By Anwar Usman
The Nigerian Army has expressed serious concern over the scanty number of applications from Southeastern states for its 2025 recruitment exercise.
This was revealed by Brigadier-General Chima Ekeator, leading the recruitment enlightenment team on Sunday, inEnugu stating that Kaduna State has seen over 3,000 applications, while Enugu has only around a hundred, a trend observed across the region.
He urged Southeast youths to apply in greater numbers to fill their allocated quotas.Ekeator said that, “Our people are losing what rightly belongs to them. Each year, whenever a slot is being allocated to our people, we keep noticing that the number of applicants from our side is usually very poor.
“Take for example, Enugu State was given about 200 slots, but the people who made it were never up to 100 due to poor application. This has also become a recurring decimal in other states in the South East.
He further stated that “Today’s statistics on the number of applicants show that Kaduna has about 3,000 applicants, while Enugu is still battling with about a hundred; and by the time we are through with screening, you will not have enough to recruit from the state.”
He disclaimed the allegation that people of South East origin were being killed in their numbers in the Army because they were the first to be sent to the battle fronts.
He added that the region was also holding strategic positions in the Army presently.
Earlier, the Commissioner for Youths and Sports Development, Barr. Lloyd Ekweremadu regretted that the problem had persisted despite the collective efforts to reverse the trend and called for a review of modes of advertising the opportunities and the need to provide more details about the benefits of serving in the Army.
He stated that, “While seated here, I was just trying to conduct very quick research and it appears this same problem is happening worldwide and militaries across the world are deploying more cutting-edge strategies for recruitment because we are talking about the new generation that you communicate in a different way from the past”.
He stated Governor Peter Mbah’s readiness to ensuring that the state filled its quota, describing the military as a noble and highly respected profession across the world.