Kaduna Army UAV Killing: Intelligence Failure or Deliberate Collateral Damage

From Abdull-Azeez Ahmed Kadir
Kaduna is home to Nigerian Armed Forces, especially the Nigerian Army. No any Nigerian military officer begins and ends his career without being recruited, or trained, or exited in Kaduna.
Commanding the 1st Division of the Nigerian Army, Kaduna in the past, means you were positioned for the exalted office of the Chief of Army Staff.
So, it is no coincidence that the current Service Chiefs are all “Kaduna Boys”. The Chief of Defence Staff is a son of the soil. The Naval and Air Force Chiefs started from Nigerian Military School NMS, Zaria. And of course, the Army Chief commanded the 1st Division Kaduna before his elevation to Army Chief.
You would have thought they would all have a grasp of the terain and a grip on the rhein of operations. But it seems not so.
The collateral damage is too huge to be called a mistake and not intended as the Army is saying, or friendly fire if the collateral damage had been fellow armed personnel.
But there are questions begging for answers. This is about the 10th of such airstrikes and killing of unarmed innocent civilians by the Nigerian Armed forces in about two years. From Rann in Borno to Nasarawa State, this is recurring.
Does this means Nigerian Armed Forces don’t carry out due diligence of intelligence gatherings during such operations?
Do they just “take out” any moving being in any territory tagged terrorists or bandits enclave?
Is the Army saying it wasn’t aware of the community of Tudun Biri and surrounding villages in all the operations it has embarked upon?
By the way, Lt. Gen. Taoreed Lagbaja was said to always be in the trenches and led from the front with troops as the General Officer Commanding GOC 1st Division, Kaduna.
Is the Army Command and Control Centre of the Unmanned Aerial Vehicle UAV manned by an experienced combatant officer, or just left for an inexperienced, young officer who is seen to be tech-savy without field combat knowledge, but triger-button happy?
What is the command structure and who gave the last instruction to shoot the fire that snuffed life out of 85 or more innocent poor, struggling villagers and leaving more than 60 more with life-long injuries?
Is Nigerian Army intelligence so poor that it cannot differentiate between the gathering of people on open field celebrating with lightings, balloons, public address system from ragtag bandits relocating from a end to another?
The strike leading to this cold killing did not happen once, but twice with minutes interval. Was the command given by the same person?
These are poor rural dwellers gathered to celebrate the birth of the noble prophet of Islam. Imagine if this was to the opposite. Only God knows the conspiracy theories that would have been weaven around it and the national tension it would have generated.
More disheartening was the visit of the Chief of Defence Staff, the Minister of State Defence and Army Chief to the surviving victims at Barau Dikko Teaching Hospital, where some of the victims were seen on bare floor.
As pathetic as they look and terrible conditions they are in, none of these functionaries could direct evacuation of some of these victims to the Nigerian Army owned 44 Reference Hospital which is stone throw away for better medical attention.
Sadly, even Kaduna State Deputy Governor went on blame game in the village, alleging the involvement of the community youth in banditry leading to the incident. This is a time when mass grave of the 85 plus, mowed down in cold blood was yet to get dry from the water of the burial. Where is our humanity?
Sadly, the conditions of some of the 60 plus injured and in the hospital is so bad that some of them may not survive it. Others may end up incapacitated for the rest of their lives Sadly.
As grievous and pathetic as this is, neither the state Governor nor the President deem it fit to cut short their international engagement and rush down to empathise with the victims and their families. No, they rather stay put and through their media aides, dished out condolence messages.
You could hardly believe that these are same people who drove between the bandit infested and controlled Kaduna-Birnin Gwari during electioneering campaigns promising paradise on earth.
The President, Army Chief among others have mouthed investigations or inquiry. Would that see the light of the day?
Can or should the Army sit over its own case?
About the 9 similar mass murder that happened in the past, what investigations or consequences have we seen?
With sad realities as the Tudun Biri, would the powers that be, be comfortable to sell lethal weapons to Nigerian government to fight insurgency and banditry with this collateral damage of struggling, poor rural dwellers that know no government presence?
With the hardship Nigerians are being made to face today due to government ineptitude and policy summersaults, should this act be allowed to go unpunished and without commensurate compensation, rehabilitation and resettlement of the victims?
The excuse of bandits embedding into rural communities does not hold water. This shows the unstrategic and illogical thinking former Governor Nasir El-Rufa’i who believed carpet bombing of terrorist was the ultimate solution to the problem. This is just one case and imagine the damages and innocent lives lost.
The Armed Forces need to change strategies to win this war.
It seems a long way from home, but we must not keep quiet and sweep this under the carpet like many before it.