By Mohammed Mohammed
An Executive Bill seeking to establish a National Commission against the proliferation of small arms and light weapons is presently receiving attention at the National Assembly (NASS).
This Bill is in alignment with the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Convention on small arms and light weapons, their ammunition and other related materials has passed second reading in the House of Representatives.
The Chairman of the Committee on Firearms Act (Amendment), Mr. Ossai Nicholas Ossai, who chaired a public hearing on the bill, in his welcome address on Monday, said the hearing is part of effort by the National Assembly to advance legal solution to the growing insecurity bedeviling the country.
The Bill, is part of Executive Bills, referred to the House of Representatives by President Muhammadu Buhari.
In seeking to formally adopt it as a state security agency, the President had in August this year also sent a bill to the Senate seeking to transform the presidential committee on small arms and light weapons into a national center for the control of small arms and light weapons under the Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA).
It is against this backdrop that a stakeholder, Amb. (Dr.) Fatima Muhammad Goni, National Chairman Grassroots Mobilizers for PMB/Osinbajo, at the public hearing at the House of Representatives pledged solidarity and all necessary support for the move which, according to her will consolidate the proper take-off of the Nigerian taskforce on the prohibition of illegal importation/smuggling of arms, ammunition, light weapons and pipeline vandalism.
Goni, said NATFORCE is an off-shoot of the National Centre for the Control of Small Arms and Light Weapons (NCCSALW) which replaced the defunct Presidential Committee on Small Arms and Light Weapons and served as the institutional mechanism for policy guidance, research and monitoring of the proliferation of small arms and light weapons in Nigeria.
“NATFORCE therefore is the most desiring body that could be used to augment the growing security lapses and civil strife in the country and also to nip in the bud the needless insecurity heralding Nigeria our dear country,” she said.
Goni said no doubt the security forces are not just overstretched but underfunded, and, according to her, with this new development they can perform better with more sophisticated weapons, equipment and funding and then the expectation is that the causes of the conflict and how to mitigate them would be further addressed.