During a recent Senate plenary session, on Wednesday December 3, 2025, Senate President Godswill Akpabio brought to light a concerning incident involving the capture and subsequent killing of Brigadier General SM Uba Musa by Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP) terrorists in Damboa, Borno State.
According to Akpabio, the senior military officer reportedly issued a distress call for rescue during an ambush, providing his precise coordinates to colleagues in an attempt to facilitate extraction. However, this critical information allegedly fell into the hands of the terrorists, enabling them to locate and execute him swiftly.
This revelation, shared during discussions on escalating insecurity, has raised significant concerns regarding potential internal sabotage within Nigeria’s security apparatus and highlights vulnerabilities in communication protocols during ongoing counter-terrorism operations.
Akpabio’s comments emerged amidst broader scrutiny of recent security lapses, including the abduction of 25 female students and the killing of a school vice principal in Maga, Kebbi State. He underscored reports indicating that troops, who had received prior intelligence of an impending attack on the school, conducted emergency training for pupils only to withdraw abruptly 30 minutes before the kidnappers struck, thereby granting the assailants unhindered access.
The Senate President called for accountability, questioning the source of the withdrawal order and its rationale, emphasizing that such decisions facilitated the unchecked removal of children. This incident, coupled with General Uba’s case, has prompted the upper chamber to establish an ad hoc committee to investigate the Safe School Initiative funding and failures in the chain of command, reflecting a parliamentary commitment to transparency in military deployments.
Further complicating the narrative, Akpabio alluded to the possibility of deliberate compromise within General Uba’s unit, suggesting that an insider may have relayed the shared coordinates to ISWAP fighters, leading to the ambush and execution. Military sources corroborated that the general was captured alive, briefly interrogated, and subsequently killed.
Rescue efforts, including Nigerian Air Force airstrikes, managed to extract other troops but arrived too late for him. The Senate observed a minute of silence in his honor, alongside the Kebbi victims, while resolutions called for the emergency recruitment of 100,000 additional personnel to bolster anti-terrorism capabilities. Akpabio reiterated the Senate’s firm stance against ransom payments or negotiations with terrorists, advocating instead for technological advancements such as drone surveillance to preempt such ambushes.
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