The Nigerian military is set to deploy more fighter jets to the country’s troubled regions as a way of complementing the efforts of ground troops, the air force chief said on Saturday.

As a result, the Nigerian air force is currently carrying out repairs on some aircraft which had been long abandoned at some military bases in the country, Sadique Abubakar, the chief of air force told reporters in the southern city of Port Harcourt.

While the extremist group Boko Haram has been destabilizing the northeast region of the country for over a decade now, armed groups have recently become a hard nut to crack in the northwest region, carrying out deadly attacks and kidnapping of citizens, among other crimes, according to Abubakar.

He said the fighters jets will be specifically deployed to these two regions, to curtail the crimes being perpetrated there.

“The Nigerian Air Force is mobilizing every asset in our inventory to ensure that we secure Nigeria and the Nigerian people from internal and external aggression,” the military official said.

He said, among other aircraft, an EC135 attack helicopter which was damaged during an operation three years ago, had been reactivated and set for an air display.

Others, he said, are at different stages of completion to make the country secure, peaceful and stable.