The Nigerian Army has raised the alarm over poor enlistment of South East youths into the military service, and called for a change of attitude to reverse the trend.
According to the Army, while Kaduna State had recorded over 3,000 applications in the ongoing 2025 recruitment exercise, Enugu State was still struggling with just a hundred, noting that the story was not different with other South East states.
It called on Enugu and South East youths to apply in their numbers in the ongoing 2025 recruitment exercise to fill their quotas.
The Army made the call in Enugu during an enlightenment town hall meeting with local government council chairmen, traditional rulers, presidents-general of town unions and other community and thought leaders at the weekend.
Leader of the 2025 Army Recruitment Enlightenment Team, Brigadier-General Chima Ekeator, said: “Our people are losing what rightly belongs to them.
Each year, whenever a slot is being allocated to our people, we keep noticing that the number of applicants from our side is usually very poor. “Take for example, Enugu State was given about 200 slots, but the people who made it were never up to 100 due to poor application.
This has also become a recurring decimal in other states in the South East. “Today’s statistics on the number of applicants show that Kaduna has about 3,000 applicants, while Enugu is still battling with about a hundred; and by the time we will be through with screening, you will not have enough to recruit from the state.”
He refuted the allegation that people of South East origin were being killed in their numbers in the Army because they were the first to be sent to the battle fronts. He added that the region was also holding strategic positions in the Army presently.
Also speaking, the Commissioner for Youths and Sports Development, Barr. Lloyd Ekweremadu, regretted that the problem had persisted despite the collective efforts to reverse the trend and called for a review of modes of advertising the opportunities and the need to provide more details about the benefits of serving in the Army.
On his part, the Chairman of the Enugu State chapter of the Association of Local Governments of Nigeria (ALGON), Hon. Okechukwu Edeh, pledged even stronger cooperation of the local government council, but called on the military high command to equally address any concerns of the people to make the service more appealing to the youths.
