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EXCLUSIVE: Nigeria Only Bought 63 Armoured Carriers For Army In Six Years Despite N2. 6 Trillion Military Spending

SaharaReporters learnt from the records that the countries which supplied the APCs and Armoured Protective Vehicles (APVs) to the Nigerian Army under Buratai’s watch were the United Arab Emirates, South Africa, South Korea and China.

The immediate past Chief of Army Staff, Lt Gen Tukur Buratai (retd.), during his tenure between July 2015 and January 2021 bought not more than 63 Armoured Personnel Carriers for the Nigerian Army, despite the N2.6 trillion which the military spent on arms as contained in the records.

 

SaharaReporters learnt from the records that the countries which supplied the APCs and Armoured Protective Vehicles (APVs) to the Nigerian Army under Buratai’s watch were the United Arab Emirates, South Africa, South Korea and China.

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“In 2016, the United Arab Emirates supplied 10 Spartan APCs and vehicles to the army while in the same year, the country supplied 25 Typhoon APCs to the army while in 2020, the same country supplied eight Phantom-2 APCs.

 

“In 2018 and 2019, South Africa supplied three Marauder APC to Nigeria while South Korea supplied five KLTV-181 in 2020 to the army. In the same year, China supplied six VT-4 tanks and six ZTL-09 AFSV to the army,” the breakdown reads.

 

In 2014 under the previous administration, the army also purchased 16 Caiman-10 APC MaxxPro from the United States of America but they were delivered in 2016 when Buratai was the army chief.

 

 

SaharaReporters had reported exclusively last Thursday that no fewer than 15 APCs purchased for the Nigerian Army in 2020 under Buratai from the $1 billion fund approved by the Federal Government were lost to the Boko Haram terrorists in the same year.

 

SaharaReporters had also reported that about $381 million was released to the army and navy out of the $1 billion for the purchase of critical equipment.

 

Last week, the National Security Adviser, Maj Gen Babagana Monguno (retd,), had raised an alarm that the funds meant for the purchase of arms to fight Boko Haram and other security challenges in the country was missing.

 

In an interview he granted to the BBC Hausa, Monguno had said, “Mr President is going to investigate those funds. As we are talking with you at present, the state governors, the Governors Forum have started raising questions in that direction. $1billion has been released, and that has been released, and nothing seems to be changing. So I assure you that the president will not take this lightly.

 

“The funds are nowhere to be found and the weapons have not been seen and the newly appointed service chiefs have declared that they have not seen the weapons.”

 

SaharaReporters had also last Wednesday reported that the immediate past service chiefs who held the military command under President Muhammadu Buhari for about six years spent more than N2.659trillion on military arms and ammunition between 2015 and 2019.

 

It had been learnt that the N2.659trillion is outside the controversial $1billion Excess Crude Account Fund which was approved by Buhari in April 2018 despite public outcry.