 Welcome back to the breakfast on Plus TV Africa. Our next conversation now is on a story of about 29 generals in the Nigerian army who have been asked to go on a one-month leave. They have been speculations with regards what this means and if this is normal military procedure, of course after the placement of Faruk Yahya as the new chief of army staff, what happens to military officers who were senior to him in the army and of course they were on courses 35 and 36 and the likes. This one we're going to be speaking with retired Brigadier General Anthony Uppu. Good morning. Thanks for joining us, sir. Good morning. Hello, good morning. Good morning to you. Thanks for joining us. I'm going to start by asking if this is regular military procedure. If there is an appointment of a general or an army officer into a position, is it normal procedure that every officer above him has to be retired? Okay, you're not very clear but if I understand what you are saying, you're trying to find out about the appointment of a chief of army staff. Yes, and if it is regular army procedure that every officer with a higher rank than he has to be retired? No, no, no, no, not necessary. The terms and conditions of service provide that only one person can be made chief of army staff at any one time. And the appointment of the chief of army staff is the prerogative of the commander in chief. So he can pick for many calls as long as the person has reached a particular rank, a general rank. Now, once appointed, all those who are senior to him have the option of retiring voluntarily if they so desire. Because the minimum length of service for a regular combatant officer is 15 years. So most of the officers who get to general rank would have put in their 15 years service already. After that, they are free to voluntarily retire without any penalties and they will get their full pension. So it is left to the senior officers who are senior to the officer who has been appointed chief of army staff if they do not wish to serve under him, they can then submit their voluntary retirements. So it is not mandatory that they would be retired. Okay. There are other other jobs that they can do within the military. In the joint service, the agents, joint service headquarters, there is Ministry of Defense, there are military appointments. So there are very many jobs that they can be deployed to. So really speaking, it's not compulsory. Okay. So Mr Uppo, we know that in 2014, when Goodluck Jonathan got new service chiefs, about 50 generals reportedly retired. And then one year later in 2015, when President Muhammad Wari appointed new service chiefs, about 25 other generals retired and now 29 to go and leave and then a one-year cost because someone lower than the rank have been appointed as chief of army staff. So do you think this practice should continue or should it be a law for the president to appoint the most senior officer or general? It really depends on the president's commander in chief. The president in his capacity as president can deploy officers as he wishes. In his capacity as chief commander in chiefs, he can do the same thing again. So it is not the norm. What I hear if it is true is not the norm. During military government, the practices were different because of the issue of perceived loyalty. So if the commander in chief thinks that the people that have been bypassed will not be loyal, then he gives them the option of retiring or be retired. But in the democratic government, it is different. So what I hear is happening now about go on leave and go on training and so on is unusual. I don't think it should be institutionalized. It should not. So what should it be? What do you think standard practice should be going forward? Maybe looking for the next president of the country. How should the procedure be for the appointments of chief of staff and other levels like this? The practice, the well-tested practice that has always been there should be maintained. Do not forget that the military has terms and conditions of service. People tend to forget that the military, just like the civil service, has terms and conditions of service and it should be adhered to. Now as you go higher in rank, the possibilities of appointment into certain positions reduce. So if you are a general and they need to appoint a chief of staff, they can only be one chief of staff among so many generals. So the practice has always been that before you get to the rank of general, you would have even reached the rank where you can voluntarily retire. So it would be, I for example, I voluntarily retired. I was given the option of voluntary retirement or compulsory retirement. It was during a military government and I chose to go voluntarily. I had opted to resign much earlier anyway. So I chose to retire voluntarily. So I wanted to ask you to react to people who say, when you appoint someone who's on a lower level and the others have to go and leave, you're basically losing about once a generation of people who have lots of experience on the field. How do you react to that? No, sorry, I didn't get you very clearly. Can you say it again gently and slowly? Can you hear me now? Yes. I'm saying how do you react to people who say this practice of the presidents appointing anyone he so chooses basically just makes people or other generals who have more experience just makes that go to waste? Like I said, the prerogative of appointment is that of the chief of the commander-in-chief. He has his own way, he has his own guideline. Every commander-in-chief has his own guideline for selection. So it is not for us to decide the guideline that the commander-in-chief used. So I think we should just go along with it. Does this in any way affect the loyalties to service knowing that there's a possibility that you might get to the peak of your career and then be asked to resign because you didn't hit the chief of army staff position? Does this in any way also affect the emotional attachments to the Nigerian army to all the military officers still finding their way to the top of their careers? Everybody wishes to be chief of army staff, but everybody cannot be chief of army staff. I think that is the long and short of it. So if you have been by past, the commander-in-chief has his reasons. And so you should accept it with grace and retire. It does not mean that it is the best, tactically or strategically, that is selected. Once you get to the rank of colonel, appointments become literally what we say, political. But isn't that dangerous? Always be that you are the one who can plan battles the best or who can fight the best that will be at the top. There are other considerations, political considerations, economics, strategic. So many considerations are put in before chief of army staff is appointed. So I don't know what the considerations were for picking up the present chief of army staff. So I cannot be specific to that point. Yeah, but what I'm asking is the considerations you've mentioned, political and economic and the likes, aren't they dangerous with regards to the strength of our army and now the ability of the Nigerian army to deliver? Should, would you advise that we have a specific format with which any person attains the post of a chief of army staff instead of based on the considerations of whoever is commander-in-chief? Well, you know, in a developing environment, even in a non-development environment, in America, for example, a number of people have been made chiefs of army staff and so on who were far, far junior to their colleagues. Like I said, it depends on the perception of the president, commander-in-chief. The issue of loyalty is always number one. The issue of performance comes second. Because if you have an officer who is very efficient, tactically competent, strategically sound, but not loyal to the system. Yeah, but how do you judge? You cannot command the army and be loyal to orders that are given to him by the president. Yeah, but how do you judge? The law is still very key. Yeah, sorry, general. How do you judge, you know, the level of loyalty to, you know, amongst officers who have given 15, 20, you know, or more years of service to the Nigerian military? How do you then say, well, all 20 of you are not loyal enough to me as a president? And so I'm going to drop all of you, even if you've given all your life and service to the military. How do you judge that loyalty? Look, there are various ways that the commander-in-chief gets this information. He has his intelligence services that feed in with information. If you, as a commander-in-chief, you know that an officer, a senior officer, has been consistently critical of your performance as a president, you'll be very stupid. You're going to appoint such a person as the chief of army staff or the chief of defense staff because you then know that the man might overthrow you. So that means of judging loyalty. It is not a test. It's not an examination. Loyalty is something that is presented to the quality. Oh, well. Anthony, well, thank you very much. I think we can wrap up here. Thanks for speaking with us this morning. And we wish you a very interesting day ahead. Thank you very much. Thank you. All right. It would always be a little confusing for me when we, you know, I mean, mostly about the loyalty thing, you know, and being able to pick and choose who you feel is most loyal to you. You know, if everyone has given all their lives in service and loyalty to who exactly, should it be loyalty to the person or loyalty to the country? I believe that, you know, the training and the service, you know, in the military, I've never been there, but I believe that it should be loyalty to the country, not loyalty to a person. Yeah, but apparently it's a longstanding military tradition here. So what can we say? Yeah, it doesn't make it entirely right, you know, because I don't, I don't, I think it's also one of, you know, the challenges that we're currently dealing with in Nigeria today, where we see government agencies, you know, openly say, oh, we are loyal to the president. It should be loyal to the country. But loyalty aside, I think the focus should be on who you think can get the job better. You know, the president felt that, you know, right now with the demise of the former chief of army staff, that the new one, you know, is more competent, has more ideas, then I think that should actually come more than who's older and who's older and who's younger. Absolutely, competence should always, you know, be key, a key factor in these things. But, you know, when they say loyalty, it just doesn't, you know, rubs me off in the wrong way. But loyalty is, loyalty is a very vital concept in the military anyway. So anyway, that's why we wrap it up with this conversation with the 29 generals who are going and leave, we'll follow up on that as more information unfolds. We're going to break here and return to talk about the price of bread.