Lawyer Aloy Ejimakor has said the reluctance of Igbo youths to enlist in the Nigerian armed forces is not a deficit of valour, but a calculated refusal to serve an institution they deeply mistrust.

He said this in a post on X after the Chief of Army Staff (COAS), Lieutenant General Waidi Shaibu, expressed concern over the persistently low enlistment of youths from the South-East geopolitical zone into the Nigerian Army.

Reacting, Ejimakor pointed out that history and current happenings show that Igbo people face systematic marginalisation within an ethnically unbalanced leadership structure in Nigeria’s security services.

The lawyer also stated that the armed forces are repeatedly weaponised against Ndigbo in times of crisis.

“The trauma of the 1967 army massacres of Ndigbo in the North remains an unhealed wound, constantly reopened by modern atrocities targeting youths suspected of IPOB ties, such as the state-sanctioned violence at Nkpor, the Aba prayer ground, Obigbo, the Trump victory rally in Port Harcourt, and many others,” he said.

He further stated that the youths are deeply appalled by the integration of “repentant” Boko Haram terrorists into the military.

“To ask them to bleed under a biased command, alongside former terrorists, is a compromise of dignity they refuse to make.

“So, their reluctance to enlist is not cowardice. Instead, it is a quiet, powerful protest against an institution that has often betrayed Ndigbo,” Ejimakor said.