By Bashir Mohammed
Kano
A retired senior military officer in the Nigerian Army, Brigadier-General Idriss Bello Dambazau, has said that there was no magic wand that could be employed to rescue the abducted Chibok girls from the “cruel hands of Boko Haram.”
Speaking in an interview with Freedom Radio in Kano, Dambazau said the snail speed with which the abduction saga was treated called for concern, stressing that the rescue mission should not have been delayed by the military.
He said he was fully convinced that the abducted Chibok school girls could not be traced and that sympathised with the girls and their parents.
He, however, said fighting insurgency like Boko Haram required adequate preparations for the military to confront the enemies with the temerity to call their bluff.
Dambazau said under the military law the amount of weapons needed to face enemies on a battle field must triple the ones possesses by them, adding that even the number of troops to be deployed to the war front must triple that of the enemies.
He said: “I was born and bred in the military institution. My father was a military officer, may his soul rest in peace. Four of my siblings and I had enrolled in the military and I joined the Nigerian army in 1969, when I was 14. So, I can tell you I know in and out of the military.”
Dambazau, who is the Commissioner for Special Duties under the administration of Governor Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso, further revealed that mutiny in the Army was a crime as the issue of loyalty must never be compromised.
When asked to confirm whether the Nigerian Military had adequate weapons and equipment in its armoury or not, Dambazau said he was not in a position to give such confirmation, affirming that only those in the right positions could attest to that.
On the way out of the situation, he said constant prayers were needed for divine intervention to prevail and that “people should be security conscious anytime they go out of their houses.”
