NIGERIA — Nigeria’s Minister of Defence, Gen. Christopher Musa (retd.), stated on Thursday, September 3, 2026, that the vast geographic scale of terrorist hideouts, including the Sambisa Forest, has presented immense operational challenges for security forces attempting to rescue abducted victims.
Speaking during an appearance on Channels Television’s program Politics Today, Musa defended government counter-insurgency efforts and explained that security personnel are carrying out rescues on a daily basis despite difficult terrain. Okay News reports that Musa said, “Few ones now, efforts have been made. If you notice, on a daily basis now, we are really getting, rescuing a lot of them. Yeah, because, like I said, we have 923 square kilometres. So this government is overwhelmed. Sambisa Forest is as big as Belgium, as a country. So when people talk about this, they make it look as if it is one small football field and we are refusing to do anything.”
Musa noted that armed groups frequently move into dense forest belts immediately after committing abductions, allowing them to evade detection before security personnel receive actionable intelligence. He stated, “These places are massive areas. The forest within Kwara comes in from Burkina Faso to Benin Republic into Nigeria and flows through all these things. So what they do is that once these abductions are done, before the information gets to anybody, these guys are already into the forest.”
He added that security operations require significant tracking time due to the expansive territory. Regarding a recent operation in Kwara State, Musa stated that security forces quarantined the targeted zone to restrict the criminals’ movement and deny them essential supplies, leading to the successful retrieval of captives after terrorists abandoned them under sustained pressure.
In addition to physical containment operations, Musa indicated that payment trails from ransoms offer administrative leads to track criminal networks. He noted that the Central Bank of Nigeria is actively working to trace financial flows associated with illegal activities.
Musa also called on state governors to review the distribution of motorcycles as palliative materials. He cautioned that such vehicles could eventually be acquired by terrorist groups, thereby increasing their operational mobility across remote regions.
