Military under pressure to compromise 2023 elections — Irabor

The Chief of Defence Staff (CDS), General Lucky Irabor, says security agencies are always under pressure to compromise elections in the country. And the 2023 elections are no exception.

Gen Irabor spoke on Thursday while featuring at the 61st session of the Ministerial Media Briefing organised by the Presidential Communications Team at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.

The military chief, however, called on Nigerians to have implicit confidence in Nigerian military officers and men who, according to him, would remain totally committed to being neutral and apolitical.

The CDS, who said security personnel came under pressure through inducements, stated that necessary measures were being put in place to ensure that security personnel obey President Muhammadu Buhari’s recent directive to maintain neutrality.

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According to him, personnel are being trained to be more professional while rules of engagement before, during and after the elections have been codified and distributed to them.

Irabor also spoke of the key achievements of the military in the effort to keep the country safe including more recruitment into all branches of the security services, routing of insurgency and banditry as well as the action to curtail oil theft leading to an increase in crude oil production.

He also said over 300,000 people had been freed from the hands of abductors since 2014 while refugees who fled the Northeast zone due to insurgency had started to return to their homes.