Docked in the port of Lagos, Nigeria’s commercial capital, floats a colossal oil tanker. Two layers of razor wire snake around its deck. Two life-sized human dummies in orange jumpsuits are perched on the ship’s bridge, posing as crew members keeping watch. Serving as a reminder that such precautions are prudent in Africa are the mangled steel and concrete remains of a jetty.
The Gulf of Guinea, on west Africa’s southern coast, is the world’s most pirate-infested sea. The International Maritime Bureau (imb) reports 72 attacks last year on vessels at sea between Ivory Coast and Cameroon—up from 28 in 2014. Elsewhere piracy is in decline. Between 2014 and 2018 the number of incidents each year in South-East Asia fell from 141 to 60, and to just three offSomalia, which in 2007-12 faced this century’s worst piracy crisis.
Unlike the Somalis, west African pirates never keep the vessels, as they have nowhere to hide them. Instead, armed with ak-47s and knives, they storm a ship, round up some of the crew and return to land, where they hide their hostages.
