A policeman has gunned down a soldier, Donatus Vonkong, a Warrant Officer of the Nigerian Army attached to the Operation Hadin Kai at the Shehu of Borno palace in Maiduguri.
Sources told Daily Trust that the policeman was under the influence of alcohol at the time of the incident.
The late soldier, according to a source who confided in Sahara Reporters, was credited with saving the Shehu of Borno from a suicide attack in 2012.
Vonkong was said to have noticed the policeman behaving as one under the influence of a substance and initially made attempt to disarm him, but left him alone.
Not long after, the policeman was said to have started shooting erratically, striking the soldier on the cheek in the process.
Aggrieved youths in the vicinity became restless and vowed to hunt down any policeman in sight.
The military is however calling for calm, adding that the incident does not suggest any inter-agency rivalry between security agencies.
When contacted, the Director of Defence Information, Maj.-Gen. Jimmy Akpor described the incident as an “isolated case”.
Promising that thorough investigations will be launched to prevent a recurrence, Akpor also revealed that there are mechanisms for handling such cases among all the security agencies.
He said: “In any case, when things like this happen, it could be accidental, but there are procedures for handling such issues. It does not suggest inter-agency conflicts. This is an isolated issue, and when they do occur, the various services have mechanisms for handling them.
“And I’m very sure that Operation HADIN Kai will investigate and carry out the necessary clear mechanism to ensure that it does not happen again. The most important thing is that we guide against future occurrences.
“There are mechanisms for handling such issues, it does not in any way portray conflicts between the military and the police. After all, they are all deployed together for the overall efforts of counter-insurgency operations over there.”
