As Nigeria fights the brutal insurgency of Boko Haram, its army is hampered by an equally dangerous enemy ‘Corruption’
Speaking on Newspaper Review on African Independent Television station on Friday morning,monitored by the OBSERVERS TIMES, Chuks Akuna known for investigative journalism disclosed it that, majority of estate you are seeing in Nigeria are subscribed to by mostly military officers of senior rank.
The revelation confirmed the ongoing speculations by many Nigerians that most senior military officers are making money from war on Boko Haram and other internal security in the country.
OBSERVERS TIMES recall
Transparency International (TI), a German-based non-governmental organization, which found that Nigerian military officers, politicians and other elites have enriched themselves by diverting money that was meant to fight terror.
Much of this money is said to have disappeared through kickbacks, payments to “ghost soldiers” who don’t exist, or via no-bid contracts resulting in inflated spending that benefits politically-connected contractors.
Nigeria’s vice president believes that $15 billion was lost on fraudulent arms procurement deals alone.
“Corruption is worsening the conflict, and it’s a big driver of insecurity in Nigeria,” said Katherine Dixon, Transparency International’s program director. “So, over the last 10 years, corrupt elites have profited from the conflict in the northeast and driven Nigeria to a crisis point.”
Troops suffer, terror gains
Dixon believes that it’s ultimately the frontline troops who suffer from this kind of corruption. Under-equipped soldiers have been killed in ambushes or have simply fled the battlefield when faced with the superior firepower and equipment of the terror group.
In 2015, 66 soldiers who had been sentenced to death for desertion had their sentences commuted when the court heard testimony that they did not have proper weapons or equipment.
Other soldiers, supposedly on the front lines, don’t exist at all.
“Payments aren’t made to the soldiers on the ground, and you end up finding lots of ghost soldiers in the ranks,” Dixon said, referring to soldiers who exist only on paper to generate payments for commanders.
TI found that the corruption also helps Boko Haram in its recruitment efforts.
“If you’ve got an ill-disciplined security sector that is abusing its own power, whether it’s because its soldiers are not being paid or because there’s just [a] sort of a culture of impunity, then, of course, you are driving people to join groups like Boko Haram, who offer a very simplistic alternative to what is considered to be a corrupt establishment,” Dixon said.
TI recommends that the Nigerian military develops an anti-corruption strategy, provide public access to security information, regulate security votes and protect whistle-blowers.
Dixon says that monitoring confidential procurement is also essential.
“Some secretive spending will inevitably have to happen that should be overseen by a particular committee, so that you have proper monitoring that’s confidential procurement,” she said. “So any spending that is important enough to remain secret is important enough to monitor effectively.”
Recall Sahara Reporters report on how General Tukur Yusuf Buratai bought a second choice property in Dubai, the United Arab Emirates, days after his appointment as Nigeria’s Chief of Army Staff (COAS), an investigation by SaharaReporters.
stated that the funds for General Buratai’s first Dubai property came from a contract awarded for the supply of vehicles and motorcycles to the Army. They asserted that General Buratai had cornered the contract in his days as Director of Procurement at the Army Headquarters, using a front identified as Usman Gamawa. “The contract was awarded for the purchase of new vehicles, but Alhaji Gamawa’s Baggash Investment Limited bought second-hand vehicles and motorcycles from Niger Republic for the use of soldiers,” said one source. He said the purchase of substandard vehicles exposed troops engaged counter-insurgency operations to heightened danger, made them vulnerable to attacks by Boko Haram insurgents, and reduced their effectiveness.
Though Army denied that the Chief of Army Staff, Lt. Gen. Tukur Buratai, and his two wives acquired a property in Dubai and paid for it in a single transaction but admitted that the Buratai family has two properties in Dubai that were paid for on instalment basis through personal savings three years ago.
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