Many times, we think of crime as only horrendous offences like murder, robbery, stealing, bribery, corruption, arson, assault, and battery. It, however, goes beyond that to include: oppression, deceit, conspiracy to commit crime and many others. Crime is any offense against humanity or the state. All crimes are considered to have immediate and long term effects on the society.
Total eradication of crime is nearly impossible in any society as humans, in the view of the ancient Greek philosopher, Aristotle, has no good in them. In concurrence, the Bible in Jeremiah 17:9-10 says that the heart of man is deceitful and desperately wicked. Even Jesus Christ, the great teacher, told us that out of the heart of men, proceeds evil thoughts, adultery, fornication, murder, theft, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, blasphemy, pride and foolishness as seen in Mark 7:21. However, every society struggles as much as possible to curtail these evil tendencies in humans and protect its citizenry.
According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crimes’ 2019 Global Study on Homicide, 464,000 people died from violent crimes in 2017. The report states that countries with high firearm ownership rates have higher intentional homicide cases. Some of the lowest violent crime rates can be seen in Europe. Nigeria, on the other hand, ranks 17th among the least peaceful countries in the world and the second country in Africa with the highest risk of genocide and the sixth worldwide. This data is influenced by Nigeria’s tensive ethnic fractionalization, increase in the incidents of rape, kidnapping, murder, burglary, fraud, terrorism, robbery, cyber-crimes, bribery and corruption, money laundering, political instability, and citizen alienation.
These negative statistics must have defined the priority given to insecurity by Professor Chukwuma Soludo immediately he assumed office as Governor of Anambra State in 2023. As a major agenda in his administration, the governor had drawn the battle line against insecurity and has not relented in addressing other non-kinetic and social challenges that increase the risk of crime in the society such as poverty, access to quality health care, public infrastructure and education.
It is, then only, rational if as citizens we contribute our own quota towards having a safe society. We can do this by being aware of our environment-get to know your neighbours and report suspicious activities when you see them, install security cameras where they can be afforded and holding our elected representatives accountable. Preventing crime tasks each person with the individual responsibility for their own safety. Sharing information with necessary authorities will also reduce crime as criminals continue to explore new ways and appropriate the nation’s vulnerabilities.
Law enforcement agencies and their officers must know that their fundamental duty is to serve the community; to safeguard life and property, to protect the innocent against deception, the weak against oppression and the peaceful against violence. They are responsible to ensure that every member of society respects the constitutional rights of others to liberty, equality and justice. Personal idiosyncrasies and considerations must be kept far away from the four walls of crime fighting.
Nigeria as a country must as well explore new frontiers and options to tackle crime. We must learn from developed countries in their use of modern technological and tactical methods in the fight which has proven to be effective in those climes.
Fighting crimes and insecurity is a challenging task even for the most developed countries. However, a collective effort from the citizenry, law enforcement agencies and government at all levels and an adoption of developmental, people-oriented, community driven and situational solutions will guarantee better success.
Written by WILFRED OBIOTIKA/
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