Posted by By MOLLY KILETE, Abuja on
The Chief of Defence Staff (CDS), General Andrew Owoye Azazi, has denied media reports ascribed to him that former President Olusegun Obasanjo did not consult the military over the ceding of the Bakassi Pennisula to the Republic of Cameroon.
The Chief of Defence Staff (CDS), General Andrew Owoye Azazi, has denied media reports ascribed to him that former President Olusegun Obasanjo did not consult the military over the ceding of the Bakassi Pennisula to the Republic of Cameroon.
Gen. Azazi, who made the clarification at a briefing with Defence correspondents in his office on Thursday in Abuja said his testimony at the Senate Joint ad-hoc committee investigating the Green Tree Agreement (GTA), did not in anyway reflect on the screaming headlines of most newspapers reports of Thursday.
Azazi, who was at the National Assembly at the instance of the Senate Joint ad-hoc committee investigating the Green Tree Agreement, to give details of military involvement in the Bakassi Peninsula saga, said he had told the committee members that even though the former CDS, General Martin-Luther Agwai, had accompanied former President Olusegun Obasanjo to New York, he was unable to give further details of the military's involvement and contributions as he was yet to lay his hands on any concrete documents prepared by the military over the matter.
According to him, 'what transpired at the public hearing did not reflect what was written. I was asked a question as to how the military was involved in the green tree agreement and I said that I remembered that the former CDS accompanied the then President when he was going to New York, and am still looking for documents, prepared by the military if they contributed and I haven't seen them and that when I see them, I will present them to the committee on public hearing and if there is none, I will put up a position paper."
On the issue of national security, Azazi, said he told the committee that boundary adjustment in the Bakassi Peninsula if left the way it is, could jeopardize Nigeria's security in that area because of the Calabar ports and that it also undermines Nigerian shipping as the deep waters is mostly on the Cameroonian side.
'There was no issue of the president at the time not taking the military into confidence or the president at the time not consulting the military on the agrement to be done. The screaming headline about OBJ not consulting the military is absolutely unnecessary." Azazi, said.