By Yinka Odumakin

AS I landed in Abuja on February 9, from Lagos, a senior journalist on board with me wore a pensive mood as he said the following words to me: “I am pan-Nigerian but certain things shake your faith like the advertisement in today’s edition of the Daily Trust”. It was an Obituary on page 46 of the paper by 70 members of ASP COURSE 14 for the late Rivers State Commissioner of Police, Mr. Francis Mobolaji Odesanya.

It was a good thing to see such comradeship but there is a sad side to the tale which exposes the underbelly of the unjust and unequal system in Nigeria reminiscent of apartheid South Africa.

Out of the 70 course mates who signed the advert, there is one Deputy Inspector General of Police and 14 Assistant Inspector Generals of Police all from the North.

I am told the present IGP who did not sign the advert is a member of that class. At the bottom of the page are Bolaji Fafowora a Superintendent of Police and Simeon Chilagorum who retired a Deputy Superintendent of Police!

I have since that day meditated day and night on this graphic portrayal of uneven yoke until my agony was compounded confronting details of the 38 officers arbitrarily retired by the Nigerian Army on June 9, 2016 without the due process.

It is the first time officers are being hounded out of their jobs as a result of interference by politicians as it has been alleged that some politicians including a governor who just left office in the South-South and a serving minister from the same zone were instrumental to the framing of some of the officers because of the charge that they did not “cooperate” with them during the 2015 elections
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Professional misconduct

Army spokesman, Col. Sani Usman claimed that the 38 officers were found wanting on arms procurement fraud and professional misconduct during the 2015 elections.There should be so much quarrel over that if available facts support his assertions.

Out of the 38, only nine appeared before the arms contracts panel and they are: Gen. MY Ibrahim, Gen. S D Aliyu, Maj Gen. FO Alli, Maj Gen. LI Wiwa, Maj Gen. EI Atewe, Brig Gen. Mormoni Bashir, Maj-Gen.DM Onoyiveta, Brig Gen. AI Onibasa and Brig Gen. A Abdusalam.

The findings of the panel were not released until three weeks after the retirement and it recommended eight officers for further investigations on page 5 of the report submitted on July 4, 2016 but three of them were retired before any was carried out.

On the partisanship allegation, 11 of the officers appeared before the Maj Gen. Oyebade Board of Inquiry on election partisanship and they are: Brig Gen. ASH Saad, Brig-Gen. Koko Essien, Col. FD Kayode, Col.DR Hassan, Col. TT Minimah, Lt Col. TO Oladumtoye, Lt Col. CO Amadi, Lt Col.O Ababa-Ochankpa, Lt Col. Egemole, Lt Col.KO Adimoha and Lt Col. A S Mohammed.

The Board recommended disciplinary action, letters of displeasure to others and letter of commendation to some, especially the Captain who recorded the Ekiti tapes. The army rule says you must be charged and found guilty before you are relieved of your job but these officers were not charged though some of them have cases to answer.

Retired without reason: The most bizarre of it all is that eight months after the retirement 18 of the 38 have not been told why they were retired by the army authority.They are Maj Gens. I N Ijioma,O Ejemai, LC Ilo,TC Ude;Brig Gens. IM Lawson, LM Bello,BA Fibuonumama; Cols. I O Ahhachi, FE Ekpenyong, OU Nwakwo, MA Suleiman, CK Ukoha; Lt Cols. A Mohammed, GC Nyekwu, D B Dazang, TE Arigbe, Enemchikwu and Major A T Williams.

Lt Col. O A Baba- Achankpa slept and did not wake up on January 31, 2016 foreclosing his ever getting justice on this side of eternity. May his troubled soul find some rest. There are quite some other ear-tingling tales among the 17 living of the 18 officers who have not been told of their offences as I write this.

Take the case of Lt Col. Arigbe who entered military secondary school at age 11 and spent a total of 23 years before he was retired. He was fourth in a class of 204. The brilliant officer with two Masters has been teaching since 2013 and was posted to Army Training School in Ghana in 2015.

He was imparting knowledge when he received a mail from army headquarters that he has been retired. In a petition through the Chief of Defence Staff to the President and Commander-In-Chief of the Armed Forces dated June 16, 2016 and acknowledged by the office of the Chief of staff the following day he stated as follows :”

I received a letter of compulsory retirement with utter shock via e mail after I was sent a message to confirm my e mail from the Army Headquarters Department of Military Secretary on June 9, 2016.

A press statement by the Nigerian Army spokesman indicated that the retirement affected officers who were indicted for partisanship during the 2015 General elections or were involved in the arms scandal emanating from the office of the National Security Adviser.

I wish to most respectfully state, sir, that I was in no way connected to the two mentioned issues. In addition,I have not committed any serious offence as I have never been invited for any board of inquiry or been charged or court martialled for any offence.”He requested the President to reconsider his case based on “wrongful retirement”.

That prayer has not been answered till date just like those of his 29 colleagues who made similar protests. The case of Lt Col. A Mohammed who was commanding 195 Battalion in Agenebode was equally pathetic.It is alleged that his offence was that he did not help the ruling party during the 2015 elections in Edo State.

Letter of retirement

But the gentleman was busy fighting Boko Haram in the North East at the period. He was drafted to Maiduguri as sector commander to fight the insurgents.
He led ferocious battles in Dambura and Kindigwa even when some of his troops deserted him. The gallant officer was posted to School of Infantry in October 2015 where he received the letter of retirement.

He asked the officer who served him the letter what his offence was but he answered that they just gave him a list. He wrote to the office of Chief of Army Staff but got no reply till date. He has followed up with a letter to the President that he is an innocent officer retired unjustly but is yet to get any response.

Brigadier Koko Essien is also among the brilliant officers lost to this whimsical exercise. He is of the 36 regular course and rated top three in his category and was defence attaché at United Nations in New York. It is said that his crime was that a top politician in Rivers said he was not helpful in the state as Brigade Commander during the 2015 elections .

There is yet the case of Col. OU Nwankwo who was said to be writing examinations at the University of Ibadan when the elections were going on in 2015 and was not invited to the arms panel, yet got a retirement letter. He has not been told his offence till date.

An example to follow: It is confounding why the authorities have refused to look into the complaints of the unjustly dismissed officers in the order of the reinstatement of Major General Ahmed Mohammed from Katsina who was compulsorily retired by the Jonathan administration on January 10, 2015 for alleged dereliction of duty in the war against Boko Haram.

He appealed to the President for reinstatement on September 30, 2015 several months outside the 30 days provided for an aggrieved persons to appeal to the commander -in-chief.
In a letter dated January 5, 2016 and signed by Maj Gen. M H Garuba,

Mohammed who was indicted on page 10 of Amnesty International Report “Stars on their shoulders, blood on their hands” was reinstated “effective from January 15” by the President. “On recall, you are to retain your substantive rank of Major general with seniority on the same rank effective June 3, 2013”. The Army was directed to restore his service ID and pay him all his salaries and allowances from his day of retirement.

It is amazing how we wallow in iniquities as a country and still expect progress to be our lot. There are immutable laws of God that stand forever. The foundation of any nation to excel must be Justice and Righteousness.
It is not too late to redress the injustices meted to these officers.

Feedback
Re: Soviet collapse and suicide-prone Nigeria

YOU gladdened me immeasurably by your column in Vanguard of February 14, 2017, the title of which I have reproduced as the title of this rejoinder.
Why do many Nigerians deploy the ignorant and infuriating adjective “indissoluble” to describe the insane and evil creation of ‘NIL-GERIA’ by the British in 1914?

Another mad declaration by the same persons is that ‘NIL-GERIA’S “UNITY” IS NON-NEGOTIABLE’!
But who ‘negotiated’ the amalgamation? Who ‘negotiated’ which “unity”? When? Where? Asphyxiating is now the by-product of our PRETENCES! Federal Republic of Let’s Pretend’!

That is why we are always devising ways and tactics and methods and strategies to achieve ‘unity’ that we already swear is ‘non-negotiable’!
If we are united, why then are we still crying about the imperative to unite?

Perhaps, we have problems with the English GRAMMAR and its words and Semantics.

Pretences do not last an eternity. The defunct Soviet Union, the former Yugoslavia, the mouldy Czechoslovakia, Ethiopia and Eritrea, Sudan and South Sudan….are great lessons in how not to build nations on presumed ” Unity”.

Apart from cultural, language, and other differences, Nigeria sizzles with political and religious hatred, mutual hatred, suspicion, envy, cheating, bitterness and the most devilish desperation to capture Federal Power by each “Geopolitical Zone” in order to feel, not only a desire to belong, but also to ‘lord it over those who had been lording it over us’.

And, to those who are incurably doped by ‘Unity”, I hurl this apartheid query: How come a child from Anambra State must score 139 over 200; the Abia child, 129 over 200; the Edo child, 127 over 200 to be admitted into Federal Government Colleges, decorated as “Unity Colleges” while children from Borno, Taraba, Zamfara and Kaduna States, all in the North, need only score 2 over 200, and 3, 4, and 67, respectively, to secure admission into the same schools, and for the same certificates? Is this UNITY?

Nigeria will be no more by 2019! Wherever the old Soviet Union and the others are, there ‘NIL-GERIA’ is destined….and HEADED!
-Sam Asowata.

I want to commend your piece on the newspaper. I think Nigeria is very much like the defunct Soviet Union but not even as functional as the communist state was. Ours is just a charity autocracy with the governors and a government that has succumbed to the hydra-headed corruption.
-Ejikenoye Eikenna.