A Bill seeking to Establish a National Commission on Small Arms and Light Weapons charged with the responsibility of regulating and prohibiting the proliferation of small arms, ammunitions and light weapons, sensitizing the public on its danger, combatting and discouraging their production among others has scaled second reading in the House of Representatives (HBs. 1295 and 1353). The Bill intends to domesticate the provisions of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Convention on Small Arms and Light Weapons.

Leading the debate on the Bill at the plenary session of Wednesday, 30 May 2018, Hon. Nnnena Elendu Ukeje (PDP: Abia) stated that the proliferation of small arms and light weapons (SALW) across the globe posed a systematic threat to a country’s long-term socio-economic development. She mentioned that available data from the United Nations Regional Centre for Peace and Disarmament (UNREC) revealed that Nigeria had about 350million SALW from the total 500 million SALW in circulation in West Africa.

Speaking further, Hon. Ukeje stated that a Presidential Committee on the Eradication of Small Arms and Light Weapons (PRESCOM) was inaugurated in 2014 but was short-lived, as it had no legal backing. She also mentioned a steady increase in reported incidents involving the use of SALW’s recalling that the operatives of the Nigerian Customs Services intercepted a total of 2,671proliferated arms coming in to the country between January to September 2017. In her view, the establishment of a National Commission was in conformity with the 2006 ECOWAS Convention on Small Arms and Light Weapons and would address the problem of proliferation.

She said that some of the functions of the Commission include:

• Promoting the removal of arms from society through the collection, storage, destruction, management and stockpiling of small arms and light weapons;

• Controlling the manufacture of small arms and light weapons by monitoring and regulating the activities of the local arms manufacturers;

• The Registration of small arms and light weapons as well as arms used in peacekeeping operations;

• Updating the register of small arms and light weapons before transmitting same to ECOWAS, the African Union (AU) and the United Nations (UN);

• Establishing programmes of action to prevent; combat and eradicate the illicit trade in small arms and light weapons; and

• Sensitizing the public on the need to submit illegally held small arms and light weapons to security services.

Hon. Ukeje concluded by giving additional advantages of having a National Commission against the proliferation of arms saying that it would help Nigeria access and conform to the multilateral instruments agreed at regionally and internationally. She added that these benefits would enable member states in ECOWAS and the UN to compile and analyze small arms and light weapons data, which would drive national policies that reduce proliferation.

The Bill has been referred to the Committee on National Security and Intelligence for further legislative action.