It's J M Adeshina Blog

After A year, Nigerian soldiers unjustly dismissed by Buhari administration await justice






A year after, the Nigerian Army compulsory retired 38 officers, many of them the country’s brightest in internal and external security operations, but, ironically, forced out of service without recourse to the rules of disengagement in the Nigerian military.

Most of the affected officers were neither queried nor indicted by any panel, but got flushed out for reasons that smack of smack of high-level arbitrariness, witch-hunting and partisanship by authorities of the Army, a reason the victimised officers petitioned President Muhammadu Buhari in keeping with the armed forces rules to seek redress.

On June 9, 2016, in letters, seen by PREMIUM TIMES, to the affected officers, their compulsory retirement was hinged on “provisions of Paragraph 09.02c (4) of the Harmonised Terms and Conditions of Service for Officers 2012 (Revised)”.

The referenced section – 09.02c (4) – of the Harmonised Terms and Conditions of Service for Officers 2012 (Revised), shows the officers were laid off “on disciplinary grounds i.e. serious offence(s)”.

Emphasising “service exigencies” and that the “military must remain apolitical and professional at all times”, Army spokesperson, Sani Usman, on June 10, released a statement, disclosing what could have constituted the “serious offences” which warranted the 38 officers to be compulsorily retired.

“It should be recalled that not too long ago some officers were investigated for being partisan during the 2015 general elections,” the statement said.

“Similarly, the investigation by the Presidential Committee investigating Defence Contracts revealed a lot. Some officers have already been arraigned in court by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC),” Mr. Usman said.

However, contrary to the claim by the Army, our investigations showed that only a few of the affected officers were queried, tried and indicted.


ARBITRARY DISMISSAL PREMIUM TIMES findings show that nine major generals, 11 brigadier generals, seven colonels and 11 lieutenant colonels, amounting to 38 officers in sum, were laid off by the army in that mass sack.

Highly placed sources in the Army told PREMIUM TIMES that out of the major generals, only one – Emmauel Atewe (N/7674) faced a panel and was indicted. Mr. Atewe was indicted by the presidential arms probe panel, and he is currently being prosecuted by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission.

Although S.D. Aliyu (N/7711); M.Y. Aliyu (N/8114) a former GOC 7 Division; and Fatai Alli, (N/7914) a former Director of Operations in the Army, also faced the presidential arms panel, they were cleared. Yet they were laid off for “serious offence”, our investigations revealed.

Other five major generals – L. Wiwa (N/7665), who is late Ken Saro-Wiwa’s brother; I.N. Ijeoma (N/8304); T.C Ude (N/7866); L.C. Ilo (N/8320); and O. Ejemai (N/8340) were neither queried nor indicted by any panel.

BRIGADIER GENERALS SACKED BECAUSE OF ALLEGED LOYALTIES

The cases of the affected brigadier generals are not different; only one of them – A.I Onibasa (N/9072) – was indicted by the presidential panel on arms procurement.

Sources told PREMIUM TIMES that the remaining 10 officers were simply retired because they were suspected to have failed to help the Buhari administration regime to power.

For instance, two officers were laid off because of their ties to the embattled former National Security Adviser, Sambo Dasuki, our sources said.


The two officers – A.S.H. Sa’ad (N/8392), who was at the Directorate of Military Intelligence; and Mormoni Bashir (N/8396), former principal staff officer to Mr. Dasuki – were retired without indictment. Although, Mr. Sa’ad faced a panel, he was not found to have engaged in any wrongdoing.

For his alleged close ties to a former Army Chief, Kenneth Minimah, D. Abdulsalam (N/9169) was sent away.

Koko Essien (N/8794), a former Brigade Commander, 2 Brigade, Port Harcourt, faced the election panel but was cleared. Mr. Essien was laid off nonetheless, like Bright Fibioinumana (N/8399); L.N. Bello (N/8799), former Brigade Commander, 34 Brigade Owerri; and M.G. Alli Moundhey, former Director, Campaign Planning in the North-East Operations, who were even not queried in the first place.

Although, the Nigerian Army said the affected officers were retired for either involvement in the 2015 general elections or arms procurement fraud, our investigations showed that officers who were not in Nigeria at the time of the elections were also sacked.

That was the case of I.B. Lawson (N/8812) and G.O. Agachi (N/9363) who were defence attaches at Nigeria’s missions in China and Benin Republic respectively.

According to a document seen by this newspaper, they were retired for allegedly committing “serious offence”.

But they were never informed of their offences nor were they invited to face any panel of inquiry, army insiders say.

PREMIUM TIMES

Two explosions have rocked Chibok, the Borno

State community where over 200 school girls

were abducted by Boko Haram nearly two years

ago.

The Hausa service of the BBC said one bomber

struck at the town’s main market while another

went off at a military check point in the early

hours of Wednesday.

A staff of Adeyemi College of Education (ACE) in Ondo west local government area of Ondo State, Miss Evelyn Ajagun has been reportedly found dead in her apartment at Palmgroove street, Oka in Ondo town.

Governor Samuel Ortom who made this known while

presenting the 2016 appropriation budget to the state House of Assembly said the gesture was to ensure that many civil servants own their own houses before retirement from service.

“Ownership of a house by a civil servant prepares him or her for retirement better than when he or she retires and starts looking for an apartment to rent and stay with the family.”

Ortom who disclosed further that the housing scheme would be built using mortgage financing stated further that his administration would embark on pension reforms in a bid to finding a lasting solution to the protracted problem of pension in the state.

The governor, who disclosed that the state now owed retirees at both the state and local government levels huge amount of pension arrears, said the national pension law would be domesticated in the state.

He informed further that a pension reform committee would be set up in the state to advise government on how to quickly clear the huge pension and gratuity arrears.

“Our goal is to put in place a very sustainable pension policy. A good pension policy allows civil servants access to their pensions as soon as they retire from service,” the Governor

said.

According to a statement signed by the state Commissioner for Information and Orientation, Hon. Odeh Ageh, the Governor’s approval of the release of the inmates followed the recommendation by the Benue State Advisory Council on the Prerogative of Mercy.

Lagos State Governor Akinwunmi Ambode has restated his commitment to keep faith with the promise he made during the campaign to run an all-inclusive government, where no community would be left out in the scheme of affairs. The Sun.

Governor Ambode, who spoke while flagging off the ‘One Lagos Fiesta’ at the Agege Stadium, said the programme was in fulfillment of his campaign promise, as well as

improving on what he met on ground.

The ‘One Lagos Fiesta’, an initiative of the present

administration, tailored towards ushering in the New Year, is scheduled to hold between December 27 and January 1, 2016 simultaneously in five locations across the state, including Epe, Badagry, Ikorodu, Agege and Lagos Island. Speaking at the event, Governor Ambode recalled the last time he visited Agege Stadium during the campaign, saying he was back again to fulfill one of the promises made to the people then.

He said: “The last time came to this stadium was during the campaign and I came with President Muhammadu Buhari.

“The President has been so magnanimous, he sent the Minister of Information and Culture to come back here and say a big thank you to all of you.

“We promised that we are going to bring governance to the communities; we promised to run a government of inclusion where all of you will be included in everything that we will be doing in Lagos State.

“That is why we are here to say that ‘One Lagos Fiesta’ is about all of you and it is about the rest of Lagos. We want every youth and every parent to enjoy what others have been enjoying in the nook and crannies of the state.

“That is why we have decided to have a five-day

programme that will be done in Badagry, Agege, Epe, Ikorodu and Lagos Island. This is the first place I’m visiting and that means you mean a lot to me,” Governor Ambode said.

He added that his administration was working hard to make Lagos work for all, just as he assured that good things would start happening in Agege, and indeed in the whole of Lagos going forward.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that 20 shops were completely razed by the inferno which lasted several hours. NAN gathered that some shop owners left huge sums of money in their shops when the incident occurred.

Sources said that the inferno was triggered by a spark from an electric cable in one of the shops when electricity was restored. Some night guards at the market were said to have noticed smoke billowing from one of the affected shops and drew the attention of leadership of the market to it.

They alerted fire fighters who came to the

scene and prevented the fire from spreading

to other shops. The chairman of Ilorin West Local Government Council, Alhaji Tajudeen Zulu-Oloje, visited the scene of the incident on Sunday.

He said that he received a distress call from one of the market officials around 2.00 am Sunday on the fire outbreak. He said the local council would do its best to reconstruct the burnt shops and assist affected traders.

Zulu-Oloje commended men of the state fire service for the quick response. Efforts to speak to the Special Adviser on Emergency and Relief to State Governor Alhaji Duro Mohammed, on the incident proved

futile. (NAN)