From Ndubuisi Orji, Abuja

The House of Representatives was furious, yesterday, over the absence of the Chief of Army Staff, Major-General Ibrahim Attahiru, at a panel investigating the procurement of arms and ammunition for the prosecution of the war against insurgency in the last ten years.

Attahiru had Major General C. Ofuche to represent him at the panel’s sitting. However, members of the ad-hoc committee rejected his representatives, insisting that the COAS must appear in person, because of the sensitive nature of the investigation.

One of the members of the panel, Ibrahim Al-Mustapha Aliyu, said the army chief has some explanations to make, especially as it concerns military weapons allegedly ending up in the wrong hands.

Aliyu said: “You can bear witness to the fact that Nigeria is embroiled in serious security issues and year in year out appropriations were made and huge sums expended on procurement of arms and ammunition and yet in the whole of arrests made, you find these arms and ammunition with some of these bandits and miscreants.

“Some of them can be traced back to the very military or police. It is a serious issue and the National Assembly is well-positioned to dig deep into the root of this issue and find solutions. As moved by my colleagues, there is a need for a motion to allow the COAS to come and make his submissions personally to this committee.

Regardless, Ofuche apologised for the absence of the army chief. According to him, “he should have been here today, an indication to that was already in motion, but for several trips. If you watched the TV yesterday, he was at Ibadan and Enugu, yesterday, all for the same security needs.”