Travails of soldier who lost marriage to Boko Haram

‘Before I came back, she had married another soldier because she thought Boko Haram had killed me ‘

Daniel Anokwuru

Aside from the general experience that the public knows about what soldiers face in battlefield, which comprises endangering their lives, fighting and living under harsh condition, there is also a hidden challenge they face at home. This challenge borders on the emotional. It sometimes leads to depression. Those caught up in this mental trauma usually take to excess alcoholic drinking, just as is also the case with some civilians, to forget their sorrow.

One theatre of such emotional distress is the insurgency war currently ravaging the northern part of the country. It has separated many families and consumed millions of naira. Some of the families were separated by war, while some died a natural death, out of fear of the unknown. Even when not in the warfront, military families often deal with the stress of almost always being on the move or the absence of a parent.

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Deployment to war creates additional issues for a family to handle. This emotional cycle of deployment begins when the news is broken to the family. It starts with a short period of emotions. Family members have diverse feelings like panic, wondering if their loved one would ever return alive. This is besides loneliness and additional responsibilities.

One of such unsavoury stories about the effect of war on soldiers concerns Lance Corporal Joseph (other names withheld). When he left his military base in Lagos State, in 2011, to Lokoja, Kogi State, he never knew that the deployment would cause the end of his nine years old marriage. The fate that befell him was like a scene from the Roman movie, Salem, where Captain John Alden, went to war, leaving his pregnant wife, Mary Sibley, behind. Before Alden came back, after seven years, Mary had married his old nemesis, George Sibley. Her excuse was that, she thought that John had died in the battle, not knowing that the enemies captured him.

Corporal Joseph faced a serious mental trauma because, according to him, he left Lagos without knowing that he would stay for years. He landed in Lokoja where they spent two years. He said after the two years, they were told that they would proceed to  243 battalion, Monguno Barracks in Borno State to keep watch over the barracks, which had been attacked by Boko Haram insurgents. He said they were told that they would spend another two weeks there because most of the soldiers at Monguno Barracks had gone for United Nations (UN) Peace Keeping in Liberia when the insurgents struck. However, he said instead of Monguno Barracks, they were later taken to Maimalari Cantonment in Maiduguri and from there to Chad Basin for the insurgency war.

Joseph said his worst trauma started when their cell phones were collected from them upon their arrival at Maiduguri and that, that was the last time he spoke with his family for two years. He said that he spent five years in all without setting eyes on his family since the seven days off they were allowed was not enough for the journey from Lake Chad to Lagos and back.

The distraught soldier noted that his salary was stopped for months and as his wife was no longer receiving alert of his salary, she assumed that Boko Haram had killed him. So, she returned their two children, a boy and a girl, to Joseph’s mother and married another soldier in another battalion.

Upon returning from war, Joseph faced a lot of mental trauma plus the experience he had at the battlefield. He was left with no option but thinking of taking his own life. To worsen his plight, his beloved wife had got married to another soldier.

According to him: “In 2011, we were taken to Lokoja in Kogi State, from Lagos. That was when a bomb manufacturing plant was discovered in the state. We were there from 2011 to 2012. Then I was communicating with my wife occasionally because she was scared, as we never envisaged spending up to four years on the assignment. Around March 2013, when Boko Haram dislodged Monguno Barracks in Borno State, that was 243 Battalion, they took the military wives and children away. Soldiers from different units formed a battalion. They told us in Lokoja that we would spend another two weeks there, because soldiers in the barracks had gone for United Nations (UN) Peace Keeping in Liberia when the insurgents struck. We later went to Maimalari Cantonment in Maiduguri.

“Immediately we arrived, they issued us materials. As they are issuing you materials, they are collecting your cell phone immediately for security reasons. After collecting the phones, we went to Chad Basin,” he said.

“The night we arrived Chad Basin, they seized all communications network. That was during former President, Goodluck Jonathan’s regime. They seized the network for one year; they extended it for another one year, making it two years. While fighting there, the military authority stopped our salaries. For months, nothing entered the account because I had left my Master Card with my wife because I didn’t know what would be my fate when we left Lagos.

“As she was no longer receiving alert of my salaries, she believed that I had been killed by Boko Haram, because it is only when a soldier fighting war dies that they can stop his salary. And my wife knows this fact very well. She had married another soldier before they resumed payment of our salaries. I spent five years in all. It was when I came back and went to my block that I did not see my wife and children. I went to my mother’s house and saw my children. I was not having a cell phone again. I would have called her immediately. It was my mother that told me that she returned my children and married another soldier. She said there was no communication for years, and they stopped my salary too; that meant that Boko Haram had killed me.”

Joseph added that: “Many soldiers from my unit had broken homes. When she returned my children, my mother asked her how she got to know that I had been killed. She said she understood the way the military works. On hearing this, I developed high blood pressure. I took to alcoholic consumption to forget my sorrow. After what I saw at the battlefield in the North, I came back, only to discover that my family had been scattered. I was in a serious pain, I started life all over again.”

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Joseph, who is still looking very devastated and emotionally depressed, said he thanks God that he has recovered from the shock, and he is alive to tell the story.

Joseph’s predicament is simply one of the many reasons Nigerian security personnel deserve better living conditions and remuneration, more than what is obtainable today. The risks they go through, serving and securing their fatherland is unquantifiable.

When the reporter visited the Headquarters of the Nigerian Army, 81 Division, on Thursday, July 25, 2019, to get their reaction, on his predicament, he was told that the boss for the unit was not available. The reporter requested for his phone number from the officer at the reception, Omoruyi M. but he declined, saying that the number was not available.

He  eventually got the number through another channel. On his reaction, Lt. Colonel Daudu told the reporter when contacted that the first step the military usually takes when a battalion is coming back from battle is to rehabilitate them, adding that the military has been doing that.

When pressed further on whether it is normal tradition to redeploy soldiers from their place of mission to another assignment and leave them to spend years without returning to their base, he told the reporter that the question was not clear.

However, he requested that the reporter should get the section Joseph belongs to enable him to better understand the question. The reporter did but Dauda was yet to respond at the time of filing this report.