Insecurity: Security Specialist Calls For Establishment Of Arms Control Agency

By Frank Oshanugor

As Nigeria’s security forces continue to engage kidnappers, bandits, terrorists and other violent criminals in battle of wits, a security specialist, Mr. Matthew Ibadin has called for the urgent establishment of what he described as Arms Control and Licensing Authority to descalate the increasing circulation of small arms and light weapons in the country.

In a statement in Lagos on Tuesday, the Badison Security Chief Executive Offficer noted that kidnapping of Citizens in the last nine years has become the order of the day with incressed
frequency and intensity of such abductions across the country in the last two months of December 2023 and January 2024, especially in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja.

According to him, the Federal Government through the Act of National Assembly should establish the Arms Control and Licensing Authority to be in charge of documenting all illegal arms intercepted by the Nigerian Customs Service or those recovered from unauthorized persons.

“All arms collected or seized from criminals should be in the custody of the Arms Control Agency and Authority with a view of ascertaining at any point in time the number of illegal arms recovered from various parts of the country.

While commending the various security agencies particularly the military and the police for doing their best, he pointed out that a lot more was expected from them.
Going forward, he suggested that the focus should be on evolving a detailed security architecture with the police being at the nucleus of co-coordinating all anti kidnapping operations in the country.

The Badison Security boss also emphasized the need for police personnel across all ranks to continuously engage in training and retraining with a view to technologically upgrade themselves.

On the issue of the existing centralized police structure, Ibadin posited that decentralization of the existing federal policing structure was long overdue and must be holistically pursued with patriotic vigour in contemporary time.

While rooting for a decentralised police structure which in other words is state police structure, Ibadin who is also currently a post-graduate student at the Nigerian Defence Academy (NDA) Kaduna stated that the poor remuneration, low training and lack of modern digitalized training for the Nigerian police personnel has helped to dampen the morale of the average police officer.

He urged the National Assembly to urgently take a proactive legislative step that would remove policing system from the exclusive list to the concurrent and residual list adding that for effective policy implementation, the state government, local government and communities must take the lead at creating and managing a police system that is fit and customized for their peculiar local needs.

“The state should enact a law that makes it easy for the police to secure a warrant to search any house in the country.
Divisional police stations should be established down to the outpost level while operational hubs for police should be established at all existing toll gates across the federation.”

To assist in solving the current operational logistics challenges that police often encounter, the security chieftain suggested that all vehicles seized by the EFCC, Customs and even the police should officially be given to the police and must be branded and documented at the zonal police headquarters.

He also recommended that to address the issue of low morale currently pervasive among police personnel, a minimum wage of N250, 000 should be approved for the police, explaining that such gesture would invariably attract high quality recruits into the Nigeria Police Force.

As a measure towards finding all embracing solutions to insecurity in the country, he also advised government to license Private Investigators (PI) as it is obtainable in other parts of the world even as he enjoined government to under-study African nations like Kenya.

“It is instructive to note that it is also in the Police Act that Private Investigator should be licensed to operate.
Ibadin also advocated that, responsible citizens should be allowed to bear arms as a first line of defense in our national security architecture.

Said he, “Senior Citizens, Senior Advocates of Nigeria, Executive Directors, Managing Directors, Security Consultants, licensed Private Investigators, senior civil servants and lecturers, local government chairmen, Counselors, captains of industries, traditional rulers and their security personnel should be profiled and allowed to bear arms. Moreso, traditional institutions should have a legislative security role to protect their subjects in collaboration with the local police.”

The Badison boss noted the place of private security outfits in the country and advised that they can be involved in the fight against banditry and kidnappers since they operate at grass root level.

With respect to the correctional intentions of government for all convicted and imprisoned criminals, Ibadin posited that the Nigerian Correctional Centres need to be reformed to mitigate the current situation of producing hardened criminals instead of reformed citizens after they come out of the system.

The security chieftain also posited that as a matter of urgency, President Bola Tinubu should look into the quality of the military’s recruitment of ‘repented’ Boko Haram elements into Nigeria armed forces “with a view to ensuring that they do not act as conduit of sabotage.

He noted the exemplary efforts of some Nigerians towards fighting Insecurity in the country and said that the Lagos State Government and notable Nigerian businessmen like Mr. Femi Otedola and Mr. Aliko Dangote should be appreciated for their enormous efforts at supporting the police regularly.