Nigeria Buries Army Chief Ibrahim Attahiru After Plane Crash

Nigeria continues to mourn following the funeral of top-ranking army commander Lieutenant General Ibrahim Attahiru on Saturday In Abuja, a day after he and 10 other officers died when their plane crashed in bad weather.

It was the third military air disaster this year and the army posted videos on social networks of the service attended by political and military leaders at the national mosque.

Army chief of staff Attahiru was appointed by Buhari last January in a shakeup of the senior command to better fight surging violence and a more than decade-long jihadist insurgency.

Attahiru died as news emerged that Nigeria’s Boko Haram jihadist leader Abubakar Shekau had himself been seriously wounded or possibly killed after clashes with a rival Islamic State-allied faction.

Attahiru was in charge of leading the frontline offensive against Shekau in 2017.

Speaking at the funeral, Lucky Irabor, Nigeria Chief of Defense Staff said 21st day of May 2021, was a very sad day for the Armed Forces as one of their finest and best pilots was conveying him along with the entourage.

He said the war against insecurity must be won, truly must be won and asked Nigerians to continue praying for them.

Nigeria’s military has been battling an Islamist insurgency in the northeast since 2009, a conflict that has killed more than 40,000 and displaced around two million more.

Attahiru had once been in charge of leading the frontline offensive against Boko Haram’s commander Shekau in the northeast in 2017.