President Muhammadu Buhari says Nigeria’s fragile nature of entry points into various countries enhance terrorism, economic sabotage, and illicit flow of arms.
Buhari, however, said Nigeria and her neighbours must place higher premium on the effective policing of borders to stop the menace.
According to a statement issued on Thursday by his spokesman, Femi Adesina, the President said this while playing host to the Secretary General of World Customs Organization (WCO), Dr Kunio Mikuriya, who is in Nigeria for a Global Conference on Fragile Borders, at the Presidential Villa in Abuja on Thursday.
Commending Mikuriya for his fourth visit to the country, President Buhari said the current one was coming at a time Nigeria was preparing for general election, adding: “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.
“It is our objective to ensure this takes place in a peaceful and conducive atmosphere, despite all the usual excitement and gamesmanship that is known to occur during election campaigning.”
Speaking on the theme of the conference ‘Enabling Customs in Fragile and and Conflict Affected Situations’, the President said is of “critical importance for us as a country as we go to the polls, but equally important to most countries on the continent, and dare I say the world.
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“In fact, it is quite frankly the singular most concerning sub-issue in our national 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.
The President further briefed the WCO Secretary General and his team on a number of efforts in combating the challenges of fragile borders, which include “Our National Security Strategy 2019 which promotes close inter-agency cooperation and the National Counter-Terrorism strategy which mandates Nigeria Customs Service to support other Agencies of government on fighting terrorism;
“Support for the armed forces in launching operations to secure our 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;
“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 Nigeria Customs Service and provide stiffer sanctions against smuggling and other criminal acts.”
President Buhari, however, expressed hope 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 that deal with the multi-faceted nature of the issues.
Mikuriya described WCO as a 184-member worldwide organisation, in which Nigeria plays an active and vibrant role.
He said Customs must now go beyond mere revenue generation and delve into security, stressing that “without security at the borders, we cannot effectively collect revenue”.
Mikuriya lamented that Customs officials are often targets of terrorists and armed groups, “and so we need to have collaboration with other security agencies, share intelligence, and deploy technology.”
He, therefore, thanked Nigeria for hosting the three days conference.
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