Lucky Irabor, the
chief of defence staff, has described an investigation by Reuters on forced
abortion for Boko Haram victims as “outright nonsense”.
Irabor said this on Thursday while fielding questions from
journalists in Abuja.
In the report published
on Wednesday, the Nigerian military was said to have conducted a secret,
systematic and illegal abortion programme in the country’s north-east, ending
at least 10,000 pregnancies among victims of insurgency.
Reacting to the development, the defence chief said the allegations contained in the investigation never occurred.
“It’s outright
nonsense. It’s not true. That is outright nonsense. Their allusion is news to
me. It never occurred. I never saw anything like that from Maiduguri down to
Maimalamari cantonment where I lived. There is a major hospital for our
personnel and their family. I am disappointed to say the least. It is not
true,” Irabor said.
“I was informed by the director of defence information about
a mail from Reuters requesting an interview with me. And he gave me a letter
written by one Alexander making allegations that have now been published by
Reuters.
“I simply said he should go back to the person and answer
their questions, but I’m not going to dignify such a report.
“You’re saying the
military, since 2013, has been engaged in a planned abortion programme. And he
said that is part of the government’s design. In that letter, he said that
12,000 abortions have been conducted. But in the published report, we saw ‘at
least 10,000’.
“The Armed Forces are peopled by people from 774 local
government areas of this country. And there is no single unit or formation
where you have only a group of soldiers coming from a particular part of the
country.
“So, what will be the interest? Sometimes, the consciousness
of the people is what has been transmitted to their consciousness. Perhaps, it
might be necessary to interrogate them and see how we can reconscientise our people
to know that we are in this together.
“What do I stand to gain? Yes, I’m the CDS. I know the
officers and men that I lead. I know what we have transmitted into them by the
way of training. I know the fundamentals, our ethics. So, what you don’t know that
make illusions.
“And I think I will
also join to appeal to you, to reconscientise our people for them to know the
apparatus of the state in terms of looking at the issue of security for the
good of the people and not against the people. We are not against the people.”
Click to signup for FREE news updates, latest information and hottest gists everyday
Advertise on NigerianEye.com to reach thousands of our daily users
No comments
Post a Comment
Kindly drop a comment below.
(Comments are moderated. Clean comments will be approved immediately)
Advert Enquires - Reach out to us at NigerianEye@gmail.com