BEYOND THE SEIZURE OF ILLICIT WEAPONS

Security agencies must do more to secure the nation

Ordinarily, peace and order are only guaranteed because citizens surrender their right of self-defence to the overarching force of the state. Once this shield of collective sovereign protection and security begins to cave in, individual citizens resort to self-defence hence the proliferation of illegal arms across the country. With Libya identified by the Nigerian Financial Intelligence Unit (NFIU) as a source of inflow of some of these illicit weapons, authorities in the country must do more than mere lamentation. “Nigeria faces a significant internal crisis of banditry and kidnapping linked to terrorism and that the flow of weapons from Libya is a source of concern and is also directly associated with the escalation of Nigeria’s internal security crisis,” the NFIU Chief Executive Officer, Hafsat Abubakar Bakari, said last week.

The revelation about Libya was not shocking considering what most Nigerians already know about our porous borders. “There are about 364 approved international border points in Nigeria with about 261 in the Northeast and Northwest regions,” a former Chief of Defence Staff, General Lucky Irabor, once revealed. “Out of this 261, only 124 are manned leaving the remaining 137 unmanned by security agencies.”  It is no surprise that we witness an influx of arms flow from Libya. But the problem is not only from the land borders. Given the overwhelming level of insecurity in the country, efforts should be made to contain the proliferation of small arms and light weapons (SALW). And it must begin from source.

Hardly a week passes that the Nigeria Customs Services (NCS) would not announce seizure of large cache of arms and ammunition. In July, the Service intercepted and seized 844 units of rifles, and 112,500 pieces of live ammunition valued at N4.17 billion being smuggled into the country through the Onne Port.  According to the NCS Comptroller the seized items include 764 units of Tomahawk Jojef Magnum Black Pump Action Rifles, 10 units of VC Verney Carron Gunmakers Jojef Magnum silver pump-action rifles, 50 units of VC Verney Caron Gunmaker double-barrel rifles, and many more. Adewale Adeniyi who disclosed that the weapons were concealed using various items such as doors, furniture, plumbing fittings, and leather bags.

Nigeria, according to most reports, accounts for at least 70 per cent of the illegal SALWs circulating within the West African sub-region most of them in the hands of sundry criminal cartels and lone wolves. It stands to reason that with access to abundant illegal weapons the rogue elements in our midst have become more fortified and hence less amenable to entreaties to make peace. With these illegal firearms, violent crime is no longer just social deviance but a thriving enterprise by many unscrupulous Nigerians with dire consequences for peace and national security. To counterbalance the threat to life and property by these armed criminals, individual citizens have resorted to the acquisition of arms for personal security and protection. In several communities around the country, the deployment of armed vigilantes and traditional hunters armed with modern weapons has become commonplace.  

The proliferation of arms in civilian hands is perhaps the readiest sign that the Nigerian state has vastly receded in terms of ability to defend its territory as well as the lives and property of citizens. Since Nigeria has no constitutional provision on the right to bear arms, all such weapons in the hands of civilians remain illegal except the few that are licensed. While the state officially remains the ultimate protector of the citizenry, it is a task that can only be performed by paying serious attention to what happens at our borders.