60 International The EconomistJune 29th 2019
2 tland’s Maritime Police Force.
None of this came cheap. obpestimates
that in 2012 the foreign naval presence cost
$1bn and private armed guards and security
equipment an additional $2bn. But it
worked. By 2013 the number of attacks had
shrivelled to 15.
As the threat of Somali piracy receded,
South-East Asia’s waters briefly regained
their former status as the world’s most per-
ilous. Attacks surged in 2014 and 2015,
when pirates hijacked 28 ships, mostly oil-
tankers, to steal their cargo. Like Somalia,
the region sits on a busy shipping lane: a
third of the world’s shipping passes
through the Malacca Strait and South China
Sea. But the littoral countries are all richer
and far better-run. Historically, piracy had
thrived because of their reluctance to work
together. Joint patrols first started in 2004;
after the surge in 2014 Malaysia and Indo-
nesia sent a joint rapid-response team to
the Malacca Strait. The two countries also
agreed to joint patrols with the Philippines
in the Sulu Sea, where Philippine separatist
groups had made a foray into piracy. In 2015
Indonesia caught a ringleader with Malay-
sian help. Two years later it detained 15 oth-
er pirates following a tip-off from Singa-
pore. Calm returned.It’s a plunderful life
Now west Africa’s pirates have the wind in
their sails. The number of attacks has
ebbed and flowed this century, reaching an
earlier peak in 2014. But the current wave of
violence seems deadlier. As in South-East
Asia, pirates in west Africa used to confine
themselves to raiding oil-tankers, to sell
their cargo on the black market. When the
oil price fell in 2015, they began copying
their Somali counterparts and focused on
kidnapping crews (though oil theft made a
comeback last year).
Unlike the Somalis, west African pirates
never keep the vessels, as they have no-
where to hide them. Instead, armed with
ak-47s and knives, they storm a ship,
round up some of the crew and return to
land, where they hide their hostages. Last
year, says Mr Williams, they kidnapped 193
people. The pirates have struck across the
region, but are primarily a Nigerian pro-
blem. They mostly operate out of the laby-
rinthine waterways in the Niger delta, near
which most of west Africa’s attacks occur.
Piracy is intertwined with the oil-rich
delta’s myriad other problems. Unemploy-
ment is at least 20%, and banditry and oil
theft on land are widespread. Cormac
McGarry of Control Risks, a consultancy,
says many pirates have gained experience
fighting for separatist groups. These
groups typically resent how much oil mon-
ey is stolen by politicians in the far-off cap-
ital, and would like to steal it for their own
ethnic group, or themselves. Cult-like
gangs also abound in the delta, with nameslike the Icelanders and the Vikings. Mem-
bers moonlight as pirates to make extra
cash. Piracy also rises during election
years, notes the imb’s Mr Mody. Local poli-
ticians are said to pay and arm the gangs to
attack rivals.
West African governments struggle to
stifle piracy. To their credit, they have been
trying to co-ordinate better. Several now
exchange information about piracy. A
handful are discussing joint patrols. But,
since west African piracy stems mainly
from one country, which is also where
most attacks happen, regional co-ordina-
tion is likely to make only a small dent in
the problem.
Shipping firms complain that the Nige-
rian government is failing to keep its wa-
ters safe. Its navy often performs admirably
when it intercepts pirate attacks. But it is
ill-equipped and spread too thin to prevent
them. Some speculate that the pirates are
in cahoots with military officials, citing in-
cidents in which pirates flee before the
navy arrives or know exactly how many
crew members are aboard a ship they at-
tack. Nigeria has yet to make piracy a spe-
cific criminal offence. Pirates captured by
the navy are often quietly released. Around
300 people have been prosecuted in Soma-
lia for piracy. By contrast, the un Office on
Drugs and Crime (unodc) says it does not
know of a single prosecution in Nigeria.
Some favour a Somali-style approach.
bimco, the largest international associa-
tion representing shipowners, issued a
statement in January calling for the eu,
America and China to deploy forces to the
Gulf of Guinea. Ship-owners also want to
be able to deploy private armed guards in
Nigerian waters. For now, Nigeria only lets
them hire escort vessels staffed by naval of-
ficers. “They have turned security into a
business,” grumbles one executive.
Others see such demands as a non-
starter. Nigeria, a democracy whose gov-
ernment—for all its flaws—is far less im-
potent than Somalia’s, is bound to resent
foreign navies or mercenaries off its coast.
Also, foreign governments would be reluc-
tant to foot the bill. The Gulf of Guinea, un-
like the Malacca Strait or the Gulf of Aden,
is not a choke point for international trade.
Mr Williams points to other constraints onthe Nigerian government. Its armed forces
have their hands full with a jihadist insur-
gency in the north-east, banditry in the
north-west and clashes between farmers
and herders in the “middle belt”—all of
which are far deadlier than piracy.
Instead, he argues, firms themselves
should do more to protect their crews. In-
ternational shipping organisations have
drawn up recommendations, based on
what worked in Somalia. They include
wrapping the deck in razor wire and build-
ing a “citadel” on board where the crew can
barricade themselves and call for help.
Among the ships docked in Lagos many
display obviously shoddy security—large
gaps in the razor wire, for example, render-
ing it useless. Mr Williams often finds cita-
dels with doors that do not close; or crews
with no training on what to do if attacked.Pay rates of penance
These lapses hint at the awkward fact that
many firms lack a financial incentive to
take security more seriously in west Africa.
Insurance companies offer lower premi-
ums for ships that protect themselves. But
the combined cost of insuring the ship, the
cargo and the crew (for kidnapping and
ransom) for a voyage to Nigeria is typically
no more than the cost of half a day’s fuel. It
can be cheaper not to bother with armed
guards. Premiums are so low in part be-
cause Nigerian pirates, unlike those in So-
malia, have priced their ransoms just right:
for many companies they can be written off
as a cost of doing business.
That means the heaviest toll is borne by
crews, most of whom are from poor coun-
tries like India and the Philippines. Afusat
Eke, a social worker for the Nigerian Seafar-
ers’ Welfare Board, says sailors often suffer
from anxiety, depression or post-traumatic
stress disorder after being released from
captivity. Companies say their growing
criticism of the Nigerian government is
proof that they care about their crews’ wel-
fare (although complaining costs them
nothing). Thanks to the internet, more sea-
men are aware of the risks in west Africa
and loth to go there.
Even if shipping firms did do more, it
would not end piracy. The stark truth, says
Mr Mody, is that it can only be stopped by
fixing its underlying causes on land. In
west Africa this means alleviating the Ni-
ger delta’s chronic lawlessness. In Somalia
pirates still scour the oceans, looking for
unprotected ships, so the frigates and priv-
ate guards will be needed as long as chaos
reigns on land. Analysts are nervously
watching Venezuela, whose economic col-
lapse is believed to have caused an upsurge
of offshore mugging. All this suggests it
will be difficult to eradicate piracy for
many years to come. But for the sake of the
world’s 1.6m seafarers, governments and
shippers should not stop trying. 7LagosPirateattacks, 2019Source: IMBHijacking Boarding Fired uponGulf of GuineaNiger DeltaNIGERIAGABONMALIGHANAGUINEALIBERIA CAMEROONIVORY
COAST750 km