Like Raeder, like Hameed Ali

Comptroller General of the Nigeria Customs Service Colonel Hameed Ali’s gung-ho approach to the closure of Nigeria’s land borders reminded me of a passage in William Shirer’s 1960 book, Rise and Fall of the Third Reich. It was about Adolf Hitler’s decision in 1940 to bomb British cities, a war crime borne out of desperation because he could not invade the British Isles. If only it could land on British shores, the German Army’s 300 divisions would make mincemeat of the British Army’s 16 divisions. However, it could not reach the British Isles because Britain’s Royal Navy was ten times stronger than the German Navy. The latter’s Commander-in-Chief, Grand Admiral Erich Raeder, said the Brits could sink all his ships if he tried to ferry the Army across the English Channel.

At the meeting to consider options, Commander-in-Chief of the German Airforce, Reich Marshall Herman Goering, proposed the bombing of British cities by his Luftwaffe instead. Other Field Marshals present at the meeting were lukewarm to the idea because it amounted to war crime. Only Raeder supported it. The author Shirer wryly observed, “Raeder’s enthusiasm for the bombing stemmed from his lack of enthusiasm for the landing.”

I suspect that Colonel Hameed Ali’s enthusiasm for the border closure stems from his lack of enthusiasm for normal Customs enforcement of anti-smuggling laws. Tried as he did in the four years since he became CG, he apparently concluded that he will never be able to stop the smuggling of rice, used vehicles and firearms into Nigeria through the land borders. Every method from border patrol to preshipment inspection to destination inspection has been tried in the last 30 years, without success. Hameed Ali therefore enthusiastically supported the closure of borders, which ECOWAS founding fathers may describe as the economic equivalent of war crime. No wonder that, much like the German Field Marshals, top Nigerian officials in charge of security, economy and diplomacy are less enthusiastic about border closure.

After the war, the International War Crimes Tribunal at Nuremberg tried and convicted Admiral Raeder. We do not want to see our Colonel Hameed Ali hauled before the World Trade Organisation’s [WTO] Economic War Crimes Tribunal, if such a tribunal exists.