Insecurity and its Impact on Nigeria’s Foreign Policy Objectives

Abstract

Nigeria has been facing unprecedented security challenges over the past decades, ranging from criminalities such as hostage taking, pipeline vandalism, kidnapping for ransom, to ethno religious religious threats in forms of riots, demonstrations, agitations for resource control by the Niger Delta militants, herdsmen attacks and violent extremism epitomised by in the Boko Haram (BH) insurgency that is ongoing in the North Eastern part of the country. The growing trend of insecurity expectedly poses a serious challenge to the economic development as it scares away foreign direct investment with the attendant problems of poverty, unemployment, electoral malpractices, corruption, Economic marginalization, governance failures that result in a circle of violence (Ijide, 2020, Bakut, 2021). Even though, the world treats Nigeria as a regional and sub regional leader, and listens to her opinions on Africa and even world issues, there is a contradiction; Nigeria is an underperformer in domestic affairs with representation in the international fora and poorly coordinated position on many issues due to clumsiness in the nation?s intervention in security matters (Zabadi, 2011 cited in Alli 2012).