The Chief of the Naval Staff, Vice Admiral Idi Abbas, has called for stronger regional military and maritime cooperation among African countries to tackle growing security challenges confronting the continent.
Abbas made the call on Friday, September 11, 2026, when he received the Chief of Staff, ECOWAS Standby Force, Brigadier General Sheikh Sulaiman Massaquoi, who paid a courtesy visit to the Chief of the Naval Staff at the Naval Headquarters in Abuja.
The Chief of the Naval Staff said broader African participation in regional security initiatives would strengthen collective capacity to respond to transnational threats, citing the recently launched Combined Maritime Task Force–Gulf of Guinea (CMTF-GoG) as an example of the benefits of coordinated action.
He also highlighted Nigeria’s growing contribution to regional security through practical maritime operations and strategic sealift support.
According to him, the recent movement of Chinese-donated ECOWAS equipment destined for frontline countries, including Benin Republic and Sierra Leone, demonstrated the importance of regional logistics and mobility in strengthening collective security efforts.
The equipment donated by China to ECOWAS comprises non-lethal field-support items intended to enhance operational and humanitarian capacity across the region.
Abbas further recalled the Nigerian Navy’s strategic sealift of military hardware to Guinea-Bissau in 2022, when NNS KADA transported equipment for the Nigerian contingent deployed under the ECOWAS Stabilisation Support Mission.
He said the deployment demonstrated Nigeria’s capacity to provide maritime logistics in support of regional peace and security operations.
The CNS called for stronger synergy between the ECOWAS Standby Force and the CMTF-GoG, stressing that emerging security challenges increasingly cut across land and maritime domains and therefore require shared capabilities, intelligence and coordinated responses.
He encouraged more African countries to participate in the CMTF-GoG as part of efforts to build a broader regional security architecture capable of confronting transnational maritime threats in the Gulf of Guinea and beyond.
Abbas also urged the strengthening of the ECOWAS Standby Force to ensure that it remains operationally ready and rapidly deployable against terrorism, insurgency and other forms of organised cross-border crime.
He stressed that Africa’s increasingly interconnected security challenges could not be effectively addressed by individual countries acting alone, noting that shared intelligence, interoperable forces, joint operations and sustained political commitment would be central to the continent’s future security.
In his remarks, Brigadier General Massaquoi conveyed greetings from the President of the ECOWAS Commission and acknowledged Nigeria’s significant role in regional security.
Massaquoi expressed appreciation for Nigeria’s continued support for ECOWAS initiatives while underscoring the need to strengthen the maritime component of the region’s security architecture.
The engagement reinforced the importance of Nigeria’s strategic leadership and regional interoperability in building a more responsive maritime security framework for the Gulf of Guinea and the wider West African sub-region.
