Award Of Professorship, A Distraction To NDA

Nigerian Defence Academy, NDA Kaduna is a professional training college for the Nigerian military as officer cadets. It is set up to train military cadets as commissioned officers.

The clear mission of the NDA is to “provide each officer cadet with the knowledge, skills, and value necessary to meet the requirements of a military officer”.

Before NDA was set up, Nigeria’s first generation of senior military officers like, Lawan Umar, Zakariya Maimalari, David Akpode Ejoor, Yakubu Gowon, Hassan Usman Katsina, Victor Adebukulunola Banjo, Benjamin ‘Black Scorpion’, and Adesanyan Maja Adekunle mostly attended the prestigious Royal Military Academy Sandhurst, United Kingdom, RMAS. NDA was an adapted version of the RMAS with David Ejoor as the first Commandant.

NDA as the highest professional military school in Nigeria is not like the regular higher institutions. NDA has derailed as we hear of its glorification of the award of professors of the military. “Nothing we no go hear for Nigeria”. What will professors be doing in the Military Academy?

In Nigeria, we have short service courses for pure academics like medical doctors, nurses, engineers, etc who want to join the military. With the craving for academic titles creeping in, very soon we shall see titles like General, Professor, Chief, and Vice Chancellor for military officers bearing this and that.

What has the military got to do with academic titles? What we know is that the military Academy should be headed by ranking qualified military officers as Commandants.

Royal Military Academy Sandhurst is still headed by a commandant.
In the UK’s Royal Military Academy Sandhurst, the commandant is Major General Zachary Stenning.
A military Academy shouldn’t be an academic title-celebrating institution.

It’s purely military affairs. What do you need academic professors for in NDA? To the Nigerian military, it has arrived. Showcasing professors in NDA is useless and unnecessary waste of effort.

They should confine themselves to their military ranks and roles. We didn’t hear and see academic professors in the military of Super Power countries with the finest military operatives in the world.
Is this a new way of showing off in Nigeria?

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This is the Nigerian military that cannot fight Boko Haram, kidnapping, fulani herdsmen killings, unknown gunmen killing of innocent Nigerians in their communities, and here Nigerian military is bragging of having professors in NDA Kaduna.
And so what?

The Nigerian military should concentrate on how to stop terrorism, Boko Haram, herdsmen killings, kidnapping, and unknown gunmen killing innocent Nigerians in their home communities and not the show of worthless professors in NDA.

The military should confine itself to the roles it was established for.
Is it not shameful on NDA Kaduna for promoting military officers to the ranks of professors? They should look at how the military operates in the US, UK, Russia, China, and France. Is it the military that is inventing and producing the latest ammunition in the US, UK, Russia, and France?

The military has nothing to do with inventing and production of ammunition. “Nothing we no go hear for Nigeria”. They are companies that manufacture ammunition in the US, UK, France, Russia, China, and Russia.

In case the Nigerian military doesn’t know its role in society then let me tell its authority. As said by Wikipedia, “the main task of the military is usually defined as defence of the state and its interests against external armed threats.”

In Nigeria, the constitutional role of the military is not only to defend the territorial integrity and sovereignty of the state, they are also to help the police if invited by the government of the day, the Police and the internal Civil security, DSS to deal with internal armed threats.

United States Military Academy, USMA is in West Point, New York state and its commandant is Brigadier-General Lori L. Robinson
In Russia, its foremost military school is the Military Academy of the General Staff of the Armed Forces in Moscow.

The point here is Military Schools are not academic universities for academic degrees and that is the position of it in the superpower countries. NDA should focus on Military training which is the purpose of establishing it. It was not established for academic purposes.

Bragging about promoting military officers to ranks of academic professors is meaningless in my opinion. This reminds me of the pettiness under Goodluck Jonathan’s led federal administration, when Diezani Allison Madueke, super minister of petroleum resources then was awarded an honorary doctorate degree by NDA Kaduna and I asked what was the motive behind the award?

The NDA Kaduna has been known for taking reckless decisions. Now they have shifted from its core value to the extent of promoting military officers to the ranks of professors. They are no longer satisfied with their military ranks of ‘Generals’. So uncalled for.

Zik Gbemre
December 29, 2023

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