The Chief of Army Staff, Lt. Gen. Tukur Buratai, has lamented that some officers poor commitment is affecting the success of the counter-insurgency operations in the country.
Buratai who spoke on Tuesday at the opening of a five-day leadership workshop for mid-level officers and soldiers in Abuja, said the rise in` terrorist attacks were due to “poor commitment to a common national and military cause by those at the frontlines.”
The army chief noted that there were proven cases of soldiers unwilling to carry out assignments given to them, adding that reluctant troops should leave the service as the army would no longer tolerate them.
Buratai said, “It is unfortunate, but the truth is that almost every setback the Nigerian Army has had in our operations in recent times can be traced to poor commitment to perform assigned tasks or simply insufficient commitment to a common national and military course by those at the frontlines.
“But we all know that professional capacity is not a sufficient condition to succeed in a task; willingness to perform the task is equally necessary. We all know that leadership is core to military professionalism; hence all military professional courses include aspects of military leadership skills acquisition.”
Buratai added that an effect of modernisation, globalisation and Information and Communications Technology in the last decades had been the “decline in nationalistic enthusiasm.”
“Hence the theme of the workshop has been aptly chosen as ‘Lead, follow or get out of the way,’” he said.
