Nigeria, Dec. 19 -- "Nigeria has never had expansionist tendencies, never been threatening towards our neighbours, and always chosen the path of peace and conciliation. This, in part, may have to do with the makeup of our polity and social fabric. Being such a huge country, we are used to the virtues of principled compromise." - Yusuf Tuggar

It has been an interesting few years in our Sahelian neighbourhood, where, for a while now, Nigeria has been forced to pay closer attention to, for different reasons, ranging from the broken state of Libya, and the inflow of arms and fighters from there, to the deteriorating security situation made worse by the hold on territories by terrorists, interest by non-African state actors, and the shadowy i...