Defence Minister Debunks Exit Rumour, Points To Security Gains
A rumour that swept across Nigerian social media this week pushed the Minister of Defence, General Christopher Gwabin Musa (retd.), into a rare public rebuttal on Tuesday, as he stepped out of a closed door meeting with President Bola Tinubu at the Aso Rock Villa in Abuja to declare that he had no intention of leaving office and would go to court against those who claimed otherwise.
“I am not going anywhere. I have never discussed this. I don’t even know who the person is that brought that information. But whoever it is, we will take legal action against them,” Musa told State House correspondents. He arrived at the Villa at about 3pm and left shortly after 4pm, insisting the session was a routine security briefing rather than a crisis meeting over his tenure.
The minister said he was taken aback by the reports, which he cast as the work of people uneasy with what he described as the administration’s improving security record. “We are surprised. I was shocked when I saw that. I don’t know where that came from. But you always expect that there will be people who will not be happy when things are going well. Security is improving, things are getting better, and for them, that is a sad point,” he said. He added that the President “is very happy with us” following the briefing, and appealed for sustained civilian cooperation, calling the fight against terrorism and banditry “a whole of society approach.”
The Tuesday remarks followed a formal disclaimer issued a day earlier. In a statement signed by his Special Assistant on Media, Leah Katung-Babatunde, the Office of the Minister branded the claim “a malicious and entirely fabricated rumour” and “absolute falsehood borne out of complete mischief,” urging media outlets and internet users to verify information through official channels before publishing. The statement maintained that Musa “remains fully focused on his national security mandate” with “results already being seen.”
Musa’s position at the head of Nigeria’s defence establishment has been a defining feature of the current security architecture. He served as Chief of Defence Staff from July 2023, shortly after Tinubu assumed office, before being nominated as Minister of Defence on December 2, 2025. His tenure has spanned a period of intense and evolving violence across the country, which makes the question of whether “things are getting better” a matter of measurable public interest rather than mere political sentiment.
The available data present a picture more complicated than any single narrative. According to the Nextier Nigeria Violent Conflicts Database, the country recorded 4,654 casualties, 3,141 kidnap victims and 1,274 violent incidents between January and December 2025. Banditry alone accounted for 599 incidents and 2,724 casualties in 2025, a sharp rise from the 256 incidents and 1,585 casualties documented in 2024. The North East remained the epicentre of terrorism, with Borno State recording the highest number of terror incidents at 43 and 397 casualties over the year.
The 2026 figures have offered little immediate relief. Nextier’s data showed that 842 people were killed, 279 kidnapped and 156 violent incidents recorded in May 2026 alone. Measured against May 2025, that represented a 51.5 per cent rise in violent incidents, a 90.1 per cent increase in deaths and a 19.7 per cent jump in kidnappings. Earlier in the year, a tally by Vanguard put the death toll from violence at 1,258 between January 1 and February 10, 2026, a period that included the February 5 attack on Woro community in Kwara State, where assailants reportedly killed more than 100 people and abducted 176.
The kidnapping economy remains concentrated in the North West. Research by SBM Intelligence found that 2,938 people were abducted in the region between July 2024 and June 2025, more than 60 per cent of reported cases nationwide, with Zamfara recording 1,203, Kaduna 629, Katsina 566 and Sokoto 358.
Set against these figures are the military’s own claims of momentum. The Nigerian Army’s year end report for 2025 stated that troops rescued 1,023 kidnap victims and neutralised 305 bandits across Sokoto, Katsina, Kebbi and Zamfara under operations including Operation Fansan Yamma. Nationwide, the Army reported that security forces neutralised 20 terrorist commanders, arrested 4,375 suspects and rescued 2,336 people during the year. Fresh emerging threats, however, complicate the outlook, including the Sahel linked group Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin, which claimed its first attack in Nigeria in 2025, and Lakurawa, a group reportedly formed from an alliance of bandits and terrorists funded through ransom.
Funding has also drawn political attention. Members of the House of Representatives Minority Caucus have alleged that budgetary releases to defence and security agencies have remained below 30 per cent, arguing that under implementation was undermining operations against banditry, terrorism and kidnapping.
For now, the government’s message is one of continuity and confidence. “The support has been massive. To defeat the terrorists and the bandits is a whole of society approach. Nigerians have keyed into it, and things are getting better, and they will continue to improve,” Musa said. Whether the coming months bend the statistics toward that assurance, or away from it, is likely to shape the debate his denial has reopened.