[allAfrica.com]  [celtel.com]


Tensions in South Atlantic, Not in Nigeria's Interest

Vanguard (Lagos)
ANALYSIS
August 8, 2004
Posted to the web August 8, 2004

By Nduka Uzuakpundu

NIGERIA may have to develop her naval force along the line of an ocean one in
consonance with the nature of the politico-military threats that are brewing in
the South Atlantic to the security of the flow of oil and other economic
activities. Director-General of the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs
(NIIA), Professor Joy Ogwu, said that such force should be part of a formidable
maritime strategy, which would register the presence of the country in the
affairs of the Southern Seas.
She observed - at a recent seminar, titled: "The South Atlantic As A Zone Of
Peace: Nigeria's Security Interest," organised by the institute - that "the low
defence capability of the states along the coast of West Africa has enhanced
the relative capability of the more advanced states like Argentina, Brazil and
South Africa." She added that by virtue of her long ocean frontiers, Nigeria
was a coastal state with an interest in the assertion of domestic jurisdiction
and enforcement of rights over her coastal waters.
Therefore, there was an urgent need for a South Atlantic surveillance and
asserting sovereignty in Nigeria's territorial waters and control over the
economic zone that extends at least 200 miles out to the seas. The frantically
increasing militarisation of the South Atlantic, Ogwu said, had made at least
1,500 miles of Nigeria's coast very vulnerable to great powers manipulation.
Naval orientation
This vulnerability, in her words, "is even more pronounced when we realise that
none of the littoral African states has a sizeable naval force. In view of this
visible threat, it is imperative that we re-examine the role of the Navy (as
well as the Air Force) and reinforce their capability to deal with an inherent
threat." Thus, a new naval orientation must begin from the irreducible fact
that tensions in the South Atlantic pose a threat to Nigeria's security and her
naval forces, which, as she put it "must be equipped with a credible
intelligence unit that is capable of seeking and processing information about
activities in her environment and any other areas of direct relevance to her
security."
Reacting to criticisms on the ability of the country's industrial base to
produce, and the ability of the navy to manage efficiently an expanded fleet,
Ogwu was of the opinion that "achieving Nigeria's political and developmental
goals in the long term, depends on a credible defence and deterrence. In
addition, Nigeria's economic well-being is continually more dependent on
overseas trade and very vulnerable to distant political developments. We may
have to rely on the strength, mobility and versatility of the Navy."
This makes the navy a necessary arm of the country's diplomacy - and, as part
of a credible defence, it should have the capability to vividly demonstrate its
economic and military might beyond its borders at peacetime.
Thus, the role of the navy should not be limited to the execution of important
missions in armed combat. But, the one rather disturbing caveat that Ogwu added
was that "the funds available in the face of budget constraints will decide how
far and how urgently Nigeria can develop an ocean-oriented fleet." This part of
her presentation was backed by one of her predecessors, Ambassador Gabriel
Olusanya, who also felt that the starting point was a re-organisation of the
Nigerian State. "We have left so many things undone," according to him,
alluding to the egregious culture of waste and the injustice and the growing
sense of misplaced priority that is exhibited in the resource allocation
process.
He was also less certain that Nigeria could play an enterprising role in the
South Atlantic geo-politics in the absence of a reliable technological base or
sound defence industry that could fashion out tanks and sub-marine weapons
which, amongst others, Brazil and South Africa are building their profiles
with.
A commentator on defence and strategic affairs, Mr. Innocent Nwabuzor, was of
the view that, in spite of the current fetters, "Nigeria is destined to have a
strong navy, not only because of her long coastline and the experience of the
trans-Atlantic slave trade, but also for the fact that she has the resources."
He buttressed his position for a strong navy by recalling the treachery which
Argentina - a prominent member of the Organisation of American States (OAS) -
was subjected to by the Reagan administration during the 74-day Falklands War
with Britain - in 1982 - because she had no formidable naval force. But that
was a view that tended to discount the fact that the Reagan administration
sided against Buenos Aires because of its invasion of the British possessions.
Recently, the Chief of Naval Staff, Admiral Samuel Afolayan, raised an alarm to
the effect that the flagship of the Nigerian Navy, which is also its newest, is
twenty years old - and that is the NNS Aradu, and that while the navy would
need N40billion to maintain its equipment, its yearly allocation is N2billion.
This may explain why the image of the Nigerian Navy is that of a coastal force.
In sympathy with Afolayan, former Foreign Affairs Minister, Professor Bolaji
Akinyemi, demands: "How many years old are the newest ships in the South
African, Brazilian, Egyptian and Indian navies? The case is so obvious that it
cannot be overstated.
The Nigerian Navy needs more resources to overhaul it and empower it with
sufficient capability that it can maintain security of any kind in the Gulf of
Guinea." He adds that: "There is a need for the creation of a coastal guard to
concentrate on anti-piracy activities in our coastal waters, and that should
include provision of security for oil installations on-shore and in coastal
waters. The Navy should... concentrate on deep blue seas. Nigeria does not need
a ceremonial navy."
In Akinyemi's estimation, the navy that Nigeria should have is the kind that
"must have the capability to maintain dominance in the contiguous zone and the
exclusive economic zone.
It must have a fighting capability in those areas where we have a considerable
economic activity such as the Gulf of Guinea." While Akinyemi thinks that there
is a need to pare down the cost of political administration to meet the geo-
strategic interests of the country in the South Atlantic, he calls on the
relevant committees of the National Assembly, the National War College, Abuja
and the National Institute for Policy and Strategic Studies (NIPPS), Kuru, to
hold hearings, workshops, retreats, seminars, etc. on the issue.
The apparent threat and the rise in tension in the South Atlantic - referred to
by Ogwu - had to do with the presence of the United States naval fleet in
international waters recently. The excuse given by one top defence operative of
Washington - much to the displeasure of Akinyemi - was that the Gulf of Guinea
sector of the South Atlantic was ungoverned, and so there was a pressing need
to fill the vacuum. Olusanya said such an utterance was less surprising.
Nwabuzor figured that the U.S. navy was becoming very visible in the South
Atlantic because they had not seen Nigeria's there.
Besides, one of the shared theses for this development was the burgeoning
interest which the Bush administration was showing in the oil chest of the Gulf
of Guinea as a source of its strategic energy supply, now that the oil fields
of the Middle East are increasingly coming under severe threat and sabotage.
In geo-political terms, the South Atlantic zone - now commonly referred to as
Zone of Peace by the United Nations Resolution 41/11of 1986 - thanks to the
groundwork done by the NIIA - encompasses roughly 20 degrees and 65 degrees
latitude and 20 degrees and 65 degrees longitude. On the African coast, it
stretches from Nigeria to Angola according to the treaty enhancing the Gulf of
Guinea Commission. Nigeria's territorial waters are located in the South
Atlantic basin, making her rely, almost exclusively, on seaborne trade for her
economic health.
These unique characteristics, said Ogwu, "confer on Nigeria a key strategic
position as a South Atlantic marine state. This geographic position imposes
enormous responsibility on Nigeria for defending not only her territorial
waters, but also ensuring that her off-shore oil and natural resources are not
rendered vulnerable to exploitation by extra-regional powers." The imperative
of having the South Atlantic as a zone of peace - one that is, for instance,
devoid of such unfair and irresponsible habit of environmental pollution and
dumping of nuclear wastes - forms an ecology of Nigeria's national and security
interests in the post-Cold War era.
The South Atlantic is an area that impinges on several vital aspects of
Nigeria's security because it could be open to hostile sea-borne incursions. It
is becoming remarkably attractive for some extra-regional powers like the U.S.
and Russia to post their maritime presence there. From the economic point of
view, Ogwu notes that most of Nigeria's oil resources, which account for over
90 percent of her external earnings, is exploited off-shore. In addition, the
region also contains some of the world's largest deposits of scarce minerals
like gold, manganese, chrome, diamonds, bauxite and uranium.
It is also a vital artery to the country's trade with the world, particularly
with North and South America. The implications of the newly emerging strategic
profile of the South Atlantic in sculpting active defence and foreign policies
for the countries of the South American and African continents are great and
multifaceted. For Africa's maritime states, like Nigeria and South Africa, Ogwu
argues that it confers, for different - and sometimes similar reasons, key
positions in any strategy for the angle stretching from Cape Blanco in the
Sahraoui Arab Democratic Republic (SADR), right down to the Cape Horn in
Argentina across the South Atlantic to the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa
and then across the Indian Ocean to Cape Comorin in India.
Still, Akinyemi is far from convinced that Washington has been attracted to the
South Atlantic by the irresistible smell of oil, or the personal, selfless
choice to do some charity job of helping security in the region. He notes that
there would be joint naval exercise between Washington and Soa Tome, even
though some defence operatives at the Pentagon say it ain't so. Apart from the
fact it was farcical for a state with few patrol boats to join in a naval
exercise with the most powerful navy in the world, Akinyemi thinks "the denial
was the first in the hide and seek murky world of military diplomacy."
Those who are beginning to feel rather uncomfortable with the visible heft of
Washington's naval presence do acknowledge the fact that the South Atlantic -
even though in a post-Cold War era - cannot afford the threat of losing its
virginity as a veritable zone of peace to the likes of the marauders at the
Malacca Straits or the enemies of the USS Cole. To that extent, there is a need
for some symmetry - borne out of a genuine desire for co-operation, peace and
security - between Washington and the maritime states of the South Atlantic.
As Washington comes into the South Atlantic, the expectation is that it would
shed the arrogance with which it disaggregated its North Atlantic allies, in
the aftermath of 9/11 - as it crusades against global terror and, more than
that, to the causing - up to this moment - of asymmetry in its ties with
Brussels. In effect, those unhelpful habits that have tended to truncate Trans-
Atlantic relations in the past two years ought to be sloughed as Washington
drags its hulking and intimidating frame into the South Atlantic.

   

  =============================================================================
   Copyright © 2004 Vanguard. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica
                         Global Media (allAfrica.com).
  =============================================================================