Reflections on the Military Armoury Disaster In Mozambique, March 2007

Abstract

This article examines the phenomenon of armoury disasters in Africa, but with specific reference to the Lagos and Maputo armoury explosions that resulted in over 1,200 fatalities. By means of descriptive approach flowing from rigorous content-analysis of print and electronic media sources and conversational interview, this article seeks to answer the following questions-what happened and why and who gets what done, when and how? To achieve this, the article is structured into three parts: The first part consists of conceptual exploration, literature review, in addition to motivation and description of methodology, sources, as well as summary of armoury disasters in Africa. The second section discusses the causative theories, advances explanations for high mortality rate, and attempts an analysis of how the state & non-state actors responded in the immediate post-disaster period. The third section which is essentially the summary and conclusion also briefly outlines the gaps in dealing with the aftermath of armoury disasters in Africa.