The Senate has confirmed former Chief of Defence Staff, General Christopher Musa, as the new Minister of Defence.
Senate President Godswill Akpabio announced the confirmation on Wednesday, December 3, following unanimous approval by lawmakers during Musa’s screening.
Akpabio also disclosed that the Senate earlier in the day initiated legislative steps to categorise kidnapping as terrorism and to introduce the death penalty for offenders without an option of fine.
The ICIR reported that President Bola Tinubu nominated Musa for the position, expressing confidence in his capacity to “strengthen Nigeria’s security architecture” and reinvigorate the ministry amid rising insecurity nationwide.
The screening commenced shortly after Akpabio read Tinubu’s request during plenary, seeking the confirmation of the retired general to replace former Defence Minister Mohammed Badaru, who resigned on Monday over health concerns.
Akpabio subsequently suspended Senate rules to allow Musa entry into the chamber for his screening.
During the session, Akpabio asked the incoming minister to address the recent abduction of 24 students from Government Girls Comprehensive Secondary School, Maga, in Kebbi State.
Musa pledged to probe the incident and others highlighted by the Senate President, promising to work closely with security agencies to confront the nation’s security challenges.
“I can assure you that we are going to investigate and all those found culpable will face the law accordingly. I will make sure that we monitor all the activities of the Armed Forces and the security agencies to make sure that they remain very, very professional. Any information that comes will be treated adequately and I’ll make sure that the troops also take action as quickly as possible,” Musa said.
He appealed for the support of state governors and citizens, assuring Nigerians of his commitment to restoring stability across the country.
“I want to assure Nigerians that are coming on board, having served 39 years all through my career in the armed forces, we have seen what is going on, we have understood what is going on, and we know what we need. Our appearance is that we are poor. But as we come on stream, we are going to come out to you and show you exactly what we need for us to do better and for us to achieve success.
“We can win this war, but we must work together. We must get the support. Because I can tell you, not counting on us, there are still a lot of gaps within the Armed Forces that are also mitigating against them being able to achieve success fully in what we are doing,” he said.
He added, “Like I said, we need the state governors, we need everyone to be on board for us to be able to achieve that. So my assurance is, from day one, we are going to monitor and review all our activities, all the operations that we are doing, and what we have done. We are going to take measures to address them, where things need to be done, we are going to handle, we are going to come back against them because there are areas that we need their support. I want to make sure the issue of funding, the gap in funding is going to be extremely difficult.”
Musa recounted his military career, noting that he was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant in 1991 and subsequently served in various command and staff roles. He became Theatre Commander of Operation Hadin Kai in 2021, later headed the Nigerian Army Infantry Corps and was appointed Chief of Defence Staff in 2023.
His predecessor, Mohammed Badaru, who assumed office on August 21, 2023, resigned on December 1 due to ill health. President Tinubu accepted his resignation and expressed appreciation for his service.
Badaru recently came under public scrutiny after a BBC Hausa interview in which he suggested that some terrorists were difficult to strike because their forest hideouts were “too dense for bombs to reach.”
