Recruiting More Soldiers To End Boko Haram Is Inevitable – Bashir Magashi

The Minister of Defense, Maj-Gen. Bashir Magashi has come out to say that more soldiers are set to be recruited to end the Boko Haram insurgency in the Northeast.

Magashi recently disclosed this while addressing troops at the Military Command and Control Centre, Maiduguri, the Borno state capital.

According to him, the recruitment of soldiers with professional skills and fighting equipment with strategies can actually route out remnants of terrorists from hideouts, so it had to be looked into.

He added that the deployment of more soldiers to Sambisa Forest, Lake Chad region and the Mandara Hills is inevitable to end the war.

His words, “It’s only you that could perform professionally in the theatre of war.”

“We count on each and every one of you in the front lines of the forest and Lake Chad region to end the over decade insurgency.”

To the soldiers, “I’m here today in Maiduguri to assess your fighting spirit, before we could unfold a plan on how to end this war.”

“We also believe in your commitments and the professional skills of fighting Boko Haram insurgents to end the war.”

“It is however disturbing that the activities of hoodlums, thugs, miscreants, cultists etc. have been on the increase of recent. As members of the party in power, we are disturbed that the Governor has been subjected to direct attacks on a couple of times, which were capable of not just harming him but could claim his life. We must put on record the heroic efforts of the Governor’s personal security team in warding off such offensives, but we are of the opinion that the gargantuan security architecture of the Governor could do better by being proactive and prevent such ugly incidents.”

“We bring to the notice of the Governor, the recent kidnapping incidents in Iwaraja and Ibokun areas of the State, cult attacks in the core part of Osogbo which has rendered citizens helpless, and the gruesome killing of six members of a family at a Fulani settlement beside Wasinmi village, along ‘Ikire/Hadan expressway. This has had some corrosive effects on the lives of the people who always think they can go to sleep with their two eyes closed.”

“The March 28th attack on the Personal Assistant to your predecessor who is the current Minister of Interior, Mr Olateju Adunni gives us reason to feel sad and we are afraid of what may become. By his account, which we believe your honour must have read, he declared it was an assassination attempt on him as declared by the assailants themselves.”

“The curious issue in his narration was that the venue of the attack was populated by APC stalwarts and members who were invited to celebrate the birthday of an honourable member.”

“So, the whole event, the birthday party and the attack were that of APC. What would have provoked it? Have we gotten to a point in APC whereby differences will be settled by assassination? If we do this to ourselves, who says the opposition PDP cannot latch onto it and deal with us severely? We refer to some intra APC attacks that have happened in recent times and we wonder if we have morality to still refer to the PDP as the nest of killers, that we use to describe them.”

“It is these dark spots in our state security, hitherto known as the haven of peace that we want to humbly request your honour’s quick response that will return us to our top-notch price situation. We are approaching elections and insecurity will be a challenge difficult to contain if we don’t nip these seemingly little things in the bud.”

“We suggest that it will be necessary to ensure that the security breaches are investigated and perpetrators brought to book so as to forestall a repeat. The case of Olateju will be good enough a case study to use in that regard.”

“We wish Mr Governor well as he navigates the ship of our state to success.”