Army sacks senior officers for ‘partisanship’ in 2015 poll
The Nigeria army has compulsorily retired some of its senior officers who have been “investigated for partisanship in the 2015 general election” and for alleged corruption.
Sani Usman, army spokesman, disclosed this in a statement on Saturday.
He said some of those retired were major-generals, brigadier-generals, colonels, lieutenant-colonels and a major.
“The Nigeria army wishes to inform the general public that quite a number of senior officers of the Nigeria army were retired from service yesterday,” he said in a statement.
“Those retired were mainly some major generals, brigadier generals, colonels, lieutenant colonels and a major.
“Their retirement was based on service exigencies. It should be recalled that not too long ago some officers were investigated for being partisan during the 2015 general election.
“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).”
Usman said the army appealed that Nigerians “should therefore not read this out of context”, saying “the military must remain apolitical and professional at all times”.
The very fact that the public is being appealed to, not to read the action out of context indicates that something is probably missing in the explanation.
To the best of my knowledge during the 2015 presidential Election, Goodluck Jonathan was the commander in chief of the Nigerian armed forces. How could anybody accuse a military officer of any wrong doing for being loyal to his commander in chief? In fact it is the other way round, meaning that officers who were not loyal to their commander in chief could be accused of sabotage.
If I may ask who among the rest of your remaining officers or the general public is not partisan including you and me? If somebody committed an offence out of partisanship or whatever reason, definitely he should be held accountable, but loyalty alone does not amount to an offence.
I am afraid some hidden agenda similar to the immediate pre-civil war situation is gradually unfolding.
Nigerian Military had never been apolitical or professional as they wanted to portray here.
We should better be careful of our actions.