With the piracy situation off Somalia
considered by some to be stabilising, over on the other coast, the
threat of piracy off West Africa is growing rapidly.
It is no surprise that the talk is of how to transfer the lessons
being learned in the Eastern HRA and apply them over in the West.Nigerian maritime criminals are making big money, and they are making it fast. It is quoted that they can earn as much as $6m a week from theft and illegal bunkering…their Somali counterparts would take hundreds of days to finally negotiate for such ransoms.
There has been a waking up to the threat, and while it is not yet quite to the Somali scale it is a real concenrn. Where so many initiatives, BMPs and military hard ware have been thrown at the Indian Ocean…over in the Atlantic, Gulf of Guinea and the Benin Bight it is a different story.
For some the temptation is to look at the successes elsewhere and try to apply them in a new theatre of conflict. The most obvious deterrent off Somalia has been the use of armed guards. However it is understood that no West African countries currently allow private security firms to carry weapons, and so that avenue is currently closed.
The stance of other governments to the deployment of armed guards off West Africa remains unclear. It is felt that a lot of work has gone into decriminalising the practice in the Gulf of Aden, but it may be a stretch to get approvals to extend to the Gulf of Guinea.
So as the western model of smash and grab piracy abounds, what of the vessel hardening techniques which have been proving so important east of Suez? According to private maritime security company Drum Cussac little or no effort has been put into hardening or protecting vessels working in the region.
With the pirates, the threat and the possible responses all being so different from one coast to the other the problems are only set to intensify. It seems that the easy pickings and potential riches is attracting more violent criminals into the fray, and this time around there may be no pragmatic answers.
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