Nigerian Navy Adds Four Ships

The former U.S. Coast Guard cutter Gallatin was transferred to the Nigerian Navy during a ceremony in Charleston, South Carolina, in the United States. The cutter was renamed the NNS Okpabana and commissioned in a ceremony in Nigeria. [Leroy Burnell/post and courier]

Nigeria commissioned four warships into service in February 2015, with two more to be commissioned before the end of the year. The vessels were handed over to their commanding officers at a ceremony at the Naval Dockyard at Victoria Island in Lagos. They are the NNS Centenary, NNS Prosperity, NNS Okpabana and NNS Sagbama, according to the News Agency of Nigeria.

The Nigerian Navy said it was the first time in its history that four warships would be commissioned at once. “It is a demonstration of the federal government’s efforts to reposition the Nigerian Navy to meet contemporary security challenges,” the Navy said in a statement.

The NNS Okpabana is the former United States Coast Guard cutter Gallatin and will be used to patrol Nigeria’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ). The vessel arrived in Nigeria on January 2, 2015, joining the Navy’s other Hamilton-class cutter, the NNS Thunder.

The NNS Centenary is a new P-18N offshore patrol vessel built by China Shipbuilding and Offshore International Co. It arrived in Nigeria on February 6 and will be used for maritime surveillance, EEZ patrols, and protecting offshore resources and infrastructure, according to Vice Adm. Usman Jibrin, Nigeria’s chief of naval staff. “The Centenary is to also provide aid to civil authority when called upon to do so in periods such as civil unrest and natural disaster,” he said.

The NNS Sagbama is a 38-meter patrol craft. The NNS Prosperity is the former Irish offshore patrol vessel LE Emer, decommissioned in September 2013 and subsequently sold to Nigeria.

“The high dependence of the nation’s economy on offshore resources, as well as the enormous potential of the maritime sector to contribute to our food security and employment generation, makes provision of effective maritime security very imperative,” then-President Goodluck Jonathan said at the ceremony.