A chieftain of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Professor Haruna Yerima, has condemned the recent wave of terrorist attacks that claimed the lives of Brigadier General Oseni Braimoh, soldiers, and civilians across parts of the country.
He said the renewed attacks were reversing earlier gains recorded by the Nigerian Armed Forces in the fight against insurgency.
Speaking to journalists in Abuja on Sunday, the former House of Representatives member said the killing of Brig. Gen. Braimoh, commander of the 29 Task Force Brigade of Operation HADIN KAI, during an attack by Boko Haram/ISWAP terrorists on a military formation in Borno State, represented a major setback in the counter-terrorism campaign.
“I believe it is high time the military authorities changed tactics in counter-terrorism operations. The terrorists have adopted one method—ambush—in targeting our high-value officers. We must find ways of stopping this,” he said.
Yerima also recalled that Brig. Gen. M. Uba, former commander of the 25 Task Force Brigade in Damboa, was similarly killed after being tracked and intercepted along the Damboa–Biu axis.
He called for a comprehensive review of Nigeria’s counter-insurgency doctrine to better protect senior officers, troops, and civilians from evolving threats.
According to him, although the military has recorded significant successes in recent years, recent attacks on forward operating bases, ambushes on convoys, and the widening theatre of violence have undermined those gains.
The APC chieftain urged the Armed Forces to strengthen intelligence gathering, deploy modern technology, and improve human intelligence capacity in tackling Boko Haram/ISWAP, Lakurawa, Mamuda networks, IPOB-linked violence, bandit groups, and communal conflicts in parts of the North-Central region.
He warned that coordinated attacks by non-state actors across the country now pose a serious threat to national sovereignty.