The arrest this week of the second-in-command of one of Japan’s criminal organisations is a lesson for Nigeria.
Kiyoshi Takayama has led Yamaguchi-gumi, one of the most powerful arms of the Yakuza criminal group, while its leader, Kenichi Shinoda, has been serving a prison term for violating gun control laws.
Takayama was arrested on suspicion of extorting $500,000 in protection money from a construction company. The dawn raid by 140 police officers was the result of a police crackdown and leaves the criminal group without a leader, a situation that will likely precipitate an internal power struggle.
Yamaguchi-gumi accounts for almost half of the membership of Japan’s criminal groups. Under Takayama the group has expanded beyond its 95-year-old base at Kobe into Tokyo.
The head of Japan’s national police agency has declared the Yamaguchi-gumi will be destroyed as part of an unprecedented crackdown on Yakuza organised crime.
The Yakuza is a highly structured criminal organisation that runs a myriad of criminal activities including protection rackets, prostitution, illegal arms, drugs, gambling and is being investigated in connection with stock market manipulation and fraud. It is not a militant group with an agenda for political reform with a view to justice.
The Niger Delta has seen the emergence of many street gangs, vigilante groups, cult groups and other criminal groups but only the NDPVF and MEND could be said to have developed a political agenda that would see them classified as militants. With the arrest of Alhaji Asari Dokubo in 2005 the NDPVF split and spawned several new groups one of which was MEND. MEND continued to develop the mantra of justice for the people of the Niger Delta. The 2010 Independence Day bombings signalled a major change in direction and agenda.
Japan’s national police agency and Nigeria’s security apparatus have much in common when it comes to the challenges they each have in their crackdown on criminal groups. The Yakuza has had very close relationships with Japan’s police force and has operated with relative impunity.
Dismantling the Yakuza is a very tall mountain to climb. The Yakuza is deeply embedded in Japan’s political and social structure. While there are some similarities with the manner in which criminal groups in the Niger Delta may have attachments to and developed from cult groups, Niger Delta criminal gangs are a recent phenomena that are not yet embedded in society and must not be permitted to become embedded in the political structure.
Breaking the nexus between political patrons and the criminal gangs is absolutely essential to contain and roll back the growth of organised crime in the Niger Delta. The run-up to the 2011 elections is building a demand for armed gang activity to secure electoral office and thus pressure-cooking the growth of criminality.
Nigeria is confronted with a most difficult situation. The extent of organised criminality is relatively low mainly because the major parties have not yet settled on their choice of candidates for the 2011 elections. When the candidates are in place the real action will begin and the activities of gangs will become more evident thus threatening any chance of free and fair elections. The ensuing wave of criminality will force the Federal Government to deploy troops in an effort to protect the public and the Niger Delta will once again be militarized.
The Federal Government thus has very little time remaining in which to take charge of the situation in an effort to ensure the potential build-up can be thwarted.
The new NSA, General (rtd) Owoye Azazi has made a good start with seizures of large illegal shipments of weapons and drugs. Another seizure of sophisticated weaponry earlier this week comes a few weeks after the seizure a major shipment of mortars, grenades, rockets and ammunition from Iran which Nigeria reported to the United Nations Security Council on 15 November. This is starting to look like a co-ordinated strategy from President Jonathan, NSA Azazi and Foreign Minister Odein Ajumogobia. This is a new and welcome level of intervention, which has only seen lip service paid to illegal importations in earlier years.
General Azazi is sending a strong signal but his greatest challenge is to reform Nigeria’s security services quickly so as to launch a co-ordinated assault on criminality before it can take a second breath of life. He can expect significant efforts to slow down and block his reforms.
Intervention at Nigeria’s international borders is long overdue and one can only conclude there needs to be a massive clean out in Nigeria’s customs service.
Canon Dr Stephen Davis is Canon Emeritus at Coventry Cathedral and has served as an advisor to President Obasanjo, Presidential Envoy under President Yar’Adua and is the author of The Report on the Potential for Peace and Reconciliation in the Niger Delta.