A former Field Commander of Operation Safe Haven, Operation Safe Haven, Major General Anthony Atolagbe (retd.), has explained that armed bandits often abduct civilians to serve as human shields against military action.
Atolagbe shared this during an interview on Prime Time aired on Arise Television on Tuesday, the 10th of March, 2026.
He spoke while discussing the worsening security situation across the country.
According to him, kidnappings follow a familiar pattern used by armed groups to strengthen their hold inside remote camps.
“The bandits have a pattern of taking people into their enclave, just to use them as sex slaves, but also as shields for negotiation.
“What I can say also is that I will not be able to dwell on specifics. But in Sambisa, some abducted people were freed. In fact, the first thing that happened was that over 100 of them escaped, based on the heat that was brought on the adversary.
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“Now, what is playing out is that these guys are being dislodged, and when they are dislodged, and they lose contact with all these women and these men that are running, who are sex slaves and liberals for them within the theater or wherever they are in their enclaves, what happens is that they try to move to other locations where they think they will be safe.
“And the next thing is to start looking for who they can also grab and bring into their new locations.
“The other side is that it is also another strategy by those that are expecting the arrival of the military that are coming into their enclaves to come and chase them out by using some of these people as human shields when the military approach their location.
“So you see that the analysis has brought it out that they have a pattern that they always want to take people into their enclave, not just to use them as slaves or whatever, but they will also want to use them to negotiate,” the retired military officer said.