On September 19, 2023, at Oriendu in Umualumaku Umueze, Ehime Mbano, Imo State, eight security agents comprising of personnel of the Nigerian military, Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC) and National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) were ambushed by unknown gunmen. They were killed and burnt in their two operational vehicles.
The ambush, killing and burning of the personnel shattered the relative peace in the South-East, where activities of the so-called unknown gunmen had gone down considerably through joint activities of stakeholders. The ambush was blamed “On the resurgence of the criminal activities of the proscribed Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) and the Eastern Security Network (ESN)” led by Finland-based Simon Ekpa.
Ekpa, leader of IPOB/ESN Autopilot Group and self-proclaimed Prime Minister of the Biafra Government in Exile (BRGIE), had ordered a three-week stay-at-home, from September 18, in which he ordered his armed followers to enforce lockdown and to go after defence and security agencies anywhere in the region.
But regardless of the cause of the recent ambush, that was not the first time Nigeria’s military and other security agents were experiencing such attacks. The Ehime Mbano ambush came barely one month after terrorists ambushed and killed three officers and 22 soldiers along the Kundu-Zungeru road in Wushishi Local Government Area (LGA), Niger State.
Then, on August 14, 2023, a Nigerian Air Force (NAF) MI-171 helicopter sent to evacuate casualties of the ambush crashed at Chukuba village, Shiroro LGA, killing two pilots and two crew members.
On September 23, Boko Haram terrorists ambushed a moving convoy of motorists on the way heading to Yola between Gwoza to Limankara in Borno State, killing four passengers and two security operatives. Others ran into the bush for safety and were rescued and brought back to Maiduguri by the security forces the following day.
We mourn the tragic loss of these personnel and many others who have paid the supreme sacrifice in defence of our fatherland. While extending condolences to the friends, families, and relatives of the deceased officers and men, we affirm that Nigeria cannot continue to condone the gruesome murder of our men and women in uniform. Or does this mean there is either a total collapse of the security intelligence architecture or they are not there in the first place?
The reality is that the frequency of ambushes against the nation’s defence and security agents has become embarrassing. They are happening in quick succession, calling into question whether the nation’s training institutions prepared them for anti-ambush manoeuvres. Nigerians expect their gallant troops to get acquainted with their deployed Areas of Responsibility (AOR), recognise and avoid potential ambushes and fight their way through any unavoidable one.
Nigerian security and intelligence agencies should be more effective and responsive. They should be proactive and dominate their environment, denying the enemy footstool to operate.
It is a disappointing reality that despite the huge resources spent in funding Nigeria’s security and intelligence system towards detecting and preventing attacks such as the ambushes, they are becoming frequent.
No excuse is tenable. After all, the troops have been fighting non-state actors since the outbreak of the Boko Haram terrorism in 2009. They are not supposed to still allow these vulnerabilities.
The ambushes and attacks are too many. Therefore, the Nigerian defence and security agencies must put their houses in order. They should unleash their superior firepower on these non-state actors.
In this direction, their leadership should go back to the drawing board and map out strategies against the ambush and attacks. They don’t need another ambush before they tighten loose ends and stop the ongoing decimation of the nation’s men and women in uniform.
They need to be on maximum alert at all times. They must know that members of IPOB/ESN or any other gunman are not a spirit. They are human beings living among the people and the failure of these agencies to infiltrate them shows either lack of leadership or plain failure.
The criminals must be stopped because each successful ambush emboldens them to plan and execute another.
It is also important for the military and security forces to look inwards to see if information about their movements and activities is leaking. The perpetrators live among the population. The inability of human surveillance agents within the perpetrators leaves much to be desired. If the troops cannot move freely, then the enemy is in charge. And if they sit at a place, they are sitting ducks.
In addition, it is time to take a second look at the calibre of personnel recruited into the armed forces and other law enforcement agencies and ensure they are in service solely to serve the fatherland and not because their names were submitted by the right people.
It is also time they all pool their resources together and be fully integrated into a unified fighting force where the absence of inter-agency rivalry will promote cooperation and sharing of information among the rank and file.
Moreover, the troops need to court the locals and stop solicitations from motorists and anti-people activities at checkpoints as they severely damage relationships with the citizens, making cooperation very difficult. Everything possible must be done to stop the ambushes.