New Telegraph

Expert: Poverty, Unemployment, Others Fuelling Insecurity In Nigeria

Any study of the worsening state of security in Nigeria cannot but be linked to issues like lack of basic infrastructure, poverty, bad governance, unemployment, among others, according to experts on socio-political and economic matters.

 

This was the submission of Oliseh Kadishi, a historian/researcher and speakers during Day 2 of Maroon Square Discourse 2020, an online conference tagged ‘Struggle of Women in Nigeria Through History: Women’s Rights and challenge of insecurity in Nigeria’ organized by Maroon Square and supported by Ross Luxemburg Foundation.

 

“It is important to note that different areas are affected with regards to the various crises and conflicts that have created insecurity in Nigeria, Kadishi stated.

While also listing perceived ethnic superiority, materialism and the display of wealth with impunity among factored that have contributed, she pointed at widening social inequality as seen in the case of militancy seen in Niger Delta years back.

 

“It is no more news that despite the fact that Niger Delta has been and the hub of oil production, the region lacks basic infrastructures and suffers exclusion in development as there are no good roads, no electricity, no pipe borne water, no visible federal government presence, among other things.

 

“Corruption is evident in practices of individuals and government practices. Government officials are known to have embezzled funds that were designated for the development of their states, local government areas and communities.

 

“These people divert the funds and other benefits or compensations to personal use. Thus corrupt practices are said to constitute one of the reasons why people are aggrieved, thus exhibiting it through protest, kidnappings, militancy and terrorism in Nigeria as was in the case of the Niger Delta militancy,” she said.

 

On his part, a lecturer in the Department of History and International Studies of Osun State University, Temitope Fagunwa, noted that women and children bear the brunt of conflicts and insecurity as available data shows most conflicts in history ended with more women and children casualties.

 

Fagunwa, who stated that Boko Haram insurgency has affected women in a multi-dimensional way including denying them access to education, social benefits, healthcare services, wage labour among others, stated: “The effects of the insurgency on women can be grouped into health, socio-economic and political effects. The enormous cases of HIV, and other deadly sexually transmitted diseases, among women in the north have been tied to the insurgency.

“Through the numerous cases of rape and forced marriages, members of the insurgency are no doubt obstacles to the reproductive or sexual rights of women.

 

“What the lack of access to education has done is that lesser women are involved in wage labour in the north. The civil service in most northern states is dominated by menfolk.”

 

According the don, the insurgency has particularly affected women in many ways that one can imagine, with life in the North East forever altered for the generation of women traumatised by unending orgy of mindless killings, kidnapping and rape going on in states like Yobe, Borno among others.

 

 

“The economic state of women in this region is also nothing to write home about on account of the Boko Haram insurgency. Indeed this crisis had prevented women from engaging in their regular productive businesses such as rural farming, petty-material production and long distance trades,” he added.

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