The Nigerian Army yesterday said that despite the initial misinformation, agitation and misplaced apprehension about the exercise ‘Python Dance’ launched during the festive period, the record of achievements was huge and highly acknowledged across the South eastern region.
It said the exercise has further raised the image and reputation of the Nigerian Army in its struggles to end insurgency, crimes and criminalities across the nation.Army’s Deputy Director, Public Relations, Col. Sagir Musa, in a statement in Enugu said that despite disinformation and misplaced apprehension, miscreants and criminals were denied freedom of action due to intensity of patrols, road blocks, raids and other activities in the operation.
“As a result, most of the criminal elements fizzled out of the region into neighbouring Delta and Rivers states. The account of peace, law, order and secured environments in the entire South Eastern region occasioned by the exercise was widely circulated by the media among others. Accordingly, the political leadership, some elites and the locals in Abia, Anambra, Ebonyi, Enugu and Imo states appreciated and differently voiced their commendations about the Nigerian Army.’’
“Also, most of the security challenges such as intra and inter communal crisis, farmers – herdsmen clashes, kidnapping, armed robbery and cultism as well as “trading in human misery” in the region were grossly reduced to the barest minimum. These menaces are and have been the focus and targets of this Exercise and have so far been effectively achieved.
“Similarly, violent secessionist agitators and related divisive irredentist groups were silently suppressed. Consequently, the region was stabilized, with an increased level of free movements and a boost to economic and social activities”, he said.
Musa noted that even the annual gridlock on the Niger Bridge at Onitsha during the Yuletide season was effectively remedied, while the yearly sufferings, inconveniencies and insecurity arising from traffic jam on the Asaba-Onitsha axis of the bridge were curtailed.He said the seamless flow of traffic was achieved by own troops working in synergy with the Federal Road Safety Commission (FRSC) and the Nigerian police.