Bloodbath at Metele

Two weeks after I asked rhetorically that what do we do with the Nigerian Army, it is with sadness and pain I return to another issue concerning our soldiers. This time around, it has to do with the bloodbath at the 157 Task Force Battalion, Metele, Abadam local government area, Borno State.

Without dancing on the graves of those soldiers whose lives were cut short by Boko Haram terrorists, we must look at our chief of Army Staff squarely in the eyes and lay the blame of those needless deaths at his feet. Needless in the sense that, the Nigerian state, and by extension, Lt. General Tukur Buratai, were responsible for their deaths. That is why his attempts at mollifying the anger of Nigerians who have been touched by the soldiers’ ultimate sacrifice actually rubbed more salt in the wounds of their deaths. At different levels, we collectively failed the soldiers and that’s why we must continue to speak out about the way their deaths have been handled so far.

It took the courage of a Premium Times reporter who broke the story on November 18 for Nigerians and the entire world to be aware that Boko Haram terrorists have made mincemeat of our soldiers one more time. Sadly, our army never said a word until four or five days after the reportage before admitting that we even lost men in the attack carried out on an army base. Our government also played games with the casualty figures preferring to keep mute rather than acknowledging the heroic deeds of the soldiers who could not match the superior firepower of the terrorists. By the way, all governments worldwide play hide and seek with war casualties but in these days of citizen journalism and incessant media coverage of wars, they forget that there are more sources for news than official channels. And that’s why threatening citizens who posted stuff on the Metele bloodbath was actually a misstep and our army lost the narrative of discussions over the attack.

But there are other issues we should worry about over Metele, one is the actual casualties from the attack. Bob Woodward in his latest book, Fear, published in August, spoke about President Donald Trump’s discomfort in speaking with the families of American soldiers who died in combat showing that even a maverick like him will experience discomfort in carrying out such exercise. So, military casualties is a hot potato globally and ours is not different. It is just so annoying that President Muhammadu Buhari’s supporters and vuvuzelas who made so much noise about military casualties towards 2015 presidential election are now at the forefront of playing the patriotism card of keeping the casualty figures quiet. As at this time, the Nigerian Army claimed that 23 soldiers died while 31 were injured at Metele, but journalists put the casualties at 118 with over 150 missing.

We apparently have issues with our equipment and ammunition. As testimonies from soldiers at the front affirmed that terrorists who attacked the base in Metele possessed superior weapons forcing our soldiers to flee. True, there will always be casualties in any war, but attacking an army base with soldiers like sitting ducks raises serious questions. If the deaths had been on the field, maybe we can conclude it was another bad day at the front, but on a military base and we are not in Kabul or Damascus, military appropriations in the last two or three years deserve closer scrutiny. Just last December; our 36 state governors approved the release of $1 billion from the excess oil account to the Buhari government to fight Boko Haram Islamist insurgency. As at then, the account holds foreign reserve from excess earnings from crude oil sales, which totaled $2.3 billion. “The money will cover the whole array of needs which includes purchase of equipment, training for military personnel and logistics,” Governor Godwin Obaseki of Edo State, told reporters after a meeting of Nigeria’s national economic council, according to a Reuters’ report. So, what happened to the money released?

This newspaper and others had reported how troops are often undersupplied and underpaid with weapons, vehicles and other basic equipment often in disrepair or lacking. In effect, we send young Nigerians to their deaths willfully and our army chief could glibly proclaimed at the Chief of Army Staff Conference “no army can have enough equipment to conduct its operations.” Remember also that another general said that going without food and other basic amenities is a sacrifice soldiers have to make while fighting war in response to queries on why our soldiers often make do with terrible food. We also lost time in jettisoning some of the Jonathan government tactics in fighting Boko Haram, sacking the mercenaries and not following up on engagement with the Chadian government and others in the Lake Chad Basin Commission until today when the president left for a consultative meeting. We must also admit that we are losing the war against Boko Haram and this must be addressed quickly as the insurgency has been on for a decade now.

The energy dissipated threatening Nigerians on what they shared concerning the attacks is better channeled towards fighting Boko Haram and urgently too.