Tina Akannam
5 July 2009
Dutse — A former military intelligent officer, Alhaji Sagir Mohammed, has described the threat by the Niger Delta militants to attack the north and northerners residing in their region as a threat to the corporate existence of the Nigerian nation, and should not be treated with kid gloves.
Mohammed who spoke with Vanguard, weekend, said he found that threat detrimental to human decency, saying what the Niger Delta militants are doing is only trying to bring unnecessary unrest in the nation.
His words: "The threat is mere nonsense because you know for militant from the Niger Delta to even contemplate that they will come to the north and fight the north, it will only lead to nihilistic suicide because the north, despite the paramilitary, the army and police, can within one month mobilise a standing army of over 500,000 if it comes to extreme hostility for declaration of war."
The Jigawa-born retired military officer further stressed that Nigeria, as a nation, has a restructured, recognised and mechanised armed forces that is capable of not only suppressing external aggression but can once and for all quell the Niger Delta conflagration.
He warned that the militants should understand that there is a difference between some 20,000 militants having light weapons, thinking that they can threaten the north and Nigeria, but they must understand that Nigerian army is a robust army.
Mohammed also blamed former President Olusegun Obasanjo for what is happening in the Niger Delta, alleging that in his plot to dominate the region politically, pushed fire arms to the region indiscriminately.
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