Nigeria’s former Chief of Defence Staff, General Lucky Irabor (retd.), has revealed that at one point during the fight against Boko Haram, troops were compelled to use abandoned and dilapidated vehicles—including relics from the Nigerian Civil War—due to severe shortages of military equipment.
Irabor made the disclosure in his newly released memoir, Scars: Nigeria’s Journey and the Boko Haram Conundrum, shedding light on the resource constraints that plagued the armed forces at the height of the insurgency.
His account comes against the backdrop of years of controversy over poor military provisioning and the punishment of soldiers who voiced such concerns. In 2014, several soldiers deployed in Borno State were court-martialled after protesting inadequate weapons and logistics; some were sentenced to death for mutiny before their sentences were later commuted.
Irabor, who served as Theatre Commander of Operation Lafiya Dole—the counter-insurgency campaign in the North-East — between March 2016 and May 2017, described the state of the military’s equipment as “deplorable,” forcing commanders to improvise to keep operations going.
“At a particular stage of the operation, the Lafiya Dole theatre’s equipment disposition was deplorable,” he wrote. “In order to boost the fighting capability of the forces, we resorted to scavenging dilapidated and abandoned vehicles.”
According to Irabor, some of the vehicles recovered were remnants from the Nigerian Civil War of the late 1960s. He credited one officer, Captain Mohammed Narogo, with leading the recovery effort that restored several of the wreckages to working condition.
“I tasked Captain Mohammed Narogo with undertaking the responsibility, and he was ingenious in bringing back to service some of the vehicle wreckages,” Irabor said, adding that he later recommended the officer for a commendation and special promotion to the rank of major.
The retired general also disclosed tensions between the military services over operational control, noting that coordination of Operation Lafiya Dole was, at one stage, handled directly by Army Headquarters—a move that caused discomfort among the Navy and Air Force leadership.
“In contrast to the provisions of the National Defence Policy, the coordination of the operation was undertaken by Army HQ at some point, such that the leadership of the other services felt uncomfortable with such an arrangement,” he said.
Irabor further revealed that the then governor of Borno State, Kashim Shettima, had to authorise the use of state-owned assets—including trucks meant for road construction and tractors procured for mechanized farming—to support military operations in the absence of sufficient federal resources.
“The deplorable state of equipment led the governor to authorise the use of trucks and tractors procured for development purposes to enhance military operations,” Irabor wrote.
The revelations underscore the logistical and institutional challenges faced by Nigeria’s military during the prolonged battle against Boko Haram—a conflict that has claimed tens of thousands of lives and displaced millions across the country’s North-East region.
