Nigeria’s Foreign Policy and Insecurity: Addressing the Missing Links and Reoccurring Issues

Abstract

Insecurity is the biggest problem in Africa and nothing meaningful has been done by several sovereign states in Sub-Saharan Africa to stem the tide and its effects on nations all over the region. To this end, security has risen to be the dire need to be considered through the lens of foreign policy as an integral part of public administration and governance in Nigeria. Therefore, this paper specifically explored the missing links that gave rise to the problem of insecurity from foreign policy perspective; and the reoccurring issues that the ebb and flow of her foreign policy posed to Nigerian public space with major focus on Buhari’s Administration. Secondary data was employed to analyse the broad and specific objectives of this paper through a descriptive and explanatory method. The missing link in Nigeria’s foreign policy and security challenges spotted in the analysis are political ideology, globalization, poorly unchecked borderlands, and high rate of migration of criminal elements. The paper discovered some reoccurring issues in Nigeria’s foreign policy and security challenges. The paper concluded that all is not well with the country, because while the protectionist policy under President Buhari to a great extent blocked foreign trade, it left security of borderlands at the mercy of corrupt security personnel. Based on this, all hands must be on deck to exterminate the current tide in the wave of insecurity ravaging the country at all costs.