Analysis of Maritime Piracy and Armed Robbery in the Gulf of Guinea Maritime Domain

The Gulf of Guinea in the past 14 years witnessed serious challenges of maritime piracy and armed robbery attacks. The paper analyzed maritime piracy and armed robbery in the Gulf of Guinea region from 2002 to 2015. Time series data of 14 years on the reported piracy and armed robbery attacks in the 15 Gulf of Guinea countries and nine coastal zones of Nigeria were obtained from International Maritime Bureau annual reports. Trend analysis model and analysis of variance (ANOVA) were used to analyze the data. It was found that there was significant variation in piracy and armed robbery attacks among the Gulf of Guinea countries, the greatest of attacks occurred in Nigeria. There was also a significant variation in piracy attacks among the coastal zones of Nigeria with attacks in Lagos ports and anchorages being highest within the period. There exists decreasing trend of attacks within the period.