(Bloomberg) -- Nigerian Chief of Army Staff Taoreed Lagbaja has died following a period of illness, the presidency said.
Lagbaja, 56, passed away in Lagos, the nation’s commercial capital, on Tuesday night after serving 37 years in the Nigerian army, presidency spokesman Bayo Onanuga said in a statement Wednesday.
President Bola Tinubu appointed Lagbaja as chief of army staff on June 19, 2023. Lagbaja enrolled in the Nigerian Defence Academy in 1987 and was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the nation’s infantry corp in 1992.
Tinubu last week appointed Olufemi Oluyede as acting army chief, with authorities elevating him to the rank of lieutenant general yesterday.
The Nigerian government is struggling to contain widespread violence that’s threatening security and crippling economic activity in multiple parts of the country, including farmer-herder conflicts in the north central region, Islamist insurgents that carry out kidnappings and attacks in the northeast, and a secessionist movement in the southeast.
(Updates with acting army chief in fourth paragraph.)
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