President Muhammadu Buhari has said that Nigeria and her neighbors must place higher premium on the effective policing of borders. According to him, the fragile nature of entry points into various countries enhance terrorism, economic sabotage, and illicit flow of arms. With the rate of Insecurity skyrocketing and the 2023 general elections fast approaching, the policing of Nigerian borders can determine how the country fairs in the following months. There have been reports that terrorists and bandits, who engage in guerrilla warfare, come from neighboring countries to attack soft targets and run back to where they came.
On Thursday at the State House in Abuja while Buhari was hosting Dr. Kunio Mikuriya, the Secretary-General of World Customs Organization (WCO), who is visiting Nigeria for a global conference on fragile borders. He commended Dr. Mikuriya for his fourth visit to Nigeria and said that this visit came at a time that Nigeria was preparing for general elections. “I have made it a cardinal commitment to ensure each Nigerian is able to exercise their franchise by participating in a free and fair election, in true practice of our relatively nascent democracy,” he said.
General elections take place in a peaceful and conducive atmosphere.
Buhari also said that the objective of his administration is to ensure that these general elections take place in a peaceful and conducive atmosphere, despite all the usual excitement and gamesmanship that is known to occur during election campaigning. The theme of the global conference that Dr. Mikuriya is attending is entitled, “Enabling Customs in Fragile and Conflict-Affected Situations.” The president said that this is of critical importance for Nigeria as a country as her citizens go to the polls.
He said that this is equally important to most countries on the continent. In fact, he said that it is quite frankly the singular most concerning sub-issue in Nigeria’s Security agenda. “The fragility of our borders has been a major Achilles heel in our fight against terrorism, economic sabotage and illicit flow of small and light weapons,” he added. He expressed his gladness that the WCO has dedicated an entire conference to the subject and theme. Thus, the organization not only recognizes its importance but also dedicates working sessions and brainstorming around it. The WCO also invited great thought leaders to dissect the issues and explore how African nations can address this problem, given our unique set of circumstances while also pursuing our joint and collective ideas of an interconnected continent via Trade and movement of goods and services.
President briefed WCO Secretary-General on efforts to combat fragile borders.
Additionally, the president highlighted some of the government’s efforts in combating the challenges of fragile borders. They include: the National Security strategy 2019, which promotes close inter-agency co-operation and the National Counter-Terrorism strategy, which mandates the Nigerian Customs Service to support other agencies of government in fighting terrorism; support for the armed forces in launching operations to secure Nigeria’s borders; demonstration of a strong political will to support Nigeria Customs Service as a critical agency of state in the discharge of its security and Revenue mandates, and more.
Continuing on, President Buhari also mentioned the approval of the Federal Executive Council for a new Customs Modernization Project that actively promotes the integration of Technology into border operations, and the ongoing effort to review the Customs enabling law to strengthen the Nigerian Customs Service and provide stiffer sanctions against Smuggling and other criminal acts. He hoped that the conference will seek to understand the operating environment that exists around countries who struggle with fragile borders and see how comprehensive and exhaustive solutions can be proposed to deal with the multi-pronged nature of the challenges.
Mikuriya said Nigeria plays an active role in the WCO.
WCO is described as a 184-member worldwide organization. According to Dr. Mikuriya, Nigeria plays an active and vibrant role in this organization. Dr. Mikuriya said Customs services must now go beyond mere revenue generation and delve into security because without security at the borders, we cannot effectively collect revenue. He lamented that Customs officials are often targets of terrorists and armed groups, and that Nigeria needs to have collaborations with other security agencies, share intelligence, and deploy technology.
