DSS Fires 57 Cadet For Failing Screening

The Department of State Service, DSS, last week, dismissed 57 cadet officers undergoing training at its training institute in Lagos for failing a screening exercise ordered by the service.

Sources told LEADERSHIP Sunday that the DSS top leadership discovered that some of the trainees did not meet the service entry requirements including academic qualifications and physical fitness.

The dismissed officers form part of about 430 personnel participating in the Cadet Officers Basic Course 28 of 2014 code-named COBC28/2014. The cadets were expected to graduate as Senior Intelligence Officers after training.

It was further gathered that some of the affected men and women were recruited into the Service through undue influence of senior officials in the service who facilitated their recruitment into the DSS.

The 57 recruits, it was learnt, had been in the training institute since December 2014 for a 10-months training programme, and had undergone basic intelligence and counter-terrorism training before they were fished out last week and shown the institute’s gate.

LEADERSHIP Sunday also gathered that the dismissal of the trainee officers was part of the “pruning and restructuring” of the DSS being embarked upon by the new director-general of the Service, Lawal Daura.

“The 57 trainees that were dismissed failed the screening that was conducted for all the recruits at the training institute. The DG was informed about some of the anomalies in the recruitment exercise and he ordered a screening which led to the sacking of those that failed”, the source said.