Mass Retirement: Group Calls For Minister, COAS Resignation
A Group, Middle-Belt Revival Network has demanded for the resignation of the Chief of Army Staff, Lt Gen Tukur Yusuf Buratai and Minister of Defence, Mansur Dan Alli, over the arbitrary sack of the senior army officers based on the above flimsy excuses.
This was contained in a statement signed by the group’s National Coordinator, Hon. Danladi Usman, where they accused the military echelon of also playing politics with national security.
According to them the new military establishment came with the mindset of doing away with any officer who worked closely with the former leadership of the service, as a result they were portrayed as villains in the eye of the press and the world at large, to perfect their plan to eject them from the system.
The group described the mass sack as an economic sabotage, which will cost the nation huge sums of money to regain the lost experience in the already trained officers.
“It is an economic sabotage for anyone to sack well trained and senior officers that Nigeria has committed so much into their trainings. This has cost the nation a huge investment simply for political expediency”. It read in part.
It also accused the present leadership of the Nigerian army of loosing focus on the job, as according to them the army has chosen politics above their primary assignment of protecting the nation.
It said, due to the high involvement of military officers in politics the spate of violence and terror has increased “even as herdsmen have taken over Benue, Plateau, Kogi, Enugu and other states of the country just as Boko Haram has returned to the north east with an unprecedented momentum for damages that never existed. This is because the professionals have been weeded out while some jokers are parading themselves as officers to siphon funds and share with the ministry”.
Meanwhile the group has threatened to lead a protest in coalition with other members of the civil society if within seven days the Commander in Chief fails to reinstate the victimised officers, while also demanding that the undertaking which the officers were forced to take under duress and the promise to incarcerate them till death should also be investigated by the United Nations.
They therefore have called on United States of America, Great Britain and other world powers to abort all their support to the Nigerian Army until there is a new leadership in place.
“We also call on the United States of America, Great Britain, France and all other world powers who have played a serious role in supporting the Nigerian military to withdraw such support as the army has been politicised and will no longer need foreign aid till they resume to their primary responsibility”. They said.