Army chief laments corpses in force’s mortuaries decomposing over power outage

The Chief of Army Staff, Lt-Gen. Taoreed Lagbaja, on Friday, lamented that corpses in mortuaries of some Nigerian Army barracks across the country are decomposing due to a power outage.

The COAS stated this when he visited the Minister of Power, Adebayo Adelabu, in Abuja.

He was in the minister’s office to seek intervention on the N42 billion owed to the Abuja Electricity Distribution Company (AEDC).

AEDC had given 83 Ministries, Departments, and Agencies (MDAs) in its franchise a 10-day notice to pay their debts or risk disconnection.

Lagbaja noted that some barracks and cantonments have been in total blackout since January.

He said: “Corpses in the army mortuaries are decomposing and the owners of the corpses are protesting.

“Debt owed is loaded on the meter. So no matter the amount of credit we put in, the meters pick it up automatically.

“It is impossible for the army to raise funds to pay the entire debt. Therefore, we solicit for liquidation as was done in 2005 by the then president.”

He assured the minister of the army’s unflinching support for the Federal Government’s efforts to check vandalism of electricity infrastructure.

In his remark, the minister promised to dialogue with the Electricity Distribution Companies (DisCos) to relieve the army of its debt burden.

He, however, said the debts would not be written off.

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