‘They joined the army to fight, not commit suicide’
AS THE Nigerian military battled Boko Haram over the past year, scores of soldiers made a decision that would put their lives in grave danger – they refused to fight.
It wasn’t for lack of bravery, they said. It was for lack of weapons.
At least 66 of the soldiers have been found guilty of mutiny and sentenced to death by firing squad. Dozens more remain in detention, awaiting trial. The Nigerian government describes them as cowards. Their supporters say they are scapegoats.
“They joined the army to fight, not to commit suicide,” said Femi Falana, an attorney for 59 of the soldiers.
The cases have opened a rare window into the Nigerian military, once one of the strongest in Africa but now struggling to combat an insurgency of several thousand fighters. Rebuilding the army is a major challenge for Muhammadu Buhari, who assumes the presidency of Africa’s most populous nation this month.
Nigeria’s defence budget is more than $6 billion (R71bn) – among the highest in sub-Saharan Africa – but experts say much of that is lost to corruption.
Many low-level soldiers complain about not receiving their $100a-month salary for weeks.
The troops’ legal cases feature numerous allegations of insufficient weaponry. The military also has been accused of grave human rights abuses.
The army doesn’t have a history of desertions, but as the military has escalated its fight against Boko Haram, the reported cases of mutiny have appeared to surge.
In the most prominent case, 54 soldiers from the 111th Special Forces Battalion were sentenced to death for mutiny after they refused to join an operation against the insurgents in August.
A month earlier, the same unit had been ambushed, leaving 26 soldiers dead and 83 others wounded. The soldiers then demanded better munitions to fight the rebels, who were armed with anti-aircraft guns and armoured personnel carriers, said a court filing from Falana.
Ironically, most of the rebels’ weapons appeared to come from Nigerian military bases they had overrun, according to the surviving troops.
The Special Forces unit had only 174 fighters in August, its commander said in court, rather than the 750 or so soldiers that battalions are expected to have.
The commander did not say why there were so few soldiers. But many Nigerian units have fewer troops than commanders indicate on their payrolls, analysts say, allowing senior officers to take the so-called “ghost” salaries.
That is one of several ways in which corruption has weakened the army.
“All this money the military has to purchase weapons is going to Nigerian officials’ pockets,” said a military officer who is the brother of one of the soldiers who was convicted of mutiny.
He spoke on condition of anonymity to protect his own career.
Nigerian military officials deny that soldiers are inadequately armed. In the case of the 111th Special Forces Battalion, military officials called soldiers’ justification for not fighting a hollow excuse.
In the 1990s, the Nigerian military was hailed for its role in peacekeeping missions in Sierra Leone and Liberia.
But after military rule in this country ended in 1999, experts say, the armed forces were kept weak to prevent them from attempting coups. The army currently has about 60 000 soldiers.
“Under-resourcing has gone on for years, and a decline in competence has come with it,” said James Hall, a former British military attaché to Nigeria.
“The government has been unable to recognise that the military has gone from something competent to something deeply incompetent.”
The quality of the Nigerians’ tactical training has declined, experts say. Human rights abuses appear to have increased in recent years, too. Even Boko Haram’s leader, Abubakar Shekau, has poked fun at the Nigerian military.
“You send 7 000 troops?” Shekau said in one video recording posted online this year. “This is small. Only 7 000? By Allah, it is small. We can seize them one by one.”
Troops from Nigeria, Chad and Niger have recently pushed the Boko Haram fighters out of a fiefdom in northern Nigeria.
But experts say the rebels have gathered in a vast, remote forest and still pose a significant threat.
Some of the mutiny trials have revealed startling glimpses of soldiers’ anger at their superiors.
In one high-profile case, 12 soldiers allegedly shot at their commanding officer after he ordered them to conduct a mission that they claimed was tantamount to suicide.
The officer was not injured, and the soldiers claim they intended to express their anger, not murder. They too were sentenced to death.
“These are issues of indiscipline,” said General Chris Olukolade, the military’s spokesman – Bloomberg