Political leaders and the government at all levels have been advised to rescue Nigeria from the destructive forces of criminality.
A Professor of criminology, Kayode Adedeji made gave the advice at a webinar organised by the Nigeria Society for Criminology entitled “Criminology and contemporary security challenges in Nigeria”, held on Monday.
The University Don noted that the need for Buhari and other political leaders to rescue the country is necessary given the present security challenges facing the country.
Adedeji who said that the government of Nigeria seems to be helpless in tackling insecurity in the country urged members of the society to make the outcome of their researches available for policymakers.
He said, “Government seems unable to tackle the problems of insecurity partly due to inadequacy of knowledge or due to the fire brigade approach usually employed in addressing issues in Nigeria”.
”Members of the society have to make their research findings available to policy actors as their contribution towards ending the spate of insecurity”.
A professor of Criminology at the University of Jos, Etannibi Alemika said the knowledge of criminology and researches are needed now more than ever before to help the country in navigating its contemporary security challenges.
In his paper, Historical and Contemporary overview of security challenges in Nigeria, Professor Adeyinka Aderinto traced the origin of contemporary insecurity to trust gaps, injustice which birthed ethnic agitations and kidnapping in the Niger-delta region.
The former Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Academic) University of Ibadan said, despite years of independence, insecurity is still Nigeria’s biggest challenge and is fast becoming Nigeria’s identity.
“Although the origin of security challenges in the country cannot be ascertained, it is researched to have started after the civil war….the 1966 coup and the resultant civil war.
“The distrust that emanated from these experiences provides strong currents driving insecurity today and many ethnic agitations have arisen many decades after the war. This is further worsened by the downturn in the economic fortunes of the country following the end of the oil boom in the 1980s”.
