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Osinbajo urges NDA to produce warrior-scholars, innovators
Vice President Yemi Osinbajo has urged the Nigerian Defence Academy (NDA) to train and produce warrior-scholars and innovators as its assignment goes beyond the training of combatants.
Osinbajo was the Special Guest of Honour at the 32nd Convocation Ceremony of NDA in honour of Cadets of 69 Regular Course, Post Graduate Students and Honorary Degree Awardees on Tuesday, in Kaduna.
The vice president said that with the trend of crime globally, it had become imperative for NDA products to be equipped with the requisite knowledge to protect the Nigerian digital domain.
In his words, “The mission of the NDA is not just to train combatants but to produce warrior-scholars in the finest martial-intellectual traditions.
“It has fallen on you to be the generation of warrior-scholars and innovators that will confront our enemies with an arsenal of unconventional skills, unorthodox strategies and critical thinking.
“It has fallen on you to be thought-leaders that will advance development both on and off the battlefield.”
Osinbajo listed the signposts and contexts of this new security environment.
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He said, first, the military must prepare to contend with the mix of asymmetric conflicts, hybrid warfare, insurgencies and armed criminal activities perpetrated by criminal non-state actors.
“These, are conflicts that are novel in their viciousness, but dated in their origins – they include the new threats of mass kidnapping for ransom and military leverage, the use of victims as human shields.
“We now have to deal with the access that these criminal gangs and insurgents have, to sophisticated weapons, and lethal ordinance, the new possibilities of access to even more lethal and more devastating weaponry from the dark web and an ever-growing economy in illegal arms and ammunition.
“How do you engage a vicious lawless enemy along the lines of the Geneva Convention? What are the new rules of engagement with well-equipped criminal non-state actors?
“The second context that we must take note of is the realities of living in the digital age; digitisation has created a whole new world, cyberspace, where all transactions and activity commercial, social, financial, and even crucial military intelligence take place,” he said.
