Armed non-state actors, insecurity, and government response to banditry in Nigeria

Abstract

Nigeria is at the brink of failure as a state partly because of its inability to control the activities of armed non-state actors. In reality, armed bandits now run their own government in parts of Nigeria; they compel citizens to pay tax, seek permission to work on their farms, and sell their goods at the market. This parallel government system operating in many states in Nigeria have not had equal state-actor forces against them. Extant studies on government response to banditry have extensively examined roles played by security agencies, whereas how the idiosyncrasies of the Nigerian president stimulate the surge in insecurity in Nigeria has been hardly investigated. The article examines this while utilizing qualitative method that relies on desktop reviews. Findings indicated that despite the military background of the Nigerian president, the country and its citizens have hardly felt safe under his current administration. Also, President Buhari’s approach to end banditry has widely been criticized in Nigeria. It concludes that banditry in Nigeria could have been a thing of the past if the Nigerian president effectively enforced his political will.