Anybody or group planning to disrupt tomorrow’s off-season elections in Bayelsa, Imo and Kogi states would face the consequences of their action, Defence Headquarters (DHQ) warned yesterday.
It said the military is aware of plans by miscreants to disguise themselves in military uniforms in order to disrupt the election process.
The military high command spoke through the Director Defence Media Operations, Major General Edward Buba, during a briefing at Defence Headquarters Abuja.
Buba said: “We are aware of plans of some to disguise themselves in military gear to orchestrate havoc and disrupt elections in some areas. Our message to such a group is that there will be injurious consequences for such an action. The military will not fold its arms and watch its image dragged to the mud.
“Election is a serious business and the military is giving it the seriousness it deserves. So much is being put in place, troops and platforms are being deployed to those locations to reinforce security that is already in place in those states.”
Giving an update on troops operations across the country in the last one week, the defence spokesperson said the military killed 113 terrorists and arrested 300 of others.
He also said troops arrested 25 perpetrators of oil theft and rescued 91 kidnapped hostages in different parts of the country.
According to him, in the South South region of the country troops denied oil thieves crude worth N571,793,350.00
He said troops of operation delta safe in the Niger Delta area discovered and destroyed 76 dugout pits, 35 boats, 95 storage tanks, 10 vehicles, 129 cooking ovens, 5 pumping machines, 13 speedboats, 6 outboard engine, one vessel, 3 motorcycles and 49 illegal refining sites.
“Troops recovered 514,640 litres of stolen crude oil, 339,315 litres of illegally refined AGO and 775 litres of DPK,” he said.
Buba also disclosed that troops recovered 129 assorted weapons and 717 assorted ammunition from criminal elements across the country.
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The Defence spokesperson said the breakdown is as follows: “one Unserviceable AA gun, one RPG tube, five RPG bombs, one GT3 rifle, 54 AK47 rifles, eight locally fabricated rifles, one locally made rifle, two pistols, two pump action guns, two dane guns, 4 locally fabricated pistol, three skeleton of AK47 rifles, nine hand grenades, one unserviceable AK47 rifle, 14 magazines, 321 rounds of 7.62mm special ammo, 40 live cartridges.
“Others are: 53 rounds of 5.45mm x 39mm ammo, 35 rounds of 7.62mm NATO, 100 rounds of shotgun, 11 rifle body, 7 breech block, 7 rifle butts, 8 rifle muzzles, 9 piston assembles, 210 springs, one drilling machine, hand filling machines, 10 magazine purges, IED making materials, 4 boafeng radios, 15 motorcycles, 20 mobile phones and the sum of N348,200.00 amongst other items.”
He said the armed forces will continue to exert military pressure on groups that seek to derail any progress towards peace and security in the country.
Buba said: “There is no doubt that these groups must be defeated and are indeed being defeated. It is for these reasons we are inflicting severe damage on the terrorist, insurgents and violent extremists through our operations across the country. Accordingly, we are targeting their leadership, infrastructure and foot soldiers.
“The coordination between the air and ground forces is like never seen before and yielding amazing results and achievements. We are expecting new platforms that would further enhance our capabilities to further root out the terrorists and destroy their military capabilities.”