Nigeria not serious about fighting insecurity with N29bn capital budget for Army – Ndume

Chairman Senate Committee on Army, Senator Ali Ndume has expressed that the N29 billion budgeted for the army’s capital expenditure in 2021 shows Nigeria is not serious about tackling insecurity.

He made this known while speaking during a Channels TV programme on Friday, Ndume noted that countries like Chad and Cameroon spend more on their military compared to Nigeria.

The lawmaker from Borno expressed that Nigeria is facing a difficult situation with the Boko Haram insurgency and the priority should be ensuring more funds for the military.

“If your house is on fire, are you going to measure the water to put off the fight? We are in trouble in the north-east particularly,” he said.

“Go and check the Nigerian army budget for this year that we want to review upward; it is less than N30 billion for capital and that is what they used to buy ammunition and other supplies (that) we are talking about.

“It is less than N30 billion and the budget of Nigeria is more than N13 trillion. Does that show any seriousness in any way? If we do not have peace, then all these things you are talking about, of what use are they going to be?

“Go and check what Nigeria is spending on militarily and compare it with that of Chad that is poorer than us, or Niger (Republic).

“Go and see the Nigerian soldiers and the Cameroonian soldiers. Their kitting is different from our own. It is superior to our own despite the fact that they are poor because they placed priority on their security.”