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The Flying Coffins of Nigeria Armed Forces, Which Way Forward?

By Moses Idika
All over the world, the Air Force is the power base of the military, modern warfare is fought in the air, the land forces merely “clear the debris.”
The ongoing Israel and Palestine Conflict is a testimony of what modern warfare looks like. adsbygoogle || []).push({}); adsbygoogle || []).push({}); Israeli military has recorded very huge and significant “victory” over Hamas terrorist group without deploying soldiers on foot into the Palestine territory simply because of strong Air Force backed by equally strong land troops and especially advanced technology.
In Nigeria, however, our Air Force is the weakest link of the armed forces.
It is unexplainable that within three months the Nigeria Air Force has lost three of its planes. More confounding is the fact that Nigerian authorities are clueless as to why the situation persists.
Nigeria government in the last six years has been in frenzy with regards to “acquiring” new technologies and especially aircrafts for the country, yet we keep losing precious airmen as if it was normal.
Taking stock of the last three air disasters involving Nigeria Military carriers reveals an unfortunate pattern enmeshed in an unfeeling corrupt cabal within a government that obvious gives no hoot if all the plane in its fleet crashes provided the Presidential Jet in unaffected.
On Friday night, the nation’s Chief of Army Staff (COAS), Lt. Gen. Ibrahim Attahiru and 10 other military personnel perished at the Kaduna International Airport in an air crash involving a NAF Beachcraft 350 aircraft which burst into flames after it crash landed just few metres to the runaway.
According to the Spokesman of the Nigerian Air Force, the “air crash involving a Nigerian Air Force aircraft occurred this evening near the Kaduna International Airport. The immediate cause of the crash is still being ascertained. More details to follow soon,” the same story that has always been told each time the recurrent decimal takes place.
The latest crash is the third in the unfortunate series of crashes involving NAF planes with no convincing explanation as to what happened and how future crashes could be avoided.
On Sunday, February 21, 2021, another NAF Beechcraft KingAir B350i aircraft crash landed just before the runway of the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja killing all seven NAF personnel onboard. The crew of the ill-fated plane was said to had earlier reported engine failure.
In yet another unfortunate and perhaps the most painful accident involving NAF aircraft, on Wednesday, March 31, 2021, an Alpha-Jet aircraft that was in the battlefront in the endless war against Boko Haram terrorists and the Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP) was lost and till today nothing has been heard about what happened to that jet or its crew.
While the insurgents claimed responsibility for downing the fighter jet, the Nigerian military denied the “shutdown” story, but has been unable to give a credible alternative explanation to what happened to aircraft or its tow pilots.
Just within three months a total of 20 Nigeria military personnel have lost their lives to air accidents that cannot be explained.
Nigeria’s Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo on two occasions escaped death by whiskers when his chopper went down. First in June 2017 when the presidential chopper crashed after take-off in Gwagwalada town in the FCT and on February 2019 when the VP’s chopper once again went down in Kabba, a sleepy town in Kogi State. The VP is the real cat with nine lives obviously.
The above sad fortune of the Nigeria armed forces has led to questions being asked about the safety of military aviation in the country, as civil aviation has recorded no crash involving commercial flights in about a decade now, thankfully.
What could be responsible?
On Wednesday August 30, 2017, the Nigerian Accident Investigation Bureau (AIB) released its report on the Nigeria Police Helicopter that crashed in a village near Jos, Plateau State that killed the then newly promoted Deputy Inspector General of Police, Haruna John and three other police personnel including the pilot of the chopper.
The report of the AIB was startling as it was revealing. That report gave insight into what may be happening to the Nigeria military as far as the recurring air crashes involving its aircrafts is concerned.
According to the details of the AIB’s report presented by its Commissioner, Akin Olateru at the bureau’s headquarters at Murtala Muhammed International Airport in Lagos, the two pilots, Assistant Commissioner of Police, Garba Yelwa and Alexander Pwol-ja (co-pilot) that were in charge of the helicopter had no business flying the chopper as at the time it crashed.
Both pilots were not qualified to man the aircraft; they had no adequate training on the aircraft in line with global aviation rules.
According to the AIB report, Yelwa’s medical certificate and simulator recurrency had expired at the time of the crash, while the co-pilot was not equally type-rated on the helicopter brand, meaning that he did not have the proper certification to pilot the helicopter. It beats all imaginations that the Nigeria armed forces put two of its personnel with no adequate training or know-how of a plane on the cockpit, more so as the bird was to ferry one of its most senior officers.
Also, the report revealed that the engineer that released the helicopter prior to the flight was similarly unqualified!
The report revealed that the engineer did not have the necessary type-training and type-rating for the aircraft type he released to embark on the journey that eventually claimed the lives of the DIG, his orderly and the two unqualified flight crew. Imagine calling a radio technician to fix your car.
Nine years after that watershed AIB report, military aviation in Nigeria seem to have taken a deeper dip into chaos.
Despite the fact that the AIB, in its safety recommendations, called on the Nigeria Police Force, and by extension the military to provide the proper funding, to carter for proper training of its personnel and to provide a conducive working environment, and develop and implement a robust training program for its technical and operational personnel with adequate supervision and approved equipment to enhance safety, the question remains which part of that report was not clear to the authorities or have been implemented by our armed forces?
From all indications, the situation has obviously worsened. If not why would the Nigeria military lose 20 of its bright stars within a space of three months in air crashes and nobody is taking responsibility?
It is only in Nigeria that military and police vehicles breakdown on the roads with reckless abandon!
They have started treating our military aircrafts like patrol vans.
I can imagine the people in charge of maintenance of these aircrafts wondering while the government will be “spending such huge amounts of dollars to carry out routine maintenance on a plane that is not broken down.”
While Nigeria top military brass and the police high command build mansions in choice areas across the capitals of Nigeria, buying palatial villas in Dubai and London, the work tools of our armed forces become decrepit, worn out and thereby exposing service men to their untimely deaths.
This inability to get Nigeria airpower to function obviously explains why the Boko Haram insurgents and bandits are fast overrunning parts of the country, or how else can one explain why a ragtag militia men on motorbikes can continually inflict such mortal blows on the Nigeria military.
The Federal Government should for once take responsibility, take charge and abide by the rule books in handling security in the country by ensuring that proper steps in line with international aviation safety regulations are taking to save our military personnel from the flying coffins that our armed forces planes have become.
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Another Massive Plan By APC To Rig Kogi Election Uncovered!

Another massive plan by the APC (All Progressive Congress) to rig the upcoming election in Kogi State has been uncovered.
The plan was uncovered in an audio recording recorded in Igala language, that is widely circulated and received by the Informavores!
The message roughly translated is as follows:
“I thank you all and may the almighty God bless us all. adsbygoogle || []).push({}); adsbygoogle || []).push({}); I am here to talk to you this evening amd thank you for all your efforts as you are listening to me from where ever you are listening to me, please forward this message so that every igala will hear what I am saying this evening.”
“As I am talking to you, it is not up to 2 minutes that I finished calling to Ankpa. It is a calling between me and the coordinator. He said that what he wanted to tell me before I called him is that the presiding officers this afternoon hinted him and that he is going to confide in me that everybody should be ready.”
“That during the upcoming voting, their plan is that they would just thumb print without capturing, therefore, when the voting is in excess without capturing(photograph), they would then cancel the polling unit. That is what he just told me. And I said I would make sure that this information is circulated among everybody online this night.”
“It is the Presiding officer that told him this afternoon and he is relaying it to me to make sure that I tell everybody that this is the plan of APC in Ankpa where they are going to vote in Ankpa. That they will photograph, so that all the votings in Ankpa will not count.”
“This is the message that reached me this night and I said I would tell people on air. Please forward this message so that everybody would here. Let us be at alert and make sure that our votes count, let us monitor the BVAS. “
“Thank you all and God bless you all.”, it concluded.
Off season elections is scheduled to take place in Bayelsa, Imo and Kogi States. Coming November 11th, 2023.
Find the audio recording below.
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NGIJ Mourn Demise Of Tukuwei Perry, Says Journalist Death A Great Loss

Foremost Investigative Group, the Nigerian Guild of Investigative Journalists, NGIJ, is saddened with the sudden demise of one of its member, Peremobewei Tobi Tukuwei Jnr, who lost his life in a tragic Boat Mishap that occurred in Nembe Local Government Area of the Bayelsa state on Wednesday 25 October 2023. adsbygoogle || []).push({}); adsbygoogle || []).push({});
The Bayelsa State born Tukuwei was a Staff of DAAR Communications and also Director, Media and Publicity of the All Progressives Congress, APC, Campaign Council in Bayelsa State.
Tukuwei was declared missing after the tragic incident occurred while he and two other journalists were travelling from Nembe Town to Okoroba Community in Nembe for the party’s governorship campaign.
According to eyewitness accounts, the driver of the speedboat in which they were travelling lost control as a result of turbulence created by waves and capsized at about 1 pm along the Nembe Creek leading to Okoroba.
In a Statement by NGIJ President, Ayoyemi Mojoyinola, as regards the death of the promising Broadcast Journalist who died in his prime,he said that his death is a great loss to the Nigeria Media Space, Bayelsa State and NGIJ as a body.
He said his selfless service, determination, charisma, urbane and discharge of duties stood him out of the crowd and among his contemporaries.
His loss he said is so painful, but stressed that God Almighty does what pleases him.
“Death is a companion of the living which we will all embrace one day, we are just pained by his sudden demise.
“We pray that God in his infinite mercy will give his family the fortitude to bear this irreparable loss”.
Tukuwei hails from Toru-Ndoro community in Ekeremor Local Government Area of the state, was appointed Director, Media and Publicity of the APC Campaign Council in Bayelsa Date early October.
He was a media and communications expert, and an alumnus of the School of Politics, Politics and Governance.
He was also a BBC-trained journalist who won the Best on Air Personality, Best Television Presenter in the Niger Delta as well as Bayelsa’s Best Journalist of the Year five years in a row from 2015-2020.
He was also a one-time acting Head of Programmes Raypower FM Yenagoa before he was elevated to the national network in Abuja becoming a co-anchor of one of AIT’s breakfast programme, ‘Kaakaki’.
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- Prince Abdulrahman Obaje is a Media and ICT Consultant, Journalist, online marketer, social media strategist, Mathematician and Computer Scientist based in Abuja, Nigeria. He is the Founder and the Publisher of The Informavores!. You can reach me on +234 805 939 5252 or send i-witness report directly to me on news@informavores.com.ng.
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Insecurity: Gombe Governor Orders Immediate Closure Of All Gala Houses In The State

The Gombe state Governor, Muhammadu Inuwa Yahaya CON has ordered the immediate closure of all ‘Gala Houses’ within the State.
This is contained in a statement issues and signed by the Director General press Affairs Government House Isma’ila Uba Misilli, through the Secretary to the State Government, Professor Ibrahim Abubakar Njodi, stating that the governor gives the directives following the series of complaints from the general public on the incessant immoral, criminal activities and security breaches being perpetrated in such night clubs.
googlesyndication. com/pagead/js/adsbygoogle.js">According to the statement, the Governor has, consequently, ordered the the Nigeria Police, Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps and the Operation Hattara to mobilise their personnel to ensure strict compliance with the directive.
He therefore said for the avoidance of doubt, the affected Gala Houses are: Jami’a Gidan Wanka located at Mile 3 Yola Road, Gombe, White House Theatre (Babban Gida) located at New Mile 3 Yola Road, Gombe; Gidan Lokaci General Merchant located at Mile 3 Reservoir Road, Gombe and Farin Gida Entertainment II located at Wuro Karal, Kalshingi Road, Gombe.
Others are: Gidan Zamani Entertainment New Mile 3, Yola Road, Tumfure, Gombe; Albarka Entertainment Located at Wuro Karal, Bypass near Hara Form, Gombe; Gala Houses Located at Kuri Town, Lubo village and Kurba village all in Yamaltu Deba Local Government Area.
Also affected are Tauraren Wash located at Trailer Park, Bauchi Road, Gombe and Gala House located at Bajoga Town in Funakaye Local Government Area.
Author Profile

- Prince Abdulrahman Obaje is a Media and ICT Consultant, Journalist, online marketer, social media strategist, Mathematician and Computer Scientist based in Abuja, Nigeria. He is the Founder and the Publisher of The Informavores!. You can reach me on +234 805 939 5252 or send i-witness report directly to me on news@informavores.com.ng.
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