In an effort to reduce the proliferations of small arms and light weapons in the country,the national centre for the control of small arms and light weapons southwest zone has said that major enabler of insecurity, banditry, terrorism in the country is the prolification of small arms and light weapons.

Speaking at one day seminar on effective post -judgement management of small arms and light weapons in Abeokuta the state capital , The zonal director, the former Commissioner of police in ogun State, Cp Abiodun Mustapha  Alamutu, disclosed that the institution has also equally discovered that a large chunk of these arms are in the hands of non-state actors.

“And that explains why we want to now shift our focus to mopping up of those illicit arms that are already in circulation. The bulk of the successes we have recorded has been at the border points, those that are about to come into our society. And we have made tremendous successes in that.”

“But now, we want to divert our attention into mopping up those that are already in circulation. That is why we require the active collaboration of stakeholders, of traditional rulers, NGOs, community leaders to talk into the minds of these criminals so that those that will involuntarily bring out these arms will, if I can see, think of possibility of granting amnesty to them. But that would be a suggestion that we can push up to the headquarters, which is important.”

On the estimate of arms proliferation, Alamutu noted that there are more than five million small and light weapons in circulation .

“The estimate is up to five million, but we can not say categorically this is the number. But from records available, it falls within or quite above five million.”

He added that the centre is a signatory to the ECOWAS Convention and the UNHCR Convention, noting that the standard, the legal framework directs that such illicit arms must be destroyed.

“If, however, we believe that at our stage, at our level, we should not follow that trend, we still need to go back to the law.”

While presenting his papers at the event, the guest speaker, Head of Department of International Relations, and Diplomacy , chrisland University, Abeokuta, Dr. Kunle Olawunmi explained that instead of destroying the weapons , it can be reused within the country or sold to other countries .

He urged federal government to, as a matter of urgency, look into the committee’s recommendation on how differently the isuue of burning of weapons can better be handled .

He added that it is a treasonable offence for someone to wage war against its country, saying that those sponsoring inequality in the country should be arrested   and prosecuted.

Dr. Olawunmi further stated that each weapon can be traced through their serial number, where it was originally purchased, and manufactured

The state commissioner of police, CP Ojajuni, his remarks urged the centre to devise another avenue to mop up weapons .