Abandoned on the Frontline: How Nigeria’s Military Leadership Is Starving Its Soldiers While Pocketing the Payoffs

There’s a word for what’s happening at Camp 5 in Warri South West: betrayal.

Men and women in uniform — soldiers sent to secure oil country for the nation — are living like prisoners of neglect. They’re going without medicine, without rescue boats in emergencies, and, unbelievably, without food. That’s not battlefield hardship. That’s an institutional scandal. And it points straight at the top

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The troops who spoke to SaharaReporters describe a scene that should shame anyone who claims to run this country. Feeding duties rotate among commanding officers — but the meals are rotten, scarce, and sometimes non-existent. Soldiers are down to two meals a day; some go a week without food. The government quietly hiked the feeding allowance to ₦3,000 a day — and yet the men on the ground see none of it. Why? Because, according to the soldiers, their commanders are skimming it off the top.

Think about that: while generals sit in comfortable offices, soldiers on the front line are starving — because their commanders are lining their pockets. That’s not incompetence. That’s theft from the people who risk everything.

Worse: soldiers deployed to guard oil company operations say those companies pay ₦300,000–₦400,000 per soldier per month — and yet the soldiers receive just ₦30,000. That’s a ten‑to‑one robbery carried out with military paperwork and blessed by silence. Many of these troops are now owed three months’ back pay. Who is answering for that? Not the chain of command. Not the ministers. Nobody.

These complaints aren’t whispers — they’re demands. The men at Camp 5 are calling for the removal of the 63 Brigade Commander/Sector 1 Commander in Asaba. They’re begging Generals CG Musa and Lt. Gen. OO Oluyede to act. And why should they have to beg? These are public servants paid to protect the nation. Instead, they’ve turned their soldiers into cash cows and punishment fodder.

Let’s be blunt: this is the Nigerian government’s moral failure on full display. You can dress it up as “logistics problems” or “administrative errors,” but when servicemen are left hungry, sick, and without emergency evacuation — while money meant for them vanishes into pockets higher up — that is criminal neglect. It’s a betrayal of the social contract. It is also a national security risk: demoralized, underfed soldiers are not an asset — they are a liability.

What do we want? Immediate, transparent audits. Freeze the accounts tied to allowances and deployment contracts. An independent, public inquiry. And real protection — not platitudes — for the whistleblowers who exposed this corruption. If generals and commanders are taking pay intended for soldiers, they must be removed and prosecuted. No more token transfers or quiet reassignments. No more letting the guilty fade into new postings.

To the presidency and defense chiefs: this isn’t a minor scandal you can weather with a press release. It’s proof that rot runs deeper than a few bad apples. Fix it. Pay these soldiers what they’re owed. Provide proper food, medical care, and evacuation resources — now. Prosecute the thieves. Restore dignity to the men and women who sign up to protect this country.

Until that happens, every day a soldier goes hungry is another day the Nigerian state proves itself unworthy of the name.