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Does Outsourcing Security to Private Security Companies Impact International Security and Counterterrorism?
Oluwaseyi Mike Bamigboye 5
In the past, the demand for better security forced states to adopt various private security arrangements, most of which were ad hoc, secret, and temporary. Today, private military and security companies (PMSCs) dominate the security industry, and their international operations reflect growth rather than contraction. This research article does not provide an exhaustive analysis of PMSCs' involvement in counterterrorism but focuses on core aspects of this seminal issue. The article assesses the involvement of private military and security companies in counterterrorism to identify trends, implications for international security, and trajectory. It concludes that further research is needed to compare the role and activities of PMSCs in security and counterterrorism and to compare national legal and regulatory frameworks to find overlaps and parallels for an internationalized regulatory framework and oversight of the private security industry.
One of the greatest security concerns confronting Nigeria in recent times is Banditry. Not only does this trigger a humanitarian crisis but also impacts the attainment of food security in northwest Nigeria. The region is engaged in commercial agricultural production such as growing cereal crops and livestock due to the vast arable land. Owing to this fact, the AFDB described this region as a staple crop processing zones in the year 2020. Given this, the study interrogates the impact of rural banditry on food security and its implication on crop and livestock production in the region. We argued that banditry has hampered sustainable agricultural production in the North West region and impacted the realization of food security in Nigeria. We adopted the documentary method using the secondary method of data collection and the qualitative descriptive method for data analysis. Findings reveal that the killings and kidnapping of farmers have affected the production of food in the region. We recommend that government should provide security for the farmers in other for Nigeria to achieve food security.
Nigeria has become characteristic of a violent state where non-state actors are unremorsefully involved in kidnapping for ransom and killings. To that extent, terrorism in the North cannot only be captured within the prism of human and material costs, but also one that has become a bourgeoning business for terrorists and their cronies. The latter reality exposes the overall weakness of counter-terrorism approach of the government which is framed as amnestication, a soft approach that has continued to fuel the rebellious activities of the terrorists. This approach is a new order strikingly different from the old order of hard stance by the government. The paper utilizes classical conditioning theory to assess the impact of this new strategy on the overall counter-terrorism strategies of the government. The assessment reveals recidivism, dangerous attacks, criminal interest of terrorists and their proxies for personal enrichment, public resentments and interpretation of sign of weakness on the part of government. A reversal to old order of kineticism and socio-economic improvements will serve the government better if truly it intends fighting terrorism as an ideologically driven group cannot repent, not even when it distastes western approach by the government.
Colonialism has had an immeasurable influence on both cultural and historical outlook of the colonized people, and the ongoing contestation of postcolonial modernity is hugely attributed to its ripple effects. Thus, in Africa, the myriad of adversities bedeviling the continent, ranging from apartheid to genocide, pandemic to epidemic, terrorism and insurgency are but postcolonial aftershocks; targeted at slowing down the pace of social change, political independence and economic emancipation. Oftentimes, the adversarial circumstances of ethnic and civil wars, terrorist acts and insurgent movements are visibly manifested as re-incarnation of history in the postcolony, where cultures wrestle with each other and against each other for survival and supremacy. African writers and poets have coped with, survived in, and even thrilled under such quagmires. Thus, the creative writers have taken the disabling effects and inspiring legacies of adversities as investigative motif in literary mode. Consequently, this has inspired unique creative expressions to tell the stories of loses and survival, trauma and resilience, woven with the paradoxes of scenes and contexts that lay bare the wavering conditions of the continent. This essay explores the representation of terrorism and insurgency by focusing on how some African poets respond to adversity and how such calamitous circumstances incite or impede creative expressions. Using the poetry of Abubakar Othman and Nereus Tadi, the essay reveals a renewal of artistic energy in the lamentation against an existing status quo.
Nigeria has struggled to combat terrorism for over a decade despite its domestic strategies, multilateral cooperation with its contiguous neighbours, and bilateral assistance from some superpowers, especially the United States. This has resulted in the death of many innocent people and others displaced. There is no doubt that alliance formation is considered a needed panacea for thwarting terrorism. Despite, the cooperation between Nigeria and the United States, the growth of terrorism trajectory in Nigeria has not been reversed. However, the task of finding the answer to why Nigeria-United States counterterrorism cooperation has not achieved the desired objective in Nigeria remains imperative for this paper to grapple with. The study was on both primary and secondary data, with 30 purposively selected respondents in Nigeria, the United States of America and the United Kingdom. Data collected were analysed using descriptive methods. Thus, the study concludes that for Nigeria-United States counterterrorism cooperation to be efficacious, both countries need to deepen their bilateral engagements devoid of politicisation of assistance and vested interests.
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