Salute to soldiers in task force

Wakdok: Salute to soldiers in task force
I HAVE a constituency that may not really show on the surface, but it is at the core of my survival today. In short, it defines my greatest manifestation as a human being. Along the line, I allowed it to grey out of my loud existence and I seldom make reference to it in the public like this unless, when I chastised them for erring; but sometime in November 2012, I had an encounter and I knew I was going to write this.
In the course of the year on “cyberia” (apologies to Prof. Pius), someone whom I had not met contacted me to help with the part review and editing of his book. We belonged to the same primary constituency though I had moved on and the tradition even if unwritten, is that the juniors know the seniors and the seniors do not necessarily have to know or remember their juniors. He was five years my junior which made the gulf too wide. As a matter of fact, I had never seen or remember seeing him when we were in school. The most regimented secondary school in Africa if I am correct, it will take one who passed through it to appreciate what I am saying or even not saying.
As a commentator, I have always critiqued the government and its agencies in their below the average handling of the quality and security of lives and property in Nigeria. The act of governance has always fallen short of our expectation and sometimes; we also see the roles that the military as an institution plays whether as positive or non-positive in the sustenance of our defense and security as a nation and as a people. Ordinarily if not for the failure of successive government both military and democratic to equip and reposition the Nigeria Police, the military has no business in internal security. The main mandate of the military is to protect the territorial integrity of its nation and repel any form of external aggression. However in Africa, things are not so especially with the long sojourn of the military in power.
I travelled to Jos with my family in November and after months of communicating on Facebook and the GSM; I informed this military officer that I would be in Jos for three days. Tight as my schedule would be, I was going to squeeze a chance and it was the only appointment I made outside my primary reason of travelling. He is on the team of the Special Task Force (STF) in Jos to bring back sanity to a town once acclaimed as the home of peace and tourism, which for over a decade now has the semblance of war torn Kosovo. Coincidentally too, his area of operations was within the reach of where I was to put up while in Jos. A day after I arrived in Jos, he quickly came to see me and we saw for the first time, at least for me I was seeing him for the first time since he may have seen me 16 years ago when I was a lord and he was a crab as the military parlance goes. As God would have it, his wife came to see a family friend within that same vicinity and when he placed a call to her, she told him she was just in the street before mine and that was how she and their son came to meet us.
The son definitely had not seen his daddy for a while though he was lucky that his daddy’s area of operations was in the same town where they lived, unlike some who are in different states or regions. The mum tried to make me understand that the boy was angry with his dad for bailing out on him. But his dad, as an Air Force officer has been called to duty, while we all sleep and snore he and his compatriots are awake to protect us. Then I looked at my son who sees me every day and will not allow me take a step without him; and my wife who always gets sober/angry each time I had to travel without them, few as these may be.
That was when I tried to quantify or even qualify the sacrifices of these men and women who mount tanks, steer ships/speed boats, fly choppers, hold guns, sleep in tents, stand on the roads in rain or shine. The members of the Nigerian Armed Forces and Police have not found it easy, especially in the last two decades. Though it is the calling they have chosen, they have made tremendous sacrifices for us to sleep even if with one eye open. If you understood the rules of engagement properly, it is better to fight against an enemy’s army than to fight against insurgency from your own citizens. They have had to live for months or years away from their loved ones in strange towns, cities and villages because we civilians have chosen not to live in peace. Some people may try to murmur as they read this especially with reference to episodes where the military were said to be culpable in some unprofessional acts. Be that as it may, the few bad ones are no where near the many good ones who are roughing it out there in the cold or heat to keep us secured. And the repercussion of having no soldiers at all to protect us will be worse than disastrous.
The few minutes we spent with this family touched me and gradually, the boy loosened up and played with my son. I knew that my family and families of many of us owe this family and the families of many other service men some words of prayer. We should appreciate both the servicemen and women who stand for us to sit, who sit for us to lie down and who run for us to walk, who shoot for us to live. We should also appreciate their families who gave them to the nation to serve; and their spouses and children who do not have the luxury of physically saying good morning and good night every day.
As I try to remember some lines of “The Soldiers ‘Creed” we recited almost two decades ago on the parade ground, I dedicate it to you all my seniors, class-mates, juniors from the Nigerian Military School and all other officers and men all over the country;
“My Honour is my faith
I vow my faith to Nigeria
The supremacy of the constitution
When ever the clarion calls
What ever the price or odds
My faith is one and ever
To the Federal Republic of Nigeria.”
I write this piece for all the children and spouses of these service men and women. I appreciate you all from Maiduguri to Damaturu, Jos to Kano, Bauchi to Kaduna, Warri to Brass, Taraba to Mubi, Enugu to Port Harcourt, Benin to Okene and pray for you today and always.