Nigeria 2015: analysis of election issues and future prospects

The Nigerian military

Overview

Nigeria has, on paper, the best-funded and best-equipped forces in West Africa.³¹² It has the largest armed forces in West Africa, numbering 80,000, of whom 62,000 are in the Army and 10,000 in the Air Force.³¹³ It is one of Africa’s leading peacekeeping nations. In the last twenty years Nigeria has deployed troops to Liberia, Ivory Coast, Sierra Leone, Sudan, Mali and Somalia.³¹⁴

Nigeria’s prime security concerns are internal: combating Boko Haram in the north; piracy in the Gulf of Guinea and instability in the Niger Delta. However, defence experts point to a lack of effective counter-insurgency and intelligence-gathering capabilities and a lack of equipment suited for counter-insurgency.

Equipment

While the Nigerian military has a wide array of equipment, including tanks, fighter jets and naval vessels, it is unclear how much is operational. Questions abound about the serviceability of equipment.

The Military Balance 2014 notes that “on paper, it maintains the broadest spectrum of capabilities in the region, but in reality much of its equipment is unfit to be deployed for prolonged periods of time.”³¹⁵ This reflects the view of the Foreign Affairs select committee, which in a recent report on West Africa was told that much of the Air Force fleet is not currently operational.³¹⁶ Many of the Navy’s vessels are deemed to be in poor condition.³¹⁷

What equipment Nigeria has tends to be better suited to state-on-state warfare than counter-insurgency, according to The Military Balance, although defence experts note recent efforts to improve this situation with programmes to refit and repair current equipment, and to purchase equipment more suited to counter-insurgency – for example, new attack helicopters.

Piracy and oil theft in the Niger Delta and Gulf of Guinea has also prompted the procurement of new inshore and offshore patrol vessels, including a former US Coast Guard cutter and two new offshore patrol vessels from China. The government has approved the acquisition of new fighter aircraft.

Combating Boko Haram

President Jonathan overhauled his military high command in early 2014. He sacked his Chief of Defence Staff and the chiefs of Army staff and Navy staff. He promoted the chief of Air Force Staff, Air Marshal Alex Sabundu Badeh, to Chief of Defence Staff. Reports at the time suggested that in-fighting between the chiefs in the conduct of operations against Boko Haram prompted the sweeping changes.³¹⁸ By the end of 2014, the army was claiming a number of successes against Boko Haram, particularly in Adamawa state.³¹⁹ However, it continued to experience serious reverses too – most notably, losing the border town of Baga in Borno state in early January 2015 (see below).

The Government set up an Army-led Joint Task Force under Operation Restore Order in the north-east in 2011. It brought together the military, state security services and the police. The Joint Task Force was replaced in mid-2013 with a newly formed Army division, based in Maiduguri in Borno state. The 7^th Division numbers around 8,000 troops and draws on elements of 1^st Mechanised Brigade, 21^st Armoured Brigade and 23^rd Armoured Brigade. It reports to the chief of Army staff.³²⁰ However, it was claimed that many of the commanders and units operating under the 7^th Division appeared to be the same people as under the Joint Task Force.³²¹

Islamist militants have directly targeted members of the armed forces. Militants attacked the air force base in Maiduguri in December 2013, destroying two attack helicopters. A daylight assault on Giwa barracks in the same city in March 2014 resulted in hundreds of detained individuals being released.

Human rights organisations have documented serious human rights violations by soldiers in the immediate aftermath of the attack.³²² Nigerian troops are reported to suffer low morale, and American officials have suggested that some of them have been afraid to engage.³²³ Amid concerns about desertion, the Nigerian defence spokesman cautioned troops against mutiny in August 2014.³²⁴ A number of soldiers are currently being court-martialled for mutiny; at least 60 death sentences were handed out in December 2014 for serious offences by military personnel.³²⁵

Rise of vigilante groups

Local vigilante groups to combat Boko Haram emerged in the middle of 2013 in the north-eastern states of Borno, Yobe and Adamawa. They have become known as the Civilian Joint Task Force.

Although unconnected to the military, local and state authorities are training and using the Civilian Joint Task Force to provide security: maintaining checkpoints and providing intelligence to the security services.

Borno state government is using members of the Civilian Joint Task Force to provide security at public schools, while the Adamawa state government announced plans in mid-November 2014 to train 10,000 people to join the Civilian Joint Task Force and assist security forces in the fight against Boko Haram.³²⁶

International support

The UK hosted a conference on tackling Boko Haram in June 2014, attended by Nigeria, Cameroon, Chad, Niger, Benin and the US, France, Canada, the UN, the EU and African Union. The UK, US and France agreed to provide tactical training and advice to Nigerian forces engaged in the fight against Boko Haram.

At the conference, Nigeria, Cameroon, Chad and Niger agreed to deploy a 2,800 strong (each contributing 700 troops) multinational task force, centred on the Lake Chad area, to combat Boko Haram. However, what this amounted to in practice has never been clear. In January 2015, Boko Haram attacked and seized control of the border town of Baga, the town where the multinational task force had its notional headquarters.³²⁷ Government forces did not put up a fight and hundreds of civilians in the town and surrounding areas were killed by the group. The future of the force is now in question, although this major set-back could also provoke more concerted action.³²⁸ Chad and Cameroon have been cooperating more closely in recent days, with a significant Chadian force being despatched to Cameroon. There is also talk of the African Union becoming directly involved, as it has been in Somalia.³²⁹

Nigeria, Cameroon, Chad, Niger and Benin also agreed in June 2014 to set up a Regional Intelligence Fusion Unit to enable them to share intelligence on Boko Haram. The UK, US and France undertook to ensure that it is operationalised quickly and to provide technical expertise to support the unit.³³⁰

Niger Delta and piracy

Another Joint Task Force, set up in 2006, is responsible for combating piracy and oil theft in the Niger Delta. Operation Pulo Shield consists of members of the army, navy and police.

The Joint Task Force’s mandate is to stop illegal oil bunkering (oil theft), protect oil and gas facilities and installations and secure the environment. In 2013 the naval component killed 82 pirates and conducted 1,025 anti-oil bunkering patrols, while the army component destroyed 1,951 illegal oil refineries, over 69,000 pieces of oil bunkering equipment, over 1,800 surface tanks and 82 tanker trucks. The Joint Task Force arrested 1,857 people suspected of stealing crude oil.³³¹

Piracy in the Gulf of Guinea continues to pose a problem for seafarers. The International Maritime Bureau reports that pirates are often well armed and violent. Vessels along the coast, rivers, ports and anchorages have been targeted. However the Bureau also says that the number of reported incidents dropped noticeably to 13 in the first nine months of 2014 compared with 29 in the same period in 2013.³³²

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