Migration Securitisation and National Security in the Regional Security Complex of Nigeria–Niger Borders

Abstract

Previous studies have argued that the more-than-a-year border closure has failed to curb criminal activities across Nigeria–Niger Republic borders. This stems from the intractability of criminal activities across the borders of Nigeria and the Republic of Niger. As a result, the Nigerian government securities entry and exit of foreigners from the Republic of Niger to justify its land border closure policy of 2019. The government of Nigeria claimed that border closure would address myriads of security challenges emanating from its borders with the Republic of Niger. In contention, the study raised pertinent questions such as: Is securitisation the only framework to control migration? What role could the regional security complex theory play to diagnose, comprehend and proffer solutions to cross-border security problems between Nigeria and Niger? Is migration the real security problem that the Nigerian state needs to combat? How sustainable is border security through the securitisation of migration? With the aid of a secondary source of data, the study argues that dreadful human security implications of banditry, kidnapping and pastoral conflicts across the borders are the product of amity and enmity conditions of security interdependence between Nigeria and the Niger Republic as postulated by the regional security complex theory.