Nigerian Army during the Shagari era. “Since 1999,” he lamented, “there has not been a concerted effort to re-equip the Nigerian Army.” Worse still, there has not been any effort to manufacture these things locally.
He, however, advocated that Nigeria now stands a better chance of equipping the Army because, unlike the past when the West refused to sell arms to military regimes, Yar’Adua can seize the opportunity of the country’s acceptance by the advanced nations to buy arms. “The more you sweat in peace, the less you bleed in war,” he reasoned, lamenting that the period of military rule did not allow the country to sweat for peace since it was characterised by efforts aimed at regime survival. The greatest victim of military rule, he argued, is the military itself.
Does this, therefore, mean that Nigeria could be defeated by Cameroun? Absolutely not, an army lieutenant colonel argued. In his words: “No country fights a war with equipment on the ground. When there is war, a country will mobilise money and procure arms. Equipment on ground is for training.” When you stockpile arms for war, this, as he reasoned, could be pre-emptively destroyed within 24 hours as the Israelis demonstrated during the six-day war when it bombed Egyptian and Syrian fighter planes before the planes even had the chance to take off from their airfields.
This, however, does not detract from the imperative of adequately equipping the Army. This is what he called Table of Organisation and Equipment, TOE, which “allows the men to train properly for combat readiness”.
That is why a section of army in India can be under “Army Readiness 1” – meaning that it can mobilise for war within 24 hours.” There could be Army Readiness 2 and 3 which give number 1 back-up. “Nigeria,” as he puts it “does not have this kind of readiness.”
What then should the Yar’Adua administration do? The Army top brass advised that it should take care of the welfare of the men and procure equipment for combat readiness, because ,as he reasoned, both are not mutually exclusive.
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