Following the appointment of Maj.-Gen. T.Y Buratai as the new Chief of Army Staff, there is the likelihood that the Nigerian Army would soon witness a gale of retirements because there is a difference of five years in hierarchy between the former Chief of Army Staff, Lt. Gen. Kenneth Minimah, and the incumbent.
According to investigations by PUNCH, apart from a few members of the Course 25, who are still in service, there are also other officers from Courses 26, 27, 28 and 29, who may likely be affected by Buratai’s emergence as Army Chief.
No fewer than 30 Major Generals, who are either senior in hierarchy or who belonged to the same course as Buratai, may have to retire from the service, the newspaper’s investigations revealed.
The long existing tradition in the Army is that a senior officer cannot remain in the service to take instructions from his subordinate.
However, a source confided in the newspaper that not all the Major Generals in that hierarchy would go as some of them who are junior to the Chief of Defence Staff, Maj.Gen. Abayomi Gabriel Olonishakin, who is of Course 26, could be moved to the Defence Headquarters and other tri-service institutions of the Armed Forces.
The situation could be however be different in the Nigerian Navy where the new Chief of Naval Staff, Rear Admiral Ibok-Ete Ibas, who belonged to Course 26 and his predecessor, Vice Admiral Usman Jibrin, of Course 24, have only a few officers between them.
It was learnt that about five senior officers between the two were retired recently thereby giving credence to a line of argument that the appointment might not culminate in retirements in the Navy.
A similar scenario too is expected to play out in the Air Force as the new chief, Air Vice Marshal Sadique Abubakar, who belonged to the Cadet Military Training, Course 5, is rated as a Course 26 member, which is the immediate junior to his predecessor, Vice Marshal Adesola Amosu, of Course 5,
A security source said on Monday that all those who belonged to the same Course as Vice Marshal Amosu would retire with him, except Air Vice Marshal Monday Morgan, who has been appointed the new Chief of Defence Intelligence.
