Nigeria army dismisses suggestions of takeover from Buhari

Nigeria's armed forces have dismissed suggestions that they should take over from President Muhammadu Buhari, who is facing mounting pressure over the country's worsening insecurity.

It was not the first time Nigeria's armed forces have issued a statement backing Buhari, but the latest has come after weeks of criticism of the 78-year-old former general's failures to stem the protracted security crisis.

From a jihadist insurgency in the northeast to herder-farmer clashes in the centre, banditry in the northwest and separatist tensions in the southeast, Buhari's armed forces appear to be struggling to curb insecurity.

In a statement late Monday, the armed forces said they would continue to "fully" support the government, remain politically neutral and protect Nigeria's democracy.

"Let it be stated categorically that the Armed Forces of Nigeria remain fully committed to the present administration and all associated democratic institutions," army spokesman Onyema Nwachukwu said in the statement.

"We shall continue to remain apolitical, subordinate to the civil authority, firmly loyal to the President, Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, President Muhammadu Buhari and the 1999 Constitution as amended," it said.

Last week, lawmakers had urged Buhari to declare a nationwide state of emergency after a month of almost daily attacks, kidnappings and killings across Africa's most populous country.

The mililtary statement referred specifically to comments made by Robert Clarke, a prominent lawyer and social commentator.

He had said the country was on the brink of collapse and suggested the political leadership hand power to the military so that the security forces could be restructured.

Opposition figures like Bukola Saraki and Nobel winner and playwright Wole Soyinka have also urged Buhari to seek external help or resign.

In a statement Tuesday, Buhari's office said "some disgruntled religious and past political leaders" were planning to "eventually throw the country into a tailspin, which would compel a forceful and undemocratic change of leadership."

Describing such attempt as "patently illegal, and even treasonable," the presidency warned that such behaviour "would attract the necessary consequences."

- Security meeting -

Buhari met with his top security chiefs last week and again on Tuesday to discuss the country's violence.

"We shall continue to discharge our constitutional responsibilities professionally, especially in protecting the country’s democracy, defence of the territorial integrity of the country as well as protection of lives and properties of citizens," the military statement said.

The army expressed the hope that the nation's "current security challenges are not insurmountable."

Nigeria returned to democracy in 1999 after almost 16 years of military rule.

Buhari, a former army commander and military ruler in the 1980s, was first elected in 2015 and re-elected four years later on a pledge to end the Boko Haram insurgency in the northeast.

Rather than abate, the Islamist rebellion has stubbornly persisted with a Boko Haram splinter faction, Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP), becoming the dominant jihadist force.

Since 2009 when it began, the jihadist uprising has killed 36,000 people and forced over two million others to flee their homes in Nigeria's northeast alone.

The violence has also spread to neighbouring Chad, Niger and Cameroon, prompting a regional military coalition to fight the insurgents.

By Joel Olatunde

AFP

‘Nobody is safe’: Nigeria reels from nationwide wave of deadly violence

Nigeria’s president Muhammadu Buhari has come under mounting pressure from critics and allies alike as the country reels from multiple security crises that have claimed hundreds of lives in recent weeks.

An alarming wave of violence has left millions in Africa’s most populous country in uproar at the collapse in security. Attacks by jihadist groups in the north-east have been compounded by a sharp rise in abductions targeting civilians in schools and at interstate links across Nigeria. Mass killings by bandit groups in rural towns, a reported rise in armed robberies in urban areas and increasingly daring attacks on security forces by pro-Biafran militants in the south-east have also all risen.

In April alone, almost 600 civilians were killed across the country and at least 406 abducted by armed groups, according to analysis by the Council on Foreign Relations. The violence has left much of the country on edge and Buhari facing the fiercest criticism since he took office.

Governors, politicians – including those in the president’s own All Progressives Congress (APC) party – Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka and civil society groups have all called for urgent measures, and criticised the 78-year-old president.

Among the most scathing criticisms in recent weeks have come from allies. “This is the worst instability we are facing. Our security system has collapsed, it has failed,” APC senator Smart Adeyemi said on the senate floor last week. “The security infrastructure that we have today cannot cope with what we are facing. From the north to the south nobody is safe, nobody can travel 50km in our nation,” he added before breaking down in tears.

Soyinka, who in recent years has been an ardent critic of Buhari’s government, has bemoaned a lack of leadership. “Unfortunately, we don’t have a government. It was quite apparent, even before the end of Buhari’s first term that he is not capable of the task of being president,” he told the Guardian in a recent interview. “Human lives have become expendable and the president has shown he is not able to protect.”

The former military general returned to power in 2015, promising to tackle Boko Haram and corruption. Yet some of the gains made in fighting the jihadist group have come undone, with multiple groups now active. Elsewhere in the country, insecurity has soared as the president has cut a muted and remote figure.

Life for millions in Africa’s largest economy has become increasingly hard, with Nigeria suffering two recessions in the last five years. The number of unemployed people has more than doubled since 2015 to 23 million.

As the economy has suffered, crime and insecurity has grown and the failings of Nigeria’s underfunded and under-equipped security forces have grown more glaring.

On Tuesday, distraught parents of 17 university students, among 22 people kidnapped from Greenfield University in Kaduna in the north-west last month, protested in the streets of the capital, Abuja, accusing the government of abandoning them and pleading with authorities to secure their children’s release.

Serial kidnappings this year by armed groups targeting students in the north have sparked outrage and despair.

The Greenfield University kidnappers have killed five of the students after parents were only able to raise half of the $263,000 ransom demanded. On Monday, an assailant who claimed to have carried out the abduction told Voice of America radio that the 17 remaining students would be killed if the rest of the ransom was not paid on Tuesday.

The policy of the Kaduna government is not to pay ransoms, which it says fuel a kidnap “industry”. But families have been left bereft, with many critical that the policy has not been supported by an increase in local security measures.

Shehu Sani, a senator for the opposition People’s Democratic party in Kaduna, said on Tuesday: “We must not wait for bandits to throw the corpses of our 17 children on our doorsteps … If the government has a better solution to freeing the kidnapped students other than the one embarked upon by the parents of the students, let it be put to work immediately.”

Reforms to restructure and better fund the police were urgently needed, Sani said. “The government has just failed to live up to its responsibilities and expectations. Corrupt security officers feeding on the defence budget must be dealt with and the welfare of troops must be upgraded. The military and the police must be better armed to match the bandits and terrorists.”

The Guardian

Related stories: Nigerian lawmakers demand action on security crisis

Nigeria's Buhari condemns killing of 'tens' of villagers

Search Underway for Kidnapped Students from Nigeria’s Kaduna State

Nigeria bans travellers from India, Brazil, Turkey over COVID-19 fears

Nigeria will ban travellers coming from India, Brazil and Turkey because of concerns about the rampant spread of coronavirus in those countries, a presidential committee said on Sunday.

"Non-Nigerian passport holders and non-residents who visited Brazil, India or Turkey within Fourteen (14) days preceding travel to Nigeria, shall be denied entry into Nigeria," Boss Mustapha, chairman of the presidential steering committee on COVID-19, said in a statement.

The ban will take effect from May 4, the statement said.

Nigeria announced 43 confirmed new coronavirus cases on Saturday, bringing its total to 165,153, with 2,063 deaths.

Indian hospitals, morgues and crematoriums have been overwhelmed as the country has reported more than 300,000 daily cases for more than 10 days straight. Many families have been left on their own to find medicines and oxygen.

In Brazil, new coronavirus cases have fallen off a late-March peak, but remain high by historical standards. Total deaths in the country are second only to the United States.

Turkey imposed a nationwide "full lockdown" on Thursday, lasting until May 17, to curb a surge in coronavirus infections and deaths, with the world's fourth highest number of cases and the worst on a per-capita basis among major nations.

Reuters

Cameroon Military Says It Pushed Boko Haram Fighters into Nigeria

YAOUNDE, CAMEROON - Cameroon's military said Wednesday its troops pushed back about 80 terrorists from Fotokol, a town on the border with Nigeria.

The statement said the Boko Haram fighters were from the Nigerian town of Wulgo in Borno State.

Cameroon's military said it killed several fighters in clashes this week, but Boko Haram escaped with all but two of the bodies. The military said it destroyed six war jeeps and seized a large arsenal, including machine guns and assault rifles.

The military said Monday's operation was led by troops of the Multinational Joint Task Force of the Lake Chad Basin Commission.

A military spokesperson, Navy Captain Atonfack Guemo Cyrille Serge, said the operation freed several civilians who had been abducted by the militants.

Nineteen-year-old Zumbaisi Babale, who witnessed the abductions, said the fighters took away his elder sister and a man with whom she was seeking refuge in their village church. He said he hid under a bench until the fighters left, then the military took him to their base for protection.

Midjiyawa Bakari, governor of Cameroon's Far North region, said Boko Haram fighters are still lurking near the border, and civilians should report strangers in their towns and villages.

He said via a messaging app from the northern town of Maroua that the military has been mobilized to be alert all along Cameroon's border with Nigeria and Chad. All travelers and their goods will be checked to protect Cameroon's territory from Boko Haram and any rebel group that attempts to penetrate, Bakari added.

Monday's attack came a week after Chad announced the death of its president, Idriss Deby.

Conflict resolution specialist Joseph Vincent Ntouda Ebode of the University of Yaounde said the terrorists may have mobilized thinking that Chad had called back its troops and there were fewer soldiers fighting Boko Haram.

He said the terrorists know that Chad, which contributes a significant number of troops to combat Boko Haram, is now concentrating on stopping its internal security threats. For that reason, he said, Cameroon and Nigeria should remobilize their troops because Boko Haram terrorists will intensify attacks since they are aware that Chad has other priorities.

It is not known if the Transitional Military Council in Chad will be as devoted as Chad's late president in fighting Boko Haram, Ebode added.

There are about 8,000 troops in the multinational joint task force fighting Boko Haram.

The task force has not indicated whether Chad withdrew its troops.

By Moki Edwin Kindzeka

VOA

Nigeria's central bank sacks entire board of First Bank of Nigeria

Nigeria's central bank on Thursday sacked the entire board of First Bank of Nigeria and appointed new directors, the regulator said in a statement, citing the previous board's "sweeping changes" without alerting regulatory authorities.

First Bank of Nigeria (FBN) did not respond to calls seeking comment.

The bank had been in "grave financial condition" when the regulator become involved in its management "to maintain financial stability" in 2016, giving it authority over FBN's operations, the central bank said.

The sacking of the board on Thursday was done "in order to preserve stability of the bank, so as to protect minority shareholders and depositors," said the regulator.

"The actions being taken are meant to strengthen the bank and position it as a banking industry giant," it said.

Nigeria's central bank has powers to remove bank executives and used them during the 2008/2009 global financial crisis when it sacked nine CEOs at banks that were under-capitalised.

The regulator in 2016 sacked top executives of Skye Bank over capital adequacy issues, having in 2015 given three commercial banks time to recapitalise after they failed to hit a minimum capital adequacy rate of 10%.

By Chijioke Ohuocha

Reuters