Tinubu Approves Recruitment of 78,000 Security Personnel

President Bola Tinubu has approved the recruitment of 28,000 additional soldiers and 50,000 police officers as part of efforts to strengthen Nigeria’s security system and tackle insecurity.

The approval is part of the administration’s proposed Five-Year Strategic Defence Operations Plan, which aims to improve military effectiveness, expand operational capacity and strengthen the country’s response to terrorism, banditry, kidnapping and other crimes.

The All Progressives Congress Presidential Campaign Council disclosed this in a statement issued on Sunday by its spokesperson, Dele Alake.

According to the statement, the recruitment of additional soldiers is intended to increase the military’s presence on the ground and improve its operational effectiveness.

“To further the manpower expansion drive, President Tinubu also approved recruiting an additional 28,000 soldiers to strengthen the military’s presence on the ground and enhance its operational effectiveness,” the statement said.

It added that Tinubu had also approved the recruitment of 50,000 additional police officers to improve internal security and strengthen the country’s response to criminal activities.

The campaign council also disclosed that the President had created four new Army divisions and restructured existing military formations to expand operational coverage and improve responses to security threats.

It said the administration had approved two additional Army depots in Osogbo, Osun State, and Amasiri-Edda, Ebonyi State, to increase military training capacity and speed up the recruitment of soldiers.

According to the statement, each depot can train 6,000 recruits at a time, giving the two facilities a combined capacity of 12,000 soldiers.

It added that 5,210 recruits were already undergoing training at the Osogbo facility.

The statement also highlighted the administration’s investment in military accommodation and operational infrastructure, including a 700-unit barracks project in Ikere-Ekiti, Ekiti State.

On the fight against insurgency, the campaign council claimed that military operations across the country had led to the killing of more than 15,000 Boko Haram fighters and bandits in the past three years.

It also claimed that more than 130,000 Boko Haram fighters and their dependents had surrendered through Operation Safe Corridor, the Nigerian Government’s rehabilitation programme for former insurgents.

The council said the proposed Five-Year Strategic Defence Operations Plan would provide a long-term framework for aligning defence priorities, operational needs, capability development and spending with the country’s security challenges.

“The initiative is a major component of President Tinubu’s determination to reposition the nation’s security architecture toward a more coordinated, intelligence-led, technology-enabled, and prevention-oriented system capable of addressing terrorism, banditry, kidnapping, and other forms of criminality,” the statement said.

The council maintained that sustained military operations, increased manpower, modern technology and non-military interventions would improve Nigeria’s ability to tackle insecurity.