Armed Forces and Remembrance Day: Buhari challenges military on rescue of Chibok girls.
President Muhammadu Buhari on Friday tasked the military to develop the appropriate intelligence and strategy to rescue the over 200 missing students of Government Secondary School Chibok in Borno.
Speaking during a live-streaming conversation with troops and pilots prosecuting the war on terror in the North East from venue of the Armed Forces Remembrance day wreath laying ceremony in Abuja, the president told pilots of an Airforce surveillance aircraft that the nation was counting on them for workable intelligence to rescue the Chibok girls.
The interaction with troops and the Deputy Theater Commander of Operation Lafiya Dole, Major General Leo Irabor as well as the airforce pilots, were part of the programme for the remembrance Ceremony which climaxed the 2016 Armed Forces and Remembrance Day.
Expressing satisfaction with the performance of the troops so far, Buhari said Nigerians were equally concerned about their welfare and were eagerly awaiting the return of the abducted Chibok girls.
He assured them of his administration was commited to improve on the military’s operational readiness to deal with contemporary challenges of national security.
His words, “I am quite impressed with what you have done so far and what you are presently doing.
“Yesterday I met with some of the parents of the Chibok girls and the nation is anxiously waiting for you to provide the intelligence on their where about and then the ground forces developing the strategy and tactics to recover them.
“Tell the troops that we are all concerned about their performance and i assure you the government is doing its best to make sure that they are provided with the best that is possible in terms of military hardware and efficiency in logistics and your allowances’’.
The president expressed confidence in the ability of the Armed Forces to restore peace and order to parts of the country plagued by armed conflict and other forms of criminal activities.
Responding on behalf of the troops, the Deuty Theatre Commander, `Operation Lafiya Dole’, Maj.-Gen. Leo Irabor thanked the president for the Federal Government’s support to the military.
He assured the president and Nigerians that the troops were in high spirit and determined to put an end to the menace of insurgency in the North-East.
On his part Air Component Commander of `Operation Lafiya Dole’, Air Vice Marshal Bayo Amao, who was on aerial surveillance of Bitta and Gwoza general areas assured the President that they were doing all they can to gather needed intelligence to rescue the Chibok girls and elimiate Boko Haram.
The President watched live streams of the Nigerian Air Force (NAF) aerial surveillance of the general areas and also streams of the activities of troops at the Military Command and Control Centre in Maiduguri through the new Eagle Mobile Command Post of the Armed Forces, a mobile communication facility of the military.
Buhari expressed pleasant surprise that the facility is used to facilitate both audio and video interaction between troops in the theatre and the commanding officers at the command and control centre.
High point of the ceremony was the laying of wreath at the cenotaph of the `unknown soldier’ by President Buhari, Vice President Yemi Osinbajo and other dignitaries at the event.
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