Some wild elements in the Nigerian Army bared their ugly fangs recently. Reports say a detachment of soldiers, who were on their way to the Ojo Military Cantonment on the outskirts of Lagos tortured two police officers, one of whom died after an argument about traffic and right of way at the Trade Fair end of the Lagos-Badagry Expressway.

According to media accounts, the murderous soldiers abducted the police officers, took them to the cantonment, where they were allegedly tortured. In the process, an inspector, Monday Orukpe, died while the other cop, Igbafe Ojo, sustained life-threatening injuries. Nigerians have had enough of unruly soldiers causing mayhem among civilians and demand appropriate punishment for the Ojo killer soldiers and their commanders.

The Nigerian Army authorities have since confirmed the incident and paid a condolence visit to the Lagos State Police Command. However, the outgoing General Officer Commanding, 81 Division, Major General Umar Musa, later in a statement, rather than ensure that swift justice is done, began making excuses for his men, attempting to justify their action. This is unacceptable. Senior military officers should stop shielding their undisciplined subordinates when they run amok among civilians.

Regularly, soldiers entrusted with defending the country against external and internal threats brutally turn on their employers, the taxpayer. They violate human rights at will. Resorting to self-help, they hold the law, law enforcement agencies and personnel in contempt, and have no qualms in brutalising civilians and destroying public and private property.

In October 2005, soldiers from the Abalti Barracks, Lagos stormed the Area C Police Command, Surulere to “avenge” a colleague who had reportedly been assaulted by a police officer. In the ensuing attack, four persons were killed; about 60 vehicles parked on the premises along with the main buildings were set ablaze. President Olusegun Obasanjo set up a judicial panel, but typically, the public never knew whether the murderous soldiers were punished.

Similarly, in 2011, a police corporal was reported to have shot a soldier dead in Badagry. Like wounded lions, soldiers threw discipline overboard. The Divisional Police Officer, Samuel Salihu, and the Divisional Crime Officer, Samson Okedusi, along with their orderlies, proceeding to the 242 Battalion, Ibereko Barracks, for a peace meeting with the military authorities, were ambushed by soldiers and callously murdered. Despite promises by the military authorities to bring the killers to book, nothing was heard thereafter.

In July 2014, following the death of their colleague knocked down by a BRT bus on Ikorodu Road, Lagos, soldiers went berserk, burnt down several BRT buses, and spread panic through the city. Despite verifiable eyewitness reports, the military claimed it was “hoodlums” that burnt the vehicles. The perpetrators went free.

The President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.), the Chief of Defence Staff, Lucky Irabor, and the Chief of Army Staff, Faruk Yahaya, should make this the last incident of lawlessness and impunity by soldiers. No provocation, real or imaginary, justifies soldiers acting like hoodlums and taking the law into their own hands. The military should be the epitome of discipline and order. But an unruly and short-tempered man given the legal power to bear arms becomes a menace to society.

Twenty-three years after the return to civilian rule, many soldiers have failed to change their orientation. This is despite the inauguration of the Nigerian Army Human Rights Desk in 2016, regular training and workshops organised by the National Human Rights Commission, the United Nations High Commission for Refugees, and other organisations.

In fairness, majority of Nigeria’s military officers and other ranks continue to demonstrate high professional standards and discipline and acknowledged internationally. Many have paid the supreme sacrifice in defence of the motherland and to keep Nigerians safe. For this, the country appreciates their selfless service and commitment. However, it is the bad eggs, a minority among them that are giving the forces an ill reputation. Irabor and the service chiefs owe their cherished profession and the country a duty to stamp out impunity as their legacy.

Political leaders need to understand that the subordination of the military to civilian authority is a major plank of democracy. It underpins the stability of successful democracies. According to the authoritative American Diplomacy journal, “For democracy, control of the military by civilian officials elected by the people is fundamental. Civilian control allows a nation to base its values and purposes, its institutions, and practices, on the popular will rather than on the choices of military leaders.”

The military should revert to its primary constitutional role. By Irabor’s admission, 80 per cent of the Armed Forces personnel are currently deployed across the 36 states of the federation providing security and performing police duties. Such military-civilian interface is potentially destabilising.

While some deployments are necessary as several parts of the country have become ungovernable, assailed by terrorists and bandits; the downside is that it has created an unhealthy rivalry between the police, which has the constitutional role of maintaining internal security, and the military, whose primary duty should be protecting the country from external aggression.

Some soldiers have turned themselves to bullies, riding roughshod over “bloody civilians,” thereby sowing distrust and denying the military the necessary public buy-in in the counter-insurgency operations.

The Nigerian military must emulate its foreign counterparts by subjecting itself to civilian authority. Despite being the most powerful force in the world, United States military personnel subject themselves to civilian law and control. Retrogressively, some officers and soldiers believe that the uniform confers them with immunity from the law and is a license for impunity. There should be swift punishment for soldiers who run afoul of the law to deter others.

The massacre in December 2015 of 347 Shiites for obstructing the convoy of then Chief of Army Staff in Zaria blights the reputation of the Nigerian military. Worse, when court judgements are given against the military for human rights violations, such compensations are often never paid to victims.

Buhari must therefore push for attitudinal reforms in the military, especially from the point of training at military educational institutions. The country should immediately facilitate state policing to relieve the over-stretched central police and eliminate the reliance on the military for law enforcement.

The killers of Orukpe must be brought to book. Murder is too grave a crime to be overlooked. All the soldiers and their commanders who facilitated the Ojo mayhem should be handed over immediately to the police for prosecution.

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