Nigerians were recently amazed by the presentation of the 2012 budget by President Goodluck Jonathan. This was not because what everybody expected, (fuel subsidy) was not mentioned in the budget, but because of the budgetary allocation to individual sector which favours some sectors above others. What particularly attracts my own submission is the plum allocation to security against all other sectors. Expectedly, there have been comments from a cross section of the public on why security could be so favoured with N921.91bn, which is more than twice the allocation to education (N400.15bn) which follows it, when we are not executing a war. But frankly speaking, no amount of resources is too much to maintain the security of a nation, since no meaningful development can take place in an unsecured atmosphere.However, as much as security deserves the full attention of the government, especially with the present situation in Nigeria, it is important to study the scenarios surrounding insecurity in order to be able to adequately tackle them. The current security situation in Nigeria deserves not impetuous, but holistic solutions. The increasing spate of violence and insecurity in the country did not just develop overnight. It is as a result of accumulated unresolved fundamental issues that border on our existence as a nation. Unarguably, the Nigerian nation has overtime been bedeviled by sundry of injustices perpetrated by either the rulers against the ruled, or the ruled against themselves. While the former is independent, the latter is an offshoot of the former. The Jos mahyem, the Boko Haram issue in the North, kidnapping in the East, the Movement for Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) upheavals in the South-South, among other violences, are all consequent upon the various bitterness that have been meted out to the society in the past, many of which are still going on unaddressed. The chief of these sins against the society are to mention a few, acute unemployment, opportunity inequality, total collapse of infrastructure and widened gap between the poor and the rich, all of which are occasioned by gross insensitivity and selfishness on the part of the rulers.At this juncture, to succinctly identify the causes of violence in the country, let me borrow an excerpt from the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs (1994), 'the social discord created by the huge contrasts in economic wellbeing that is, abject poverty in closely juxtaposition with great wealth, and the frustration produced by marginalisation and the inability to do anything about it are perhaps, the most significant motives for crimes and urban violence.' In addition, lack of prospects and/or opportunities for upward social mobility, negative socialisation, poor education, peer pressure and poor job prospects, absence of strong legal deterrents, general breakdown of family values, lack of social control within the communities which tend to cancel out community influence in dealing with deviant behaviours are other causes of repeated violences and crimes in the country. All these, if sincerely addressed, would have automatically resolved the security issue to an extent.However, the way the government wants to handle the situation, especially judging from the budgetary allocation to the sector, enough caution has to be exercised. The social order must be reversed, first to economically arm the poor masses, as against the current order, where less than 10 per cent of the population control more than 90 per cent of the country resources, thereby leaving the remaining very little (less than 10 per cent) for the majority poor to compete for. The mind of individuals has to be reformed and reshaped, and mindset changed for better. If the people themselves are not redeemed, and the many wrongs identified not corrected, no amount of resources allocated to security will be meaningful. Also, the working conditions of the security personnel must be attended to, their overall welfare must be generously met, what I mean by this is what goes to their pocket at the end of the month, bearing in mind that many corruptive intents of most security officials are on many occasions, predicated upon poor remuneration and packages. Otherwise, many of the sophisticated gadgets procured for all state security outfits will end up in the hands of criminals and robbers.In a society where vices are institutionalised and violence is seen to be pursued in the name of justice by the oppressed and in fear of displacement by the threatened, further importation of arms and ammunition will only add to the weaponry of the criminals, whether directly or indirectly. Government must fight insecurity by providing employment, arming the youths by productively engaging both their minds and hands. Government should have spent more on agriculture, power, health and others above security, at least in the interest of empowering the citizenry and meeting the Millennium Development Goals by 2015. An idle mind is the devil's workshop.Wasiu Mayowa sent this piece in from Oje Owode, Oyo State.
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