Troops of the Nigerian Army have neutralised many bandits and destroyed their camps in coordinated operations in Bauchi, Governor Bala Mohammed has confirmed.

Mr Mohammed, while briefing journalists at the end of a closed-door security meeting on Monday in Bauchi, said the military conducted successful operations in synergy with the Police, other security agencies and vigilantes.

“The operations routed bandits’ enclaves in Dajin Malam Forest linking Bauchi, Plateau and Taraba. The troops neutralised thousands of bandits, destroyed camps and motorcycles. They also disrupted their supply routes, forcing many of them to flee.

“The troops dismantled several bandit camps. Four warplanes bombed the bandits and successfully cleared several camps, disrupting criminal activities within the forests. Several bandits were neutralised while others fled under sustained military pressure.

“Several motorcycles used by the criminals were destroyed, limiting their mobility and operational capability,” he said.

Mr Mohammed said the state government had provided a temporary surrender window to the bandits and urged them to lay down their arms to consolidate recent security gains.

“We are calling on those still hiding to surrender within this period. This is not amnesty, but a chance to return and reintegrate under the government supervision,” the Bauchi governor said.

He said that arrangements were being made to relocate surrendered bandits and their families, adding that most of them were not indigenes of Bauchi.

The governor announced plans to conduct a biometric data capture of residents in the affected communities as part of broader security reforms to end banditry and ensure peace and stability.

Mr Mohammed said the government would adopt strict surveillance mechanisms, intelligence-led monitoring and verification of activities in markets, motor parks and public spaces.

He said his government would also strengthen community-based security systems by recruiting and supporting vigilantes to complement security agencies.

The governor said the biometric data profiling would be conducted in collaboration with the National Identity Management Commission and other relevant agencies to ensure proper documentation and monitoring of population movements in high-risk areas.

According to Mr Mohammed, the measures aim to prevent the existence of ungoverned spaces that could serve as safe havens for criminal elements.

“We are taking these measures to ensure that no space is left ungoverned or unmonitored, so that criminal elements cannot regroup or threaten our communities again,” the governor said.

(NAN)

After 15 years, Tim Cook will hand off the Apple CEO role to John Ternus, the company’s senior vice president of hardware engineering. Starting on September 1, Ternus will lead one of the world’s most valuable companies, but if you’re not a dedicated Apple enthusiast, you’ve probably never heard of this man, who has largely remained out of the spotlight until now.

How long has John Ternus worked at Apple?

Ternus has worked at Apple for nearly half of his life — now 51 years old, he has been with the company for 25 years.

He joined Apple’s product design team in 2001 as only his second job out of college (his first was at a small maker of virtual reality devices called Virtual Research Systems). By 2013, Ternus was a VP of hardware engineering, and was promoted to the SVP role in 2021. Ternus — who is 15 years younger than Cook — was among the youngest of top Apple executives who had been rumored as a possible successor, implying that Apple could be looking for someone to lead the company for a long time. After all, Apple has only had two CEOs in this millennium, so it seems that leadership continuity is important to the company.

Ternus reports to Cook, whom he considers a mentor, and leads all of hardware engineering at Apple. That’s a pretty big deal for a company that’s known for ubiquitous hardware like the iPhone and the MacBook.

In his 2024 commencement speech at his alma mater, the University of Pennsylvania’s engineering school, Ternus reflected on the lessons he learned at Apple, which perhaps can tell us a bit about his character — or at least a sanitized version of it.

“Always assume you’re as smart as anyone else in the room, but never assume that you know as much as they do,” Ternus said in the speech. “With this mindset, you’ll find the confidence you need to push forward, but more importantly, the humility to ask questions.”

In a tech ecosystem populated with abrasive egos, it’s refreshing to hear Ternus utter the word “humility.” Better yet, he doesn’t appear to have an X account.

What projects did John Ternus lead at Apple?

Ternus’s earliest project at Apple involved scrutinizing parts for the Apple Cinema Display, an early desktop monitor.

“At some point in my first year, I found myself at a supplier facility. I was far away from home. Well past midnight, I was using a magnifying glass to count the number of grooves on the head of a screw […] and I was arguing with the supplier because these parts had 35 grooves. They were supposed to have 25,” Ternus recalled in his commencement speech. “I distinctly remember stepping back for a minute and thinking, ‘What the hell am I doing? Is this normal?’”

As Ternus climbed the corporate ladder, his responsibilities grew. He may no longer spend as much time analyzing screws, but he still seems to take pride in getting the little details right. In a recent interview, when Ternus was asked about his favorite memory of Steve Jobs, he mentioned the former Apple co-founder’s attention to craftsmanship.

“[Jobs] was moving a piece of furniture, a chest of drawers, and pulled it away from the wall and looked at the back and was just reflecting on, you know, that the carpenter who made it had made it beautiful,” Ternus said. “It finished the back as beautifully as the rest of it, even though nobody was going to see it, right? And I think about that all the time because I think that perfectly exemplifies what we do here.”

From there, he went on to lead the hardware development behind products across the Apple ecosystem, overseeing launches like AirPods, Apple Watch, and the Vision Pro. He also had a hand in major technical upgrades at Apple, like Apple’s transition from Intel chips to its own proprietary Apple silicon.

Most recently, Ternus was involved in the production of the MacBook Neo, Apple’s new, more affordable laptop model that lowers costs through some clever tradeoffs in hardware design, like using an iPhone chip to power the device.

“We never want to ship junk. We want to ship great products that have that Apple experience, that Apple quality. To do that with the Neo required building something completely new from the ground up […] leveraging both the technologies we’d been developing like Apple silicon, but also the kind of expertise that we’ve developed over many, many years of building Macs, and building phones, and building iPads, and all of these things,” Ternus told Tom’s Guide.

As CEO, Ternus will have to steer Apple through its challenge to catch up in the AI race and figure out what to do with the underlying tech behind the Vision Pro.

What else do we know about John Ternus?

Ternus was on the swimming team at Penn. For his senior project, he built a feeding arm that people with quadriplegia could control with head movements.

According to public records of political donations, Ternus donated $2,900 to Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) in 2021.

Otherwise, Ternus has maintained a relatively low profile.