Let’s Involve Foreign Partners To Tackle B/Haram – Ex-Military
Chief
The ex-military chief, who spoke
under anonymity, served as a top commander in the ongoing insurgency fight in
the North-east.
The source, who is a retired Army
General, warned that seeking foreign help has become a necessity because the
Boko Haram elements had in the last one month carted away sophisticated
military equipment with which they could strike at any time.
Of late, there have been
increasing calls for the engagement of mercenaries to fight the deadly
insurgents and bandits whose activities had become a source of worry and
concerns to the citizens.
At the meeting of the North-east
Governors Forum held March in Bauchi, Borno state Governor Babagana Zulum had
called on the federal government to hire mercenaries and collaborate with
Nigeria’s neighbours to end insurgency.
Zulum, who spoke as the chairman of the forum,
had said: “Service chiefs have been changed, expectedly, a new strategy by the
new chiefs should be formed as insecurity in Northeast is taking a new turn for
the worst because the tactics presently employed is having limited impact. The
federal government should seek for support from neighbours with a view to
finding solution to insurgency.”
Also in November 2020, the
governor raised the need to engage foreign paid fighters, a policy that was
adopted under President Goodluck Jonathan’s administration.
The Jonathan administration had
used Specialized Tasks, Training, Equipment and Protection (STTEP), a South
African company to combat the insurgents in the North-east.
But the incumbent administration
discarded the idea which it described as “disgraceful.”
Toeing the path of Governor
Zulum, the House of Representatives, following a motion by Abdulkadir Rahis in
March, resolved it was time to re-strategise in the insurgency fight.
And in an amendment to the
motion, Mansur Soro called on the government to consider foreign paid fighters
in the anti-terror war.
In his motion, Rahis had raised
the alarm on the spike in attacks on Maiduguri, particularly the February 23
attacks, which resulted in 16 fatalities.
