Stabilising Nigeria: Small Arms and Light Weapons Control and Security Sector Reform

Abstract

Nigeria presents a good case study for the proper understanding of the linkage between SALW control and SSR for four mutually reinforcing reasons. First, the country is a plural society that mirrors almost all the features associated with other Africa's multi-ethnic and multi-cultural societies. Thus, the major findings of the study will be of high policy relevance to other African countries in their efforts to free their societies of arms proliferation. It offers the opportunity to probe the reasons behind the upsurge of numerous sub-State actors, constructed around ethnicity, religion, etc, and their relationship with SALW and their overall effects on the militarisation of Nigeria. This is germane taking cognizance of the fact that such militarisation of the society has daunting effects on the issues of poverty and development that are central to the people. Furthermore, this investigation is of immense importance in the sense that it unmasks the dangers inherent in a situation where a constituted authority (state/government) abandons its primary tasks of providing security and weapons control at the peril of vulnerable populations.