Strategic Security Planning and Protection of Multinational Oil Pipeline Assets in the Niger Delta

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article argues that lack of effective strategic security planning and capacity building undercuts the ability of security agencies to provide adequate intelligence and effective security to multinational oil pipeline facilities in Nigeria’s oil rich Niger Delta. The article relies on content analysis and interpretative reviews of government documents to underscore the problem of strategic security planning in Nigeria. Using the case of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defense Corps (NSCDC), the article establishes important linkages on how critical strategic planning gaps are implicated in the government’s inability to upscale professionalism of security officials and procure important operational equipment and gadgets such as hi-tech communication gadgets, firefighting equipment, operational vehicles, trucks, cranes, speedboats, surveillance equipment, helicopters, and speedboats. Again, the award of pipeline surveillance and protection contracts to private companies encouraged overlap functions and frictions, which further undermined the general coordination and stability of the Corps as a security agency.