UPDATE ON MUTINY: Army Removes General Shot By Soldiers

The general officer commanding (GOC), 7 Division, Nigerian Army, Major General Ahmadu Mohammed, was said to have escaped death by whisker on Wednesday when a group of disgruntled soldiers turned their gun at his vehicle and pulled the trigger. The soldiers who perpetrated this near-act of mutiny, according to various accounts, were reacting in anger over the ambush attack they suffered in the hands of Boko Haram on their way back from an operation. The few soldiers that survived the attack blamed their plight on the military hierarchy in the division headed by the GOC who, they said, had insisted that they must return to Maiduguri via a route they had earlier considered dangerous for them to take at night. Some soldiers who shared the sentiments of the angry soldiers that carried out the shooting on the GOC said the victims and those that survived had pleaded to pass the night in one of the villages so that they could safely return to Maiduguri on Wednesday morning. “But those commanding the troop declined their request on the grounds that the GOC wanted them back to Maiduguri at all cost ,” said a soldier who pleaded anonymity. A top military source confided in LEADERSHIP that the GOC had been removed over the incident. Details of the circumstances leading to the GOC’s removal would be made known shortly. But a very senior security officer who spoke to LEADDERSHIP on condition of anonymity said, “The action of the soldiers was misplaced and unprofessional because the time of the day does not determine when soldiers or troop should move from one point to the other. Perhaps the officers that insisted that the troops should return to Maiduguri at that time might have considered the nocturnal trip as the best. But no one plans for ambush; it was unfortunate, but the GOC should not have been the one to blame because they are not directly under his command; thank God the GOC is hale and hearty; nothing happened to him.” However, his personal aides who were trying to protect him during the tragedy received multiple injuries.