The Defence Headquarters has said that there was no act of illegality perpetuated by the Chief of Army Staff, Chief of Naval staff or Chief of the Air Staff, regarding extending the length of service for officers.
The DHQ said extant guidelines and policies are always followed as laid out in the aforementioned document when the need arises.
Director of Information DHQ, Major General EJ Enenche made the clarification on Thursday in a statement.
He said the need came for the office to make the clarification because of the stories making the rounds in the media that the COAS extended the service of his course mates illegally.
Enenche said: “The attention of the Defence Headquarters has been drawn to a news item making rounds in the media captioned “How Service Chiefs Illegally Extend Military Careers of Course Mates”.
“Thus, it has become necessary to clear this issue that was addressed particularly to the Nigerian Army, Navy and Airforce.
“It cited Harmonised Terms and Conditions of Service (HTACOS), 2012, Paragraph 02: 10 (b) as justification for the assertion, which is a tabulation of the conditions relating to the length of service of a commissioned officer of the Armed Forces of Nigeria.
“However, it failed to give insight into other sections of the Paragraph that borders specifically on extension of service for a commissioned officer.
“In view of this kind of an unbalanced publication, the Defence Headquarters wishes to posit that; Paragraph 02:10 (d) of Armed Forces of Nigeria, Harmonized Terms and Conditions of Service, officers, 2012 is clear on the considerations for extending the length of service for officers, which are summarised as follows:
“An officer’s career can be extended based on the interest of the Service, in this case, Army, Navy and Airforce.
“In very exceptional cases, an officer’s Career can be extended beyond one year for as long as necessary.
“Extension of service for officers can only be approved by the Service council/board comprising the Honourable Minister of Defence, Chief of Defence Staff, the service Chief, Service Director at Ministry of Defence and Permanent Secretary Ministry of Defence.
“Extension of service for officers can also be at the discretion of the Commander in Chief.
“From the foregoing, I wish to state thatThe general public is hereby re-assured that the service Chiefs under the strategic leadership of the Chief of Defence staff are focused and will remain so, in tackling the security challenges of the Nation, and would not be distracted by any means.”
He noted finally that a good number of the officers mentioned in the article are no longer in service.
“Only very few are still in service, in the interest of the Armed Forces of Nigeria, which is in line with Harmonized Terms and Conditions of Service for Officers, 2012, Paragraph 02.10 (d),” he said.