The Cross-Border Flow of Small Arms and Light Weapons and Security Challenges in the North-Eastern Nigeria: 1999-2009
1Ibrahim Musa Ibrahim Kirfi & 2Ibrahim Babagana Shehuri
1Corporate Affairs Commission, Headquarters Maitama Abuja
2Department of Political Science, University of Maiduguri, Nigeria
Email: ibrahimkirfi@yahoo.com; ashehuri@yahoo.com
ABSTRACT
In recent years the North-Eastern region of Nigeria has been rocked by security challenges emanating from the cross-border flow of Small Arms and Light Weapons (SALW). The availability of such weapons have fuelled ethno-religious crisis, electoral and post-electoral violence, armed robbery, politically-inclined assassinations, rampant use of Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) on strategic places (offices, institutions, markets, schools), incessant kidnappings and cultism in institutions of higher learning which necessitated the need for governmental intervention. There is a need to find a solution to this seemingly unending problem which necessitated the conduct of this research. For the purpose of this research, Conflict theory and Contiguity theory would be used and in the end to see how the two theories relate well in addressing the problem of cross-border flow of Small Arms and Light Weapons (SALW) into the North-Eastern Nigeria from the neighbouring countries of Cameroun, Chad and Niger borders.
