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Some Nigerian Soldiers Could Face Punishment for Allegedly Writing an Article Online
--- by Femi Thomas (NaijaBlog)
Prior to the recent online speculation
about the overstay of
143rd Battalion in the ongoing battle against the Boko-Haram insurgency, some soldiers
of the unit may face severe punishment for allegedly writing the article,
which has attracted the concern of some senior officers in the Army.
 |
| Chief of Army Staff, Lt. Gen. Tukur Buratai |
It should be noted that troops of 143rd Battalion were
inducted into Operation Lafiya Dole in Adamawa, Northeastern Nigeria on
November 30th 2014 and advanced to Madagali and Limankara, Borno State from
Mararaba Mubi on foot. The unit has her headquarters at Madagali, Adamawa
State with four locations, which include Michika, Gulak, Sabon Gari, and
Limankara under it.
However, the unit among three other units (114th,115th, and
117th) are under the 28th Task Force Brigade, Chibok, which is responsible for
the operation in the Adamawa Axis. A
source close to the military revealed that except for the 114th
Battalion, none of the other three battalions, including 143rd Battalion, which
was the first to be inducted into the operation had been rotated.
It should be noted that Chief of Army Staff, Lt. Gen. T.
Buratai, has in the past mentioned that no unit is to exceed two years in the
operation without rotation. A source also revealed that as a result of
this, soldiers after two years in the operation were patiently waiting to
be rotated to enable them re-unite with their loved ones. All to no avail. About two consecutive times, the Unit has
gotten a signal for rotation, which died without actions. The most recent was the nomination of 144th Battalion of Abia State to rotate the unit, only for them to be diverted to
Mongunu in Borno State after two months of intensive training at Buni Yadi,
Yobe State. Next was the nomination of 6th
Battalion, Awka Ibom which also died down as well.
As a result to this, a dissatisfied soldier took to social
media and sent an SOS article across soliciting for an urgent intervention of
the appropriate authority.
In the article, he condemned the present and past commanding
officers, present and past Brigadier Generals and blamed them for theoverstay
of the units. The writer also condemned the Chief of the Army Staff and blamed
him for thwarting the nomination of the units that were supposed to relieve
143rd Battalion and regarded him as not having integrity. Moreover, the writer
lamented the poor feeding, lack of special promotion, and poor welfare of
soldiers among others.
As a result to this, the unit has been changed from
operation back to unit, replaced by 144th Battalion on 15th of July, 2019.
However, higher authority of the Army picked offence because of the write up
and wants to know the writer of the social media article. Ten soldiers of
143rd Battalion who were not allowed to go with the unit were
arrested and accused of masterminding the write up because they had decried the
poor feeding in their location on their unit's WhatsApp chat platform sometime, a while before the emergence of the said article. The
soldiers were arrested and upon interrogation were detained in the Battalion's
Guardroom at Madagali and subsequently taken to 7th Division Military Police
Guardroom at Borno State for further interrogation and detention.
A source close to the military disclosed that this single
act might keep the soldiers behind the bar for as long as possible without
trial.
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