Angry soldiers from the newly formed 7th Division of the Nigerian
Army today mutinied in their barracks against Major General Abubakar Mohammed,
their General Officer Commanding.
Report coming to us say evealed that numerous
soldiers shot sporadically into the air at Maimalari Barracks, which is also
home to the Artillery Corps, the Ordinance, as well as army signals in
Maiduguri.
The 7th Division was formed only recently as a unit devoted
to fighting the war against Boko Haram. General Mohammed was appointed as the
GOC in February 2014.
One of the sources revealed that the situation was extremely
tense, adding that the GOC escaped by the whiskers as the mutiny by angry
soldiers could have degenerated into a personal attack on him.
Soldiers became enraged when they saw the bodies of their
colleagues ambushed by Boko Haram terrorists in Chibok, a town in Borno State
that has spurred global protests over the abductions of schoolgirls by members
of the extremist Islamist sect.
The restive soldiers complained that their superior have not
provided them with adequate weaponry with which to fight the war against the
better-armed Boko Haram militants.
“We the soldiers don’t have the kind of arms and ammunition
that [Boko Haram] fighters have. So every day, they kill our men anyhow, but it
is never published in the media,” said one source. The other source also
complained that the commanding officers “are too busy ‘eating’ money. And they
do not pay our allowances on time. And once [a soldier dies], nobody knows what
happens to his allowances again.”
Residents living near the barracks said that they heard the
sound of sporadic exchange of gunfire. “We thought that may be Boko Haram was
attacking and the army was trying to push them back”.
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