Despite several failed promises of either capturing or eliminating Nigeria’s most notorious bandit, Bello Turji, the Nigerian Army has once again, assured Nigerians that his days are numbered as he will be taken out in no distant time.
Director of Defence Media Operations, Maj.-Gen. Edward Buba, who gave the fresh assurance while briefing newsmen on the operations of the military in the year 2024 on Tuesday in Abuja, described the notorious bandit leader as a walking dead man who will soon go down like most of his lieutenants who have been eliminated by the military.
“Indeed, Bello Turji is merely a dead man walking. It will be insulting to try to take issues or join words with a terrorist. Before him, there were other terrorists who boasted that they would deal with security forces. Today they have all been taken out. We will do the same with other terrorist leaders like him,” Buba said.
“All these terrorist leaders that we are seeing today, before them, there were some that thought that they were champion upon champion. Where are they? They are buried. They are dead.
“And I assure you that those of them that are leaders today, commanders or whatever they call themselves, just watch out. I will from this platform tell you we have buried them (terrorist leaders) on the battlefield, because that is their fate in 2025. They are dead men walking. C’est fini.”
“During the course of the year, troops eliminated thousands of terrorists and also their commanders and combatants among others,” he stated.
The army spokesman stated further that it was important to realise that the terrorists exist for the sake of war and must be destroyed for the sake of peace, noting that troops had sustained pressure on the terrorist enclaves, hideouts, and strongholds as an incentive to speedily defeat the terrorists and hastily end the war.
“The update is that since he knows we’ve been after him, he has been operating underground and we are conducting operations.
“What we have been doing, of recent, is that we are picking everybody close to him; all those giving him support in one way or the other, we have picked them, we have killed his commanders. It’s just a matter of time.
“We are also sure that similar fate awaits those parading themselves as terror leaders and commanders today. Take it from me, Turji is merely a dead man walking, as he will soon follow suit with many others that have been eliminated during the course of the year.”
This is not the first time the military has assured Nigerians that the end had come for the bandit leader.
The CDS had, during a press conference in Abuja on September 10, boasted that it was just a matter of time before the dreaded bandit whom he described as deranged would meet his waterloo.
Shortly after he was sworn in as the Chief of Army Staff (COAS) by President Bola Tinubu, Lieutenant General Olufemi Oluyede, also boasted that he would bring down the bandit kingpin.
But in spite of all the assurances and an all out war declared on Turji, he has continued to loom large, exuding an air of invincibility and seemingly out of range for the security agencies to bring to book.
The bandit has continued to dare the Nigeria military, and on more than one occasion dared it’s hierarchy to face him in the field of battle. Many innocent Nigerians have been sent to their early graves, while many more live in fear and torment as the military continues to mouth its resolve to bring Turji down permanently.