Suchergebnisse

Violent criminality and insecurity are pervasive across Nigeria as private armies, ethnic militias, armed robbers, political assassins, ransom kidnappers, hostage takers, and serial bombers have gone on rampage. Uneducated youth are often blamed in mainstream discourse as the major perpetrators or foot soldiers of anti-social crimes and non-state violence. Conceived as "loose molecules," their behavioral patterns are said to be largely deviant and oppositional to acceptable culture. In contrast, educated youth (including those in higher education) are believed to be refined and easily conform to social norms, values and laws, thereby shunning criminality and violence. This article investigates this widespread notion and discovers, contrary to orthodox thinking, that higher education students pose as much threat to Nigerian society as uneducated youth. The article blames the criminalization of students on the debasement of social values, the culture of corruption in Nigeria, and the infrastructural decay that currently undermines teaching and learning in the country's higher education sector. To prevent tertiary institutions from becoming breeding grounds of criminals, the article stresses the need for values re-orientation, adequate funding, and infrastructural development as well as ensuring that students and staff who contravene the laws are sanctioned appropriately.

The amnesty granted to the Niger Delta militants by the Nigerian state has stopped active and sustained physical combat in the oil-rich but volatile region. Yet, peace remains elusive in the area. This article, which relies essentially on secondary sources of data, examines this 'no war, no peace' situation by mapping the challenges confronting the amnesty programme and its corollary disarmament, demobilization and reintegration (DDR) programmes. It is argued that, until the incentives for violence are identified and checked, the age-long grievances of the region against environmental insecurity, underdevelopment, and distributional injustice in oil rents addressed, perpetrators of human rights violations – including extra-judicial murders – brought to book, and victims of human rights abuses and the protracted conflict compensated, the current peace of the graveyard in the region is likely to subsist.

The Niger Delta militancy and Boko Haram insurgency pose the greatest security threat to Nigeria since the end of the civil war in 1970. This article places both rebellions in comparative perspective. It argues that, though spatially and ideologically differentiated, both insurgencies are products of the dysfunctional character of the Nigerian state. Owing to poor governance, the state relies essentially on repression and the military option in managing challenges to its legitimacy, leading to the radicalization of violent non-state actors. The article recommends the need for developmental politics and a critical re-examination of the National Question to make the state more relevant to the people.