The Ministry of Defence’s civilian staff, under the Joint Executive Council, have closed the ministry’s headquarters in the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja.
The action is a response to allegations of lawless soldiers brutalising civilians.
It was reported that the protest began early Monday morning, with hundreds of civilian employees barricading the entrance of the ministry.
In response to the brutalisation, the President of the Council, Didam Joel, stated that a civilian staff member of the ministry had been detained by military authorities for a month, despite not being military personnel.
He added that an assistant director from the ministry, working at Command Secondary School in Ojo, Lagos, was also brutalised yesterday, disregarding civil service rules.
Joe said that the joint executive council consisted of all affiliate unions representing the civilian staff in the Ministry of Defence..
Meanwhile, a member of the Association of Senior Civil Servants of Nigeria (ASCSN) in the army, Abuja, told Channel TV that one of the civilians brutalised on Monday by a private soldier under the command of Lt. Akubor was Ambrose Akhigbe.
The victim is to be currently in the hospital.
He also alleged that a laboratory scientist in the Naval Reference Hospital, at Navy Town, Ojo, Lagos, was “brutally killed” barely two months.
“We were at the heat of it, the person controlling the current crop of soldiers in all command schools in Lagos including some civilian PSOs, are backing these shameful acts of killing MOD staff at duty posts.
“We therefore demand the complete overhaul of the command schools by returning the schools to their original structure of standard school system, to be headed by professional education officers in the Ministry of Defence and they can only provide security if they wish.
“The management of MOD should be aware that we are not backing down on this as we don’t know who is next,” the ASCSN official said.