Nigerian Army clears Air on troops protest, says it was a mild complaint

The Nigerian Army, on Friday, dismised media reports that Soldiers of an unidentified battalion in “Operation Lafiya Dole” protested their posting to a location in the Theatre of Operation.

In a statement, Director, Army Public Relations, Brigadier General Mohammed Yerima said the reports also claimed that the aggrieved soldiers, besieged the headquarters of the Theatre Command in Borno State, shooting sporadically into the air on Thursday to protest alleged unpaid operational allowances as well as obsolete equipment.

He said the claims were unsubstantiated and did not represent the true situation of the incidents.

“For the records, the Headquarters, Theatre Command, Operation LAFIYA DOLE wishes to state that the claims were unsubstantiated did not represent the true situation of the incident.

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“Preliminary investigations by Theatre Commander, Operation Lafiya Dole, Maj. Gen. Farouq Yahaya, revealed that what some media reports described as protest was a mild complaint by few soldiers of Mobile Strike Team (MST), deployed in Exercise Tura Takaibango in the frontline of Operations.

“At (about) 3pm on 25 March, 2021, some of the troops of Mobile Strike Team 10 & 11 who were primed to conduct phase 2 of Exercise TURA TAKAIBANGO in Bama after the first phase of the exercise, raised some concerns which were quickly addressed before they were relaunched to the second phase of the Operations.

“On the issue of ‘obsolete weapons’ as reported in some media, the position of Army Headquarters is that soldiers have right to demand proper weapons to prosecute the operations. However, the Federal Government was making concerted efforts toward deploying new fighting equipment to augment the existing ones in the Theartre of Operation,” Yerima said.

The Director of Army Public Relations also denied report that some soldier were owned operational allowances.

He said no soldier was owned any Allowance in the Theartre.

He said the Nigerian Army would continue to remain focused and determined to perform their constitutional roles and responsibilities professionally in the protection of the sovereignty of the nation, ensuring the safety of life and property as they clear the terrorists, their cohorts and collaborators in the country.