Nigeria bought the SEPECAT Jaguar in 1983, during the oil-funded expansion that had already brought MiG-21s and C-130s. The order was for 13 single-seat Jaguar SN and five two-seat BN, export versions of the Anglo-French strike fighter, and deliveries began in 1984. According to Wikipedia, the aircraft were operated by a single squadron at Makurdi; the designation of that squadron is not given in the sources checked.

The Jaguar was the most capable strike aircraft Nigeria had owned, but it did not last. Wikipedia records that a second order for 18 more aircraft was cancelled, and that the fleet was withdrawn from use in 1991 as an economy measure, after only seven years. Fourteen of them, eleven single-seaters and three trainers, were later offered for sale as a bulk lot by the Inter Avia Group on behalf of the air force, and the sale failed.

The episode is the clearest example at Makurdi of the pattern that marked the air force in the 1990s: expensive aircraft bought in the boom years and then grounded for lack of money for spares and maintenance.

Nigeria’s first JF-17 arrived in pieces. On 21 March 2021, defenceWeb reported, video circulated of a Pakistan Air Force Il-76 transport, R09-001, unloading a JF-17 fuselage into a hangar believed to be at Makurdi. The three aircraft ordered carried the serials NAF-720, NAF-721 and NAF-722, and by the end of April defenceWeb judged the deliveries complete.

On 20 May 2021, as the air force marked its 57th anniversary, the three JF-17 Thunders were formally inducted at Makurdi Air Base. The Minister of Defence, Major General Bashir Magashi, represented President Muhammadu Buhari, and the Chief of the Air Staff, Air Marshal Oladayo Amao, received the aircraft from the manufacturer, Pakistan Aeronautical Complex.

The JF-17s joined the Chinese-built F-7NIs as the air force’s only supersonic fighters. Neither the operating squadron nor the role the three aircraft have flown since induction is described in the sources checked.

Makurdi is also where the attack helicopter fleet has been built up. On 30 April 2018 two Mi-35M helicopters arrived at NAF Base Makurdi aboard an Antonov An-124-100, their main and tail rotors removed for the flight, defenceWeb reported. They brought the number delivered to four of the twelve ordered; the first two had entered service in April 2017.

On 6 February 2024 Vice President Kashim Shettima inducted the first two Turkish T129 ATAK attack helicopters, NAF 500 and NAF 501, together with a Beechcraft King Air 360ER, NAF 205, at NAF Base Makurdi. The Chief of the Air Staff, Air Marshal Hasan Abubakar, presided. defenceWeb added that the T129s would be operated not at Makurdi but by 115 Special Operations Group at Port Harcourt.

The base is therefore best understood as a hub: aircraft are delivered, assembled and handed over here, then dispersed to the groups that fly them.

The twelve F-7NI and three FT-7NI fighters ordered from China in 2005 were delivered in 2009 and 2010 to replace the long-grounded MiG-21s. Keeping them flying has been difficult. In December 2020 defenceWeb listed Makurdi as the site of F-7NI reactivation work, alongside L-39 work at Kano, Alpha Jet depot maintenance at Kainji and C-130 maintenance at Ikeja.

On 14 July 2023 a two-seat FT-7NI crashed at Makurdi; both pilots ejected and were taken to hospital for observation, and a Board of Inquiry was set up. defenceWeb counted earlier losses on 22 March 2011, 11 May 2011, 3 May 2012 near Kaduna, 10 October 2015 near Yola and a mid-air collision on 29 September 2018 in which one pilot was killed.

For all the ceremonies, Makurdi is first an office: the headquarters from which Tactical Air Command runs the air war. On 28 October 2025 the chief of the South African Air Force, Lieutenant General Wiseman Mbambo, visited it with the Nigerian Air Force’s Chief of Operations, Air Vice Marshal Francis Edosa. defenceWeb reported that they were briefed on the command’s structure and its role in air surveillance, radar coverage and support for internal security operations, and watched a static and aerial display at 131 Engineering Group.

The base is also a town of air force families. On 18 September 2026 the air force commissioned a 30-flat block for married non-commissioned officers at NAF Base Makurdi, the Chief of the Air Staff linking decent housing directly to operational effectiveness.