Chief of Army Staff, Lieutenant General Tukur Buratai, said Wednesday that 12,000 soldiers will be recruited this year, and more would be added to the nation’s army each subsequent year until the current personnel capacity is doubled by 2024.
Buratai said the army under his command is embarking on an ambitious expansion programme to address manpower needs of the force to respond appropriately to contemporary threats to national security.
The top soldier said the army plans to increase its personnel “from its present 100,000 strength force to slightly above 200,000 in the next eight years”.
Buratai who revealed this in a lecture entitled, “Nigerian Army: Challenges and Future Perspectives” at the National Defence College, Abuja.
According to him, 12,000 personnel would be recruited in 2016 alone to fill the vacancies created as a result of the new establishments in the army in line with the ongoing army expansion programme.
He said the army’s expansion programme was aimed at boosting its response capacity, stressing that its capabilities to effectively deal with its present challenges were however not in doubt.
General Buratai said at least 12,000 soldiers would be recruited and or enlisted into the Army this year, and the tempo would be sustained for the next eight years.
He said the effort was aimed at “boosting the soldiers’ response capacity even as emphasized that the present capabilities of the existing personnel force to effectively deal with its present challenges are not in doubt. The contemporary national security needs and Nigeria’s territorial size require more than the army presently has in terms of personnel strength.”
The army chief said in line with its expansion needs, the army had established two more divisions (Nigerian Army 8 and 6 Divisions) in the northern part of Borno and the South-South region respectively.
Buratai said the establishment of the new divisions “is part of a strategic plan by the army to boost military operations against insurgents, particularly in areas around the Lake Chad Basin.
The new division would now make Borno State a host to two army divisons following the creation of the 7 Division Nigeria Army, Maiduguri in August 2013, to tackle the then rising Boko Haram insurgency in the Northeast.
“We have established the 8 Division located in the northern part of Borno, specifically to clear the area of the remaining terrorist elements, while another division, 6 Division, will be established in the South-South,” Buratai said.
He emphasized that the establishment of the additional Army Divisions would bring the total number of divisions in the Nigerian Army to eight.
“Emerging threats to the security of our nation, which has been aggravated by the proliferation of armed groups, has added to the task of the military in protecting the lives of Nigerians and the integrity of its territory.
“The focus of the Nigerian Army, today, is to find lasting solutions to these contemporary threats posed by the activities of the armed groups and their allies.
“The Nigerian Army therefore remains poised to the extermination of the Boko Haram insurgency in Nigeria. Today, they can no longer hold any territory as it used to be in the past that is why they have resorted to the use of IEDs to hit soft targets,” he said.
-Leadership
