Security guards have become common fixtures in corporate Nigeria. They work at banks, pharmacies, schools, and nearly every other kind of corporate establishment in the country.

Isaac Fajaiye is a 28-year old part-time student who works as a guard at a fast food restaurant in Jibowu, Lagos. He says he supervises the traffic of customers, and monitors the restaurant’s facilities to be able to forestall security threats. He says he earns N26,000 monthly but that the amount is incommensurate with the amount of risks his job involves.

“I just manage this job because I have to pay for my education,’ he said. “N26,000 is not enough to cover for the type of risk I face daily. There was a time when armed robbers came here, and they hit me with a gun when I told them I did not know where the money was.”

Many security guards face similar risks ― but they earn even less.

Bassey Udor is one of them. He’s a guard at a hotel in Festac, Lagos, and earns only N10,000 a month. ”Normally my job is to open the gate for cars to come in and go out, but I want to leave this work soon: the pay is too small and the risk is too much because robbers usually target big hotels like our own,” he said.

Considering that they are likely to get attacked while at work, some security guards think their employers should provide them with arms so they can protect themselves and discharge their duties more effectively.

Seun Oyeleye, who is one of the guards at a Lagos bank, belongs to this group. “We don’t have weapons to defend ourselves if the need arises, so if a small boy comes here with a gun and asks me to open the door, I’ll do so or else he may shoot me,” he said.

Most security guards are usually not employed by the company where they really do their work but by a separate security firm. This firm makes a deal with a given company, called the client, and then it hires people to work as guards at this client’s establishment according to the terms of the deal. In this case, the security firm is the real employer of the guards and is responsible for their remuneration and welfare.

Some of such security guards claim that their employer pays them an unfair amount of the money the client pays for their services or that their employer does not provide them satisfactory welfare conditions.

“Here we have no medical, retirement or insurance benefits,” said a guard who did not want his name published. “You’re not allowed to go on leave and nothing is given to you when your appointment is terminated.”

Samuel Yenki gave up after years on the job. “I worked for a security firm for over ten years and left when I learned the client was paying N18,000 for my services, whereas my employer was paying me only N6,000 of it,” he said.

Experts in the industry have decried the trend, saying that such treatment open avenues for security guards to betray the trust reposed on them.

Tony Ofoyetan, the director-general of International Institute of Professional Security, said professional security firms should not pay their guard less than 65 percent of what the client is offering. ”Besides that, a lot of these guards asking for fanciful welfare benefits do not even have the befitting educational or professional qualification,” he said.

Ray Ekwueme, a chief superintendent at the National Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC), said that the agency is trying its best to enforce better conditions for guards employed with security firms.

“There are rules governing private guarding,” he said. “For example, the employers must provide medical benefits for their guards. So we have seized licenses and closed down some non-compliant security firms in the past. On the issue of what percentage of the client’s actual payment the security outfits should pay their guards, a decision has not been reached because clients don’t pay the same amount. If we say 65 percent, how will the outfits settle guards whose clients are paying N20,000 or less? But then we maintain that every guard must get a minimum wage of N10,000 no matter what his client is paying.”