Nigeria faces a fresh but not new wave of banditry in the Northwest, farmer-herder conflicts, Boko Haram insurgency, and kidnapping for ransom among multiple security challenges. Over 2,266 people were killed by bandits or insurgents in the first half of 2025, surpassing all of 2024, according to figures released by Nigeria’s National Human Rights Commission in July 2025. In September 2025, suspected Boko Haram fighters stormed Darul Jama (also called Darajamal) in Borno state at night, killing over 50 people, including five soldiers and burning newly built homes meant for returning displaced families, a brutal reminder that even “liberated” communities remain exposed.
The Dependency Trap: How Foreign Procurement Weakens Nigeria’s Defence
Nigeria is one of Africa’s largest defence spenders, spending about $4.5 billion in 2021, decreasing slightly to $3.2 billion in 2023, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), yet the country relies heavily on foreign military equipment, creating a serious vulnerability. This foreign equipments, many of which we pay premium prices for still come with long stipulations and rules, for example, Nigeria’s purchase of A‑29 Super Tucano attack aircraft from the United States was tied to strict end‑use monitoring phrased as: “human‑rights conditions”, and U.S. lawmakers have repeatedly delayed or blocked follow‑on attack‑helicopter sales over concerns about how Nigerian forces conduct counterinsurgency operations.
While their concerns are valid, given Nigeria’s documented human rights violations, these conditions create operational constraints, shaping the decision-making of the military commanders on the battlefield, who must consider foreign-imposed regulations when engaging armed groups, using equipment Nigeria purchased. The Super Tucano saga exemplifies the problem: lengthy approval processes, end-use monitoring, and the constant risk of supply cutoffs. This dilemma goes beyond hardware; as I argued in an earlier essay on Nigeria’s defence dependency, foreign capital, export controls and political conditions shape what the military can buy, how fast it gets it, and whether local firms can build credible alternatives.
On December 25, 2025, U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) conducted airstrikes in Sokoto State, on Nigerian soil, against ISIS-affiliated targets. While Nigerian officials confirmed they were involved in the operation, the incident underscores a troubling reality: Nigeria’s military, despite billions in defence spending, required American precision strike capabilities to hit targets within its own borders. The strikes may have been to neutralise militants, but the optics are damaging; the “giant of Africa” is effectively outsourcing kinetic operations on its territory. Whether the targets were legitimate or the intelligence sound matters less than the perception: Nigeria cannot independently execute certain military operations without foreign intervention. This is the ultimate consequence of defence dependency.
How Modern Warfare Has Changed: Speed, Scale, and Cheap Systems
Nigeria has historically faced limitations in its Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (ISR) capabilities for many reasons, one of which I already stated in this article – dependence on foreign military equipments, but we can learn directly from real-world battlefield innovation in places like Ukraine and Syria, especially in rapidly iterated technologies, such as low cost drones, and adapt these lessons to build a resilient local defence ecosystem rather than remain trapped in dependence on foreign suppliers. This means the Government, deliberately leveraging Nigeria’s current security crises to push for indigenous tech solutions – drones, sensors, AI, electronic warfare… etc – backed by policy, capital, and doctrine that reward speed, adaptation, and partnership with local industry. This will significantly increase our response speed and effectiveness, as well as help equip and protect the brave Nigerian military men who face these dangers daily.
Nigeria already has a foundation to build on. Local defence technology companies such as Briech UAS (part of EIB Group), which produces Damisa Combat Drone, Terrahaptix, which is shaking the ecosystem at the moment in drone production, Kifta Technologies, which focuses on surveillance systems, UAVs, smart glasses and Proforce Defence Limited, which works on UAVs and armoured vehicles, all demonstrate that indigenous capacity exists. These companies, however, remain starved of government contracts, capital access, and policy support. Rather than treating them as afterthoughts in procurement processes, they need government contracts, capital access, and policy support, not occasional acknowledgement.
What Indigenous Defence Means for Nigeria
Nigeria doesn’t need to build fighter jets tomorrow; building a thriving local defence industry requires understanding that it takes time, and there are steps within the journey that cannot be skipped. We need to start with what’s achievable, low-hanging fruit like drone assembly, armour plating for vehicles, communication systems, and night vision refurbishment, amongst others. Building a thriving Defence Industry is a phased process, which includes:
- Tier 1: Maintenance, repair & overhaul of existing foreign equipment that can be replaced by local ones (immediate). We have some of this happening in the ecosystem already with certain sector players, but we need a more deliberate, planned approach to sector growth.
- Tier 2: Co-production and licensed assembly (3-5 years)
- Tier 3: Indigenous R&D and manufacturing (5-15 years): Ukrainian manufacturers produce FPV drones for $300-500 each, compared to $170,000 for comparable US military-specification attack drones. At scale, Nigeria could produce reconnaissance and strike drones domestically at a fraction of the cost of imports, while building sovereign defence capabilities.
A great role model for this type of progressive growth is Turkey, which began F-16 maintenance in the 1980s, then moved to licensed production, and now exports the Bayraktar TB2 drone globally. This took 40 years of disciplined policy; today, Turkey’s defence exports now exceed $6 billion annually, with the Bayraktar TB2 used in conflicts from Libya to Nagorno-Karabakh to Ukraine. Nigeria doesn’t need four decades; it needs to start now.
Three Technology Vectors for Indigenous Defence Capability: A Framework for Nigeria
Nigeria’s choice is limited: remain a buyer of other people’s defence systems, or become a builder of systems tailored to its forests, savannahs, and creeks. The dense vegetation of the Niger Delta requires different ISR solutions than the open savannahs of the Northwest or the semi-arid Lake Chad basin. Foreign systems are optimised for Afghan mountains and Iraqi deserts, not Nigerian rainforests, where canopy cover defeats off-the-shelf thermal imaging.
There are three key defence electronic defence vectors I recommend Nigeria’s defence focus on building to adequately respond to the threats at home, while reducing dependencies on foreign weapons, they are:
- ISR and Unmanned Systems: Seeing the Battlefield First
Drones offer real-time visual and thermal imagery, data collection, and communication relay in the most challenging environments, critical for forest surveillance, border monitoring, and kidnapping response, making them an important defence utility in enhancing Nigeria’s real-time ISR capabilities. We need to deploy drone and counter-drone platforms at the platoon level, especially at sensitive locations.
- Electronic Warfare and Counter-Drone: Denying the Enemy Advantage
Bandits increasingly use commercial drones for reconnaissance in Nigeria; the military also needs to adapt quickly, deploying counter-drone (C-UAS) systems at checkpoints and drones at the platoon level and across Nigeria’s military bases in Zamfara, Borno, and Niger states. Counter-drone capabilities range from RF jamming to kinetic auto-turrets; these capabilities are cheaper to develop locally than to import from Israel or the US. RF jamming is well within Nigeria’s technical capacity, given our existing telecommunications manufacturing base.
- Data Fusion and AI: Turning Information into Action
To be maximally effective, we would also need to prioritise integrating AI and data platforms to fuse drone, satellite, and human intelligence into actionable targeting and insight. This is where Nigeria has the greatest advantage: its talent in the tech sector, since software is easier to indigenize than hardware, and Nigeria’s tech ecosystem has demonstrated world-class capability. The challenge is bridging the gap between Nigeria’s thriving startup sector and the defence establishment through security clearances, access to training data, and contracts structured for agile software development.
Each vector represents a future article in this series, but all require the same foundation – policy reform and capital mobilisation.
Why Progress Has Stalled in Nigeria’s Defence Industry
Technology alone doesn’t explain Nigeria’s defence stagnation; incentive structures and institutional design matter just as much. Here are some reasons this stagnation persists:
- Misaligned Incentives: Transparency International reports show that some Military generals and politicians profit from commissions on foreign equipment. Until incentive structures change, making it more profitable for officials to support local innovation than to collect commissions on foreign contracts, progress will remain slow.
- No industrial policy: Unlike Turkey/Iran, Nigeria has no National Defence Industry Strategy; this has to change fast!
- Brain drain: The JAPA phenomenon in Nigeria keeps devastating the nation, as top talents and Engineers go abroad or into fintech, not defence. Until defence R&D offers packages comparable to those in the private sector & pushes for an innovation culture, Nigeria will struggle to retain the talent it needs in this sector.
- IP and partnerships: Nigeria lacks formal mechanisms for universities and private companies to collaborate with defence institutions while protecting intellectual property. There are no standardised technology transfer agreements, security clearance processes for civilian researchers, or legal frameworks allowing companies to retain IP rights while developing for military applications. A huge opportunity is being wasted here, in my opinion.
What Nigeria Should Do Next
Nigeria needs to create a Nigerian Defence Innovation Unit (similar to the US Defence Innovation Unit), whose role would be to accelerate Nigeria’s technological innovation for National security. The Nigerian Defence Innovation Unit should launch with no less than a ₦50-100 billion annual budget, roughly 2-5% of the defence budget, with mandates to:
- Provide seed capital or Co-fund 50% of R&D costs for dual-use tech. Also, serves as the bridge between the military and the private sector
- Award contracts to local firms within 60 days (versus current 12-18 month procurement cycles) while creating strategies to expand and grow the ecosystem
- Offer IP protections and run annual defence competitions for university teams, private sector players and the military.
- Guarantee first purchase orders for successful prototypes.
The unit should operate semi-autonomously under the National Security Adviser with authority to fast-track security clearances and sign binding contracts without multiple approval layers. It must be led by individuals with both military and technology-sector experience, not by career bureaucrats.
Conclusion: Building Security on Nigerian Terms
The choice is binary: continue dependency on suppliers who dictate terms and timelines, or build the capacity to defend Nigeria on Nigerian terms. Turkey and Iran prove it’s possible; both started from positions weaker than Nigeria’s current industrial base. Ukraine proves it’s urgent; their rapid drone indigenisation since 2022 demonstrates that necessity accelerates innovation timelines. The only question is whether Nigeria’s leadership will act before the next Darul Jama massacre, before the next supply cutoff, before dependency becomes a permanent vulnerability.
Nigeria must build systems, talent, and production loops, not just purchase hardware. The 63 people killed in Darul Jama deserved overhead ISR coverage, rapid-response drones, and the kind of technological umbrella that modern militaries provide. Indigenous capability isn’t just economic policy; it’s a moral imperative to those who volunteer for military service and civilians in exposed communities. The infrastructure exists. The talent exists. What’s missing is political will and institutional reform. The question is no longer “can Nigeria build?” but “will Nigeria build?”