Military recruitment: Kwara detects 67 fake certificates between 2010 – 2016

Kwara State government says it has so far discovered 67 persons recruited into the Nigerian Army with fake citizenship certificates of Kwara between 2010 and 2016.

Isiaka Gold, secretary to the state government, disclosed this figure when he appeared before the Kwara State House of Assembly Committee on ethics, privileges and judiciary at the assembly on Wednesday.

The House had on Tuesday summoned both the SSG and the chairman of the internal revenue service over alleged fake state of origin certificates for military recruitments.

Gold while testifying before the committee said the 67 persons were detected in army recruitment exercises through their names and their inability to communicate in the languages of the local government areas they claimed.

Giving the breakdown of the number of fake certificates discovered, the SSG said 16 persons were discovered in Ekiti Local Government Area, lfelodun nine while eight persons each in Moro and lrepodun.

Others are five persons each discovered in Edu, Baruten and Kaima local government areas while llorin West and Oyun local government areas had three persons each.

The rest were OkeEro, Asa, llorin East and llorin South local government areas one person was discovered each.

Lack of cooperation among Army hierarchy, easy access in obtaining certificate of local government of origin and logistics challenge have been identified as reasons non-indigenes impersonate Kwarans during Army recruitment exercises.

The SSG, who highlighted the challenges, said those who engaged in the fraud could not be persecuted due to the inability of the security agencies to apprehend culprits at the screening exercise.

The SSG, who lamented that his office had been confronted with some challenges in the task of detecting those impersonating Kwarans, later presented the list of the state indigenes for another Army recruitment slated for February 6, to the Assembly for proper identification.

The SSG therefore solicited the assistance of the House and chairmen of all the 16 local government councils to curtail the trend.

In his submission, Muritala Awodun, chairman of the state internal revenue service, represented by Segun Olani, the director of informal sector, disclosed that the revenue service had issued 21,000 new citizenship certificates between June 2016 and now.

Ali Ahmad, the speaker, represented by Mathew Okedare, deputy speaker, restated the commitment of the Legislature in ensuring that the state was no longer short-changed in military recruitment exercises, saying the House would not relent in protecting the interest of citizens.