Nigerian Army has said the arrest of three fraudulent candidates in Lagos is an indication of transparency in the recruitment process.
This is just as the authorities vowed to prosecute those trying to breach its recruitment process.
The director of army public relations Major General Onyema Nwachukwu stated this when he reacted to a viral video depicting the arrest of some fraudulent candidates of the ongoing 86 Regular Recruits Intake, who were caught attempting to short-change indigenous candidates of Lagos State through dubious means.
He said the arrest of the fraudulent candidates was a result of the commitment of the Nigeria Army in upholding a transparent and credible recruitment process in line with its core values of integrity and fairness.
“The video is a pointer to one of the processes to which the candidates were subjected, in order to ensure only true indigenes of a particular State are recruited, using the slots of that state and not non- indigenes.
“The video in itself therefore, clearly shows that the process is transparent, as the state representative, who is a prominent member of the recruitment team has been part and parcel of the process and was given unhindered access to do her job by scrutinizing the candidates’ state of origin, to ascertain the genuineness of their indigeneship claims”.
He explained that the duty of the state representative is to identify non-indigenes amongst candidates applying for recruitment and “this is applicable in other states of the federation”.
“We wish to inform the general public that the fraudulent act perpetrated by the three candidates who attempted to secure vacancies designated for candidates with Lagos State indigeneship is a serious breach of our recruitment process and will not be condoned.
“We want to assure the public that a thorough investigation will be conducted to ascertain the extent of these fraudulent activities and to identify any individual(s) or unscrupulous syndicate(s) involved” he said.
