It is very amusing to listen to the Minister of Defence, Gen. Christopher Musa, literally gloating as he pontificated about a new monthly pay rise for the Nigerian soldiers from N49,000 to N100,000.
In an interview the defence chief granted a news medium last Wednesday, he said the increase was part of the efforts to improve the welfare of military personnel. He added that the pay raise demonstrated the government’s commitment to supporting members of the Armed Forces.
“When they started, a soldier was collecting ₦49,000 monthly. We tried so hard, now he’s collecting ₦100,000,” he glibly enthused.
While it is laudable to recognize the need to constantly improve the conditions of our soldiers, like Gen. Musa hinted, the improvidently low amount involved and the exhilaration exhibited by the defence minister while announcing it are mind-numbing.
The General virtually celebrated the pay rise as if it is a prodigious achievement that will momentarily lift the status of the fighting men. Pray, what is N100,000 a month worth today in the face of a searing inflation that has worsted the household purchasing power?
To be sure, the N100,000 is like the minimum wage for the Armed Forces. Hence, the pay structure for the military personnel will still be graduated pro rata to the experiences, ranks and qualifications of the officers and men.
However, our concern is the minimum pay of N100,000, because the rank and file who obviously earn this peanut usually form the preponderance of the combatants, the ground troops, who directly engage the enemy at the various theaters of conflict.
Of course, in modern warfare, the task of the ground forces is, in many cases, made cushier by aerial bombardments in which the enemy’s positions must have been significantly weakened by the firepower of the air component before they (ground troops) move in.
Yet, the ground forces are those who face the greatest peril and are paying prices of seismic proportions in their constitutional duty of defending the territorial integrity of the nation, while the rest of us sleep in the cosy comfort of our homes.
They are the ones who square up gallantly to the firepower of the enemy on our behalf. They are the ones who unfortunately fall prey to the ghoulish ambushes often mounted against our troops by the villaneous daredevils, orchestrated by the wicked moles in the system, who sell off their colleagues for filthy lucre.
These are the crops of fighting men who deserve priority attention in terms of welfare. Gen. Musa is, no doubt, a fine brass hat who knows his onions. A veteran, well trained in the art of modern warfare, he has acquitted himself admirably in all the command positions he has held.
No wonder his appointments as Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) and later as defence minister received wide acclaim. As a matter of fact, his removal as CDS elicited public outrage before he was later appointed defence minister. That demonstrated his populist approval.
He, therefore, ought to know better than to celebrate such a paltry pay for men who are making heavy sacrifices in the service of their fatherland. He ought to know how imprudent poor pay is to the system and what low morale, accentuated by poor pay, can do to the psyche of a fighting force.
The system has for some time been riven by complaints of low welfare attention, stirring dysphoria among the rank and file. Specifically, tales of poor soldier welfare in the military, ranging from low salaries and delayed allowances to inadequate front-line feeding, have consistently elicited concerns. Allegations detailing these welfare issues include frontline feeding controversies.
Viral videos frequently surface showing soldiers in the North-East complaining about the allegedly poor quality and quantity of food served them at front-line outposts. An activist was consequently arrested in March, 2026, alongside some soldiers following social media posts alleging that troops were starving and being served inadequate meals.
Soldiers have also repeatedly muffled displeasure about what they described as their poor pay and allowances. Some claim that they have to often personally purchase uniforms and bulletproof gear.
Prominent figures have occasionally weighed in on the issue. Former Senate Leader, Ali Ndume, openly fulminated against allowing low morale to creep into the rank and file of the military. He described the newly announced N100,000 monthly salary raise and N5,000 daily feeding allowance as grossly inadequate for soldiers risking their lives in conflict zones.
The military authorities have, however, dismissed most of these allegations as sheer baloney, attributing them to manipulated media. They asserted that personnel welfare remains a top priority in the Armed Forces.
On the frontline feeding brouhaha, the military is accusing influencers of encouraging troops to remove meat from their meals before recording videos to incite discontent. Commanders assert that they have established structured food committees and sustained logistics to effectively manage troops’ rations in the field.
Be that as it may, it is an embarrassment in its crudest form to pay people who have signed their lives to protect the rest of us just N100,000 a month. And it is infantile to have announced it with such a facile gusto as if the best has happened to the recipients.
It is unfortunate that the pay of men of the Armed Forces has for a long time been largely opaque. Not much of it had been public knowledge until Gen. Musa announced their old and new minimum wages. It is thus disconcerting that the men who have been putting their lives on the line for the nation had even been receiving a paltry N49,000 before the raise. This is highly unconscionable, to say the least.
This is happening in the same country where a senator, for example, earns about N1.2million a month, excluding other undisclosed humongous emoluments the federal lawmakers are believed to be receiving monthly but have remained controversial.
According to the Revenue Mobilisation Allocation and Fiscal Commission (RMAFC), each senator receives a total monthly salary and allowances of N1,063,860.
The breakdown consists of the following: Basic Salary – N168,866:70; Motor Vehicle Fuelling and Maintenance Allowance – N126,650:00; Personal Assistant – N42,216:66; Domestic Staff – N126,650; Entertainment – N50,660:00; Utilities – N50,660:00; Newspapers/Periodicals – N25,330:00; Wardrobe – N42,216,66; House Maintenance – N8,443.3 and Constituency Allowance – N422,166:66 respectively.
Among the privileged colony of these federal legislators are former governors-now- senators who constitute a severe leach on the nation’s resources by earning eye-popping life perquisites pari-pasu with their legislative packages.
The new pay for soldiers is thus a cruel metaphor for an ossified system that allows such incongruous disparities in pay structures, a system in which wealth distribution is so unfairly skewed that some privileged class are made to revel in profligacy and flamboyance at the expense of the tax payers’ money, while some others, including soldiers who sweat it out defending the nation against external aggression, are only scratching the bottom of the barrel to survive.
Pray, how does an average soldier survive on N100,000 a month at a time when spiral inflation has made nonsense of the household purchasing power? In a situation where the price of an average 50kg bag of local or budget foreign rice ranges from ₦45,000 to ₦65,000, depending on the market and the region? At a period when standard paint bucket of beans costs between ₦6,000 and ₦8,500, while a paint bucket of garri averages ₦1,000 to ₦1,300?
Food prices remain high because food inflation in Nigeria is heavily driven by transport/logistics costs from northern farming regions, exchange rate fluctuations affecting imported goods and localized supply chain disruptions. In any case, food is just one of the many household necessities that guzzle money.
Low morale arising from poor pay may just be one of the reasons for the convoluted nature of the anti-terror war because a hungry man, it is said, is an angry man. And an angry soldier can hardly be committed to fighting his heart out in combat.
It could also probably explain why our military and police personnel earn accolades abroad and become segued into literal ‘jellies’ before an otherwise ragtag army of terrorists back home. Yet, the gallantry displayed in the eventual rescue of the Oyo kidnapped children and teachers is emblematic of our military’s intrinsic capabilities if they are adequately motivated.
Legendary war veteran and former French leader, Napoleon Bonaparte, once said, “An army moves on his stomach.” In other words, a well fed, well remunerated soldier is one who gives his best at the war front.
Hence, let the N100,000 salary raise be the starting point. There must be commitment to periodic increases that will gradually push our gallant soldiers’ pay from starvation to a real living wage.
Only then can we expect them to perform at their utmost.
….thumbs up over Oyo kidnapped school children’s, teachers’ rescue!
At long last, the children and teachers kidnapped two months ago from three Oyo State schools have breathed the air of freedom. The victims, all the 44 children and teachers, were rescued last Friday after spending a total of 56 days in terrorists’ den.
The Army revealed that their rescue from the vastly expansive old Oyo National Park forest was effectuated following over a month intelligence-led, carefully planned and executed operation by troops of the Nigerian Army, led by the General Officer Commanding 2 Division, Nigerian Army, Ibadan, Major Gen. C.R. Nnebeife.
They reportedly worked in collaboration with a combined highly formidable team, made up of special units from the Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA), specifically the National Counter Terrorism Centre (NCTC), the Defence Headquarters with Special Forces elements from the Nigerian Army, Navy, the Air Force and the Nigeria Police, the Department of State Services (DSS), National Intelligence Agency (NIA), the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps and other security agencies, as well as local vigilantes, hunters and Amotekun operatives.
They were abducted on May 15 by suspected breakaway faction of Boko Haram insurgents, Ansaru militants, who attacked Community Grammar School, Baptist Nursery and Primary School, and L.A. Primary School in the Esiele and Yawota communities of Oriire Local Government Area of Oyo State.
According to earlier official accounts, 39 pupils and seven teachers were taken during the attack, while the assistant headmaster of L.A. Primary School, Joel Adesiyan, was killed during the attack while attempting to escape. Another teacher, Michael Oyedokun, was decapitated in a most horrendous manner by the terrorists while in captivity.
The incident, which was the first school attack in Southern Nigeria, generated a groundswell of national and international expressions of tarnation and angry outbursts. Nigerians, at home and in diaspora, flew into a howling rage when the video depicting the profane spectacle of the beheading of a teacher by the soulless insurgents went viral. Vitriols and depreciatory words were momentarily heaped on the heartless Islamic militias over the obscenity.
The degree of the people’s tempestuous reactions against the Oyo schools kidnap was akin to the international obloquy and hysteria that greeted the Chibok episode where a total of 276 schoolgirls were kidnapped in one fell swoop by Boko Haram insurgents from the Government Girls Secondary School in Chibok, Borno State, on the night of April 14–15, 2014.
National and global pressure was mounted on the Federal Government, the military and other security agencies to urgently take out the Oyo kidnappers and rescue the victims unhurt. A joint rescue team, made up of soldiers and other security forces, was immediately raised, which went to work immediately.
But at a point, the authorities began to receive blistering roasting from impatient Nigerians who were getting uncomfortable with what they viewed as the unnecessary vacillation over the matter.
However, unknown to many, the rescue forces were working subterraneanly, preferring to remain taciturn in order not to jeopardize rescue efforts and imperil the victims.
The efforts paid off handsomely last Friday when all the 44 victims in captivity were rescued unhurt. A preponderant number of the kidnappers were neutralized, while eight of them were arrested. And significantly too, nothing was conceded to the marauders. The government refused to accede to their desperate demand to release their commander in government’s custody.
These, to say the least, are prodigious accomplishments that showed a demonstrable superior firepower of our military and security forces over the militants. The Federal Government, Oyo State government, troops, other security agencies as well non-state actors such as Amotekun operatives, local vigilantes and hunters, who effectuated this humdinger of a feat deserve the thumbs up.
The feat has considerably deflated the big balloon of dysphoria and eased off the fever pitch anxiety that had built up over the abductions, giving way to a flurry of nationwide, well deserved commendations for the authorities.
It is clearly revelatory of the seismic capabilities of our military and other security forces if they are given the necessary tools to work. More importantly, it raises a new vista of hope that, indeed, we can defeat the ragtag army of terrorists that have been holding the nation to ransom if our political leaders and the military high command could muster the will.
Let them, therefore, go ahead and replicate this feat by rolling out the same formidable military machine, with the same gusto, against all the terrorists in most parts of the country towards extirpating them and their terror cells once for all.