Expect changes in security operations — Defence Minister

The Minister of Defence, retired Major General Bashir Magashi, has assured Nigerians that there will be a lot of changes in the security operations.

The minister gave the assurance while fielding questions from State House reporters after presenting the new Chief of Army Staff (COAS), Major General Farouk Yahaya, to President Muhammadu Buhari at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.

The COAS was presented to President Buhari at a brief meeting attended by the Chief of Defence Staff (CDS), General Lucky Irabor.

Magashi said the President shared his military experiences with the new COAS and reminded him of the current “pressure on security” in the country. “He told him that there’s a lot of pressure on security and being an actor, at one point or the other, he has given us a direction in which we can learn from his experiences and apply them to our modern operations and I think we have taken the advice seriously. The issue of synergy among the security forces was also stressed and I’m sure there will be a lot of changes as regards to the security operations in this country,” he said.

Magashi, while reacting to a question on what the military was doing in the Northwestern part of the country with the feats so far achieved in the North East, said: “In the northwestern part of the country you know that the more concern we have is the insecurity of banditry, kidnapping, and other criminalities.

“We are taking the challenge, but you know, really, this is the constitutional responsibility of the police, we are only an aid to the police and we are giving maximum cooperation to the police in order to see an end to this banditry and insecurity in the Northwest, otherwise I think it’s quite different from the Northeast.

“In the Northeast, it’s Boko Haram issue and we are up and doing to ensure that we bring an end to this Boko Haram issue, especially with this development of ISWAP,” he said.  (Daily Trust)