Daily Trust Editorial, October 9, 2025
The disturbing trend of diversion of military stockpiles to terrorists, bandits and other non-state actors by rogue soldiers was underlined again on September 18, when a Special Court Martial (SCM) convicted four soldiers of arms/ammunition racketeering. The SCM presided by Brigadier General Mohammed Abdullahi, which sat at Headquarters Theatre Command Officers’ Mess in Maiduguri, sentenced Sgt Raphael Ameh (armourer with 7 Division Garrison), Sgt Ejiga Musa (main armourer of 195 Battalion), and LCpl Patrick Ocheje to life imprisonments while Cpl Omitoye Rufus bagged 15 years imprisonment.
Specifically, they were convicted for theft, unlawful dealing in ammunition, offence in relation to Service Property as well as aiding and abetting the enemy, which are all punishable under the relevant sections of the Armed Forces Act (AFA) Law of Federation of Nigeria (LFN) CAP A20 2004 and other extant laws.
The military court held that the soldiers wilfully stole and transferred government-procured or issued weapons from armouries to the enemy combatants they ought to decimate.
These ignoble acts directly endanger troops, imperil military operations and national security. It not only fuels violence, crime, and instability, it undermines discipline, morale, and erodes public confidence in the armed forces, potentially destabilising governance. These soldiers betrayed the trust and honour expected of troops.
What is also frightening are the reported cases of soldiers escorting and protecting crossborder smugglers of arms and ammunition which are sold to bandit groups operating in northern Nigeria. Indeed, in October 2024, the National Security Adviser (NSA), Nuhu Ribadu, noted that security personnel are a primary source of arms for non-state actors.
For example, during Exercise Operation Snowball launched against ammunition racketeering, on August 16, 2024, the Army arrested two of its soldiers – Sergeants Saad Adamu (05NA/56/385) of 3rd Division Ordinance Unit and Dalhatu Murtala (07NA/60/0940), armourer of 19 Brigade Garrison, for gunrunning. In fact, Sergeant Adamu, who concealed 313 rounds of 7.62mm PKT ammunition, 172 rounds of 7.62mm special and two magazines inside a bag filled with cartons of dry fish told investigators that the weapons were supplied to him by Sergeant Murtala.
On May 29, 2025, troops of Operation Hadin Kai (OPHK) announced the arrest of 18 serving soldiers and 15 police officers for allegedly selling arms to terrorists and other criminal elements. On September 2, the Army arrested L/Cpl Saifullahi Garba (14NA/72/15972) in Marte Local Government Area of Borno State with 711 rounds of 7.62mm ammunition which he had been accumulating from clearance operations with the intent of supplying terrorists.
During surveillance operations on September 27, 2025, troops of Operation Hadin Kai apprehended a serving soldier and a police officer after intercepting arms, military-grade ammunition and other logistics being smuggled to Boko Haram/ISWAP terrorists in the North East.
We at Daily Trust condemn the acts of these unpatriotic elements who have desecrated their sworn sacred mandate of protecting citizens’ lives and properties. And we state that no circumstances would warrant such professional misconduct of endangering the lives of comrades in armed services and those of the citizens they swore to serve and protect.
We strongly commend the military high command for the action taken on some of the criminals arrested through the Court Martial. We also urge the military to immediately conduct investigations into these internal treachery and sabotage and unearth the perpetrators, sponsors while instituting surveillance on the armouries and all assigned arms and ammunitions. We also believe that it is laxity that allowed such wickedly “highly lucrative” criminal enterprises to be perpetuated without any supervisory red flags.
All misguided personnel within the system should be apprehended and eased out through the force of the law as nothing should be allowed to dampen the effectiveness of the fight against insecurity. And it should go beyond sale of arms to serving personnel who snitch on troops’ movements and other information that may compromise the safety of soldiers in the battlefield or the citizens they are protecting. The military high command must ensure that disturbing stories of soldiers arming terrorists and bandits belong to the past by plugging all loopholes.
We also remind all soldiers that violation of the oath of allegiance to protect Nigeria and Nigerians is treasonable. Most importantly, there should also be a new scrutiny on the recruitment process especially the conduct of background checks on all entrants and serving personnel. The current spate of involvement of uniformed personnel makes it imperative that no undesirable character should be recruited or enlisted into the armed services.
Towards this, all allegations of interference with the normal recruitment process must stop. The military should not be infested with only the children, wards and “unemployed relatives or constituents” of the political, economic and social elite who see enlistment into service as a status symbol or continuation of a family tradition or “job for the boys.” The military is a voluntary service with its own rules and regulations, in addition to the laws governing the larger society, and they must be enforced.
Involvements of soldiers in gunrunning are sobering and sad as they show the creeping of indiscipline into the military system. They are negatively affecting, if not destroying the very fabrics of the Nigerian military, especially the regimentation, which is obviously under attack.
And you cannot meaningfully fight insecurity when you have saboteurs within. It should not come to the point where those charged with protecting Nigeria’s territorial integrity abet and arm criminals. This, therefore, demands immediate clean-up of the military recruitment, monitoring and disciplinary processes.
The military high command must immediately enforce mechanisms to check this debilitating sabotage. And the measures should take the urgency, seriousness and transparency it deserves.
