Nigerian Army Resource Centre (NARC) Weekly Subject Experts’ Presentation was held at Hall C, TY Buratai Block, Abuja. There were two presentations made by the Subject Experts on Southern Africa and Middle East/North Africa and Turkey.
The first presentation by Col OR Akerele (Rtd) Subject experts on Southern Africa focused his presentation on how, Zambia Compulsory Standards Agency Destroys Non-Compliant Electrical Appliances and Fruits Juice Drinks. The construction of buildings of all types and other infrastructure projects requiring use of electrical appliances takes place daily worldwide. In the same vein, fruit flavour or whole fruit drinks are produced, smuggled or imported and consumed daily all over the world; Zambia and Nigeria inclusive. However, the high demand for these products may compromise the quality of construction and consumption of the flavoured drinks with possible fire outbreaks and contamination by heavy metals, while unwholesome and over-ripe or decaying fruits leads to fatalities in both cases.
Electrical appliances and fruit flavour drinks or whole fruit drinks exist in various forms and brands and are marketed by different producers and readily used and consumed on daily basis. Moreover, such electrical appliance and flavored or whole fruits juices are relatively affordable and cheaper than the genuine appliances and originally produced juice drinks and highly used especially for mass housing construction and leisure/relaxation drinks serves the general public during celebrations. The major problem therefore remains quality control in the manufacture and production of the electrical appliances and fruit flavour/ fruit juice drinks.
In his analysis and lessons for Nigeria, Col OR Akerele (Rtd) stressed that, in Nigeria, the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) is the Agency established on 1 Jan 92 to regulate and ensure the availability of quality and safe food, drugs and other related products. It aims to protect and promote public health by instituting an efficient regulating system that ensures that only the right quality of food, drugs and other regulated products are manufactured, exported, imported, advertised, distributed, sold and used in Nigeria. (Mojisola Adeyeye, 2024).
Similarly, the Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON) established in 1971 is also the sole statutory body vested with the responsibility “to promote consumer confidence global competitiveness of Nigerian products and services through standardization and quality assurances. Therefore, these two organisations are responsible for regulating the use of genuine electrical appliances and sale/consumption of genuine fruit drink juices. To this extent, NAFDAC has continued to clamp down on factories producing fake drinks while the SON has been clamping down on producers or importers of sub-standard electrical appliances. On 18 Dec, 2023, over 1,500 cartoons of fake and substandard products and variety of beverages including wines, soft drinks and other consumables were seized in Ezikwu Market, Aba, Abia State.
He recommended that, NAFDAC and SON should develop and embark on continuous education of the public to sensitize people on the ills of using non-compliance electrical appliances and consumption of fake and unwholesome fruits juice drinks.
The second presentation by Brig Gen S Musa Subject experts on Middle East/North Africa and Turkey, centered his presentation on, Jordan and Syria to Tackle Arms and Drugs Smuggling and Daesh Resurgence. Middle East Monitor Newspaper publication of 22 January 2025 reported that – “Jordan and Syria have agreed to form a joint committee to secure their borders, fight arms and drug smuggling, and work to prevent the resurgence of Daesh/Islamic State, Jordan’s foreign minister said on Tuesday. Western anti-narcotics officials say that the addictive, amphetamine-type stimulant known as captagon is being mass-produced in Syria and that Jordan is a transit route to the oil-producing Gulf states, Reuters has reported. Jordan’s army has conducted several pre-emptive air strikes in Syria since 2023, which Jordanian officials say targeted militias accused of links to the drug trade and their facilities.
“We discussed securing the borders, especially the threat of arms and drugs smuggling and the resurgence of Islamic State,” said Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi told a joint press conference with his Syrian counterpart Asaad Al-Shaybani. “Our security is one, we will coordinate together to combat these mutual challenges.” Shaybani, who was in Amman after visiting Qatar and the UAE following the fall of President Bashar Al-Assad, told Safadi that drug smuggling would not pose a threat to Jordan under Syria’s new Islamist rulers. “The new situation in Syria ended the threats posed to Jordan’s security.” Referring to the addictive captagon, he added: “When it comes to captagon and drug smuggling, we promise it is over and won’t return. We are ready to cooperate on this extensively.”
In his analysis and lessons for Nigeria, Brig Gen S Musa pointed out that, the joint cooperation between Syria and Jordan to secure their borders offers valuable lessons for Nigeria and its neighbors (particularly Niger Republic) in combating illicit drugs, arms flow, terrorism and related crimes facilitated by porous borders and sour diplomatic relations. One major lesson to be learnt by Nigeria from the joint collaboration is the Enhancement of Border Security. This is because the Joint Border Patrols between Syria and Jordan demonstrate the necessity and effectiveness of collaborative border security efforts which Nigeria and its neighbors should continue to utilize, review, enhance or strengthen in order to effectively monitor and secure their borders. Hence, the establishment or operationalization of MNJTF in 1994 with Hq in NDjamena was/is intended to achieve this objective amongst others.
The rumored withdrawal of Niger Republic from the task force and the subsequent threat/rumour of withdrawal by Chad, bring to the Centre the relevance and necessity for Nigeria to make concerted efforts to ensure that collaborative security efforts and excellent diplomatic relations with her neighbours are sustained. Another valuable lesson that can be learnt from the Syria and Jordan Joint border patrol is in the áreas of Intelligence Sharing. The two countries’ intelligence-sharing mechanisms have helped identify and disrupt terrorist networks (particularly Daesh/Islamic State) and enhance peace and security across their borders. In the same vein, Nigeria and its neighbors can and should continue to encourage and sustain similar intelligence-sharing protocols to stay ahead of peculier security challenges facing them. The threat of withdrawal by any member is not good in our collective struggles to end insecurity in our respective countries.
He recommended that, FGN should periodically review, enhance or strengthen its bilateral or multilateral cooperation with her neighbors in order to overcome mutual security challenges and also consider protection of Nigeria’s borders a priority security issue in order to effectively checkmate trans-border security challenges.
