‘Air Force should admit their mistake and not let it happen again’ – Senator Ndume

The Chairman, Senate committee on Millenium Development Goals, Senator Ali Ndume (PDP, Borno) has stated that his recent near death experience with the Nigerian Air Force whose fighter pilots dropped a bomb near his convoy was a mistake which was not happening the first time.

The Senator called on the Air Force to strengthen its capabilities to forestall a repeat of the incidences which he said had led to the amputation of the arm of a policeman in the past.

“Recounting his experience he said, As l was about to join the federal highway from Pulka to Gwosa, I heard a big explosion behind me. When l turned back, l saw the whole place covered by a thick smoke. Initially, l thought it was from Boko Haram. I even suspected some youths sitting by the side, thinking they were the ones that detonated a bomb probably planted on the highway.

“But I was told by the military detachment ahead of me that the bomb was thrown by airforce jet hovering over us. And there was, indeed, an airforce jet hovering over us around ten minutes after 2pm that day. Infact, l have the leftover shells of that bomb, about four of them. Even the villagers there took three of those bomb shells and kept with them and l took one as evidence. So l am surprised to hear different stories from the airforce spokesman after the authorities initially admitted that the bombing was a mistake on their part.

“Now they turned back to say nothing like that happened. My worry is that if that bomb had hit me, l will not be talking to you now. And that means there will be nobody that will be telling my side of the story. And it is unfortunate that the security agency, didn’t contact me or anybody in Pulka to cross check my claims. Any resident of Pulka and even the army base there, will tell you there was an explosion from the airforce jet that was hovering and we tried to establish communication with them. It is unfortunate that somebody will sit down in Abuja and, without doing his work or investigating what happened, will come out to say that something like that didn’t happen.”