Nigerian Army Fired Dozens of Officers Over Corruption

June 12th, 2016

Awake Goy

nsnbc : The Nigerian Army is firing dozens of senior officers over charges of corruption and theft amounting to billions of dollars. Some 50 officers have already been discharged. The sacking comes against the backdrop of other initiatives that target corruption and nepotism in the military as well as in civil society.

Nigerian Army

Army spokesman Colonel Sani Kukesha Usman noted that those who had been sacked mainly were major generals, colonels, lieutenant colonels; One major has also been sacked, he said.

Some of the sacked officers who are accused of corruption and theft have already been handed over to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission. Others found to have played partisan roles in the 2015 elections in the south of Nigeria, where former President Goodluck Jonathan had a lot of support.

The sacking of the officers comes against recent initiatives launched by the administration of President Muhammandu Buhari to address corruption in the country. Buhari’s administration took, among others, measures to address the “anything goes” attitude of foreign corporations in Nigeria and Nigerians involved in business with them.

Buhari has himself a military background. The “military spring clean” is widely perceived as the extension of his administration’s attempt to tackle corruption and as an attempt to consolidate his political power, also within the ranks of the influential military.

While the names have not yet been made public, it transpired that two of the officers who will have to stand trial are former chiefs of staff. The new round of sackings and trials follows previous rounds including a trial against Air Chief Marshal Alex Bedeh, who stands trial for allegedly stealing about $20 million. The money was allegedly used to build a shopping mall and buy other property in the capital Abuja.

Retired Colonel Sambo Dasuki, a former national security adviser to Jonathan, is standing trial for having diverted 2.1 billion on Jonathan’s orders to bribe officials to win Jonathan his party’s presidential nomination.

The money that allegedly has been diverted by Col. Dasuki amounts to about one-third of Nigeria’s 6 billion per year military budget. Buhari has noted that corruption in civil society as well as in the military need to be addressed. Buhari stressed that corruption, especially within the military, weakens Nigeria’s capacity to fight Boko Haram. The Islamic State affiliated insurgency has been linked to the death of more than 20,000 Nigerians in six years.

Corruption also complicates the implementation of much-needed social reforms to address poverty. It is believed that poverty and extreme poverty fuel human trafficking as well as slavery in Nigeria. Emma Christopher, an expert on slavery and human trafficking, stressed that tens of thousands of people are bought and sold in Nigeria every year. The majority of them are children. Christopher is referring to the International Labour Organization which estimated that in 2003, as many as six million Nigerian children had been trafficked at some time in their lives. This situation has been aggravated after Boko Haram began its insurgency some six years ago.

CH/L – nsnbc 12.06.2016