File: National Security Adviser, Nuhu Ribadu.
The Federal Government has begun preparations for a new National Baseline Survey on illicit small arms and light weapons.
This is coming a decade after the country conducted its first survey in 2016.
The plan was disclosed on Wednesday in Abuja at a one-day workshop reviewing lessons from the 2016 exercise, organised by the National Centre for the Control of Small Arms and Light Weapons.
Speaking at the event, the National Security Adviser, Nuhu Ribadu, represented by the Director of External Affairs at the Office of the National Security Adviser, Solomon Fehintola, linked the spread of illicit weapons directly to insecurity across the country, saying such arms sustain banditry in the North-West, fuel farmer-herder clashes in the North-Central, arm criminal gangs in cities and support terrorist groups in the North-East.
