Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, Director-General of the World Trade Organisation (WTO), has stated that insecurity in Africa’s most populous country is being used as a political tool.
Speaking at the 2024 Annual General Conference of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) in Lagos, she emphasized that security is essential for development, saying “We cannot have socio-economic development without security… We certainly cannot have security without development.”
Okonjo-Iweala criticized the politicization of insecurity, stating “We all know that security has been weaponised in our country for political purposes by political actors, leading partly to the situation we have now… We have politicians who believe that the best way to make their opponents look bad is to instigate insecurity making it look like they can’t govern, regardless of whether this leads to loss of lives and property of innocent Nigerians. This has to stop.”
She also addressed the issue of crude oil theft, saying “Nigerians have seen for years how organised crude oil theft on a massive scale seriously undermines the economic and financial health of the country… All Nigerians must agree that stealing of our national assets of any type is intolerable and must be stopped.”
Okonjo-Iweala emphasized that technology is available to track and prevent crude oil theft, and that there should be no excuses for not doing so.
