By Evelyn Usman

The Nigerian Navy Special Boat Service, NNSBS has concluded a maritime training with the United Kingdom Commandos, aimed at enhancing the capabilities of the NNSBS to respond to emerging security challenges in the nation’s maritime domain, including counter-terrorism and maritime law enforcement.

Speaking at the graduation ceremony held at the Joint Maritime Security Training Centre, JMSTC in Navy Town Ojo, Lagos, a British Military Assistant Team’s BMAT trainer, Captain Tom Pycock, praised the SBS operatives for their exceptional professionalism and dedication.

Describing the four weeks training as a success ,Pycock of the UK Royal Marine’s 42 Commando ,added that the SBS operatives demonstrated remarkable skills and capabilities in the duration of the training.

He also mentioned the ease of collaboration with the Navy and the potential for future training opportunities, rating the participation of the Nigerian SBS 10 out of 10.
He said: ” We’ve been in Nigeria for the last four weeks, developing the Visit, Board, Search, and Seizure, VBSS capability for the Nigerian SBS. So, we’ve covered everything from close quarter combat in the buildings located around JMSTC. From here, we’ve moved on to the range work. We’ve done sniper, long distance shooting, along with both pistol and rifle close quarter marksmanship, progressing the capability of the Nigerian SBS, improving their speed, improving their times on the shoots.
” Thereafter, we moved into the boarding phase, which is the access onto the ships. We’ve been fortunate enough to use the training facilities, such as the ship-in-the-box, worked with the Navy to get underway training, which has probably been the highlight for everyone here. We also conducted a full mission profile, to a full run-through and a full demonstration of the capability that has been developed by the Nigerian SBS over the last four weeks. And hopefully, it’s something we can build on. And if we’re fortunate enough to come back , it’s something we can develop and help build that capability for operational purposes.
“The overall impression is that the Nigerian SBS is a very capable force.
Participants by score, is 10 out of 10. They turned up all day, ready to learn and that made the instruction from our side much more enjoyable, and it was good to see. And hopefully, at the end, they’ve learned a lot, and they can take away a lot.
“Although we’re classified instructors, and we teach them over here, we also learn a lot from the Nigerian Navy as well”.

In his welcome address the ,Commander, JMSTC, Commodore Benjamin Francis said 20 SBS operatives among who were eight snipers underwent the training.
He said the training provided opportunities for the team to share experiences with the training staff.
He said: “I personally monitored the training, and I was impressed with the quality of instruction from the BMAT’s team.The participants have learned all the boarding techniques on VBSS and have demonstrated excellent performance in the exercises.
” Some of the drills that were conducted really show that the participants have learned a lot.
I have no doubt that when they get back to the field, they are going to positively impact our future operations”
“We thank the Chief of Naval Staff for approving the training and look forward to more training experiences in this center”.
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Also in his remark, Commander, Special Boat Services, Captain Godfry Osuobeni commended the training team at the Joint Military Training Center JMSTC for its exemplary performance during a recent training exercise.
Like Commodore Francis, he expressed satisfsction over the training saying the trainees demonstrated a high level of professionalism and expertise, and he expressed his satisfaction.
“The training exercise was part of a larger effort to enhance the capabilities of the Navy Special Boat Services, and it involved simulations and live-fire exercises.
The feedback from the simulations will be invaluable in improving future training exercises”, he said.