THE DYNAMICS OF UNEMPLOYMENT AND CRIMINALITY IN THE EASTERN NIGER DELTA AREA OF NIGREIA
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Date
2016
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The Department of History and International Studies, University of Ilorin, Ilorin, Nigeria.
Abstract
The upsurge in criminal activities such as violent crimes, mindless vandalism and the widespread insecurity in the Eastern Niger Delta area of Nigeria has become a menace. These crimes are largely traceable to the rising unemployment rate in the area over the years. Today, youth restiveness, militancy, pipeline vandalism, oil theft, kidnapping, abduction, assassinations, armed robbery, cultism, prostitution, advanced fee fraud, cyber-crime, substance abuse, drug trafficking, human trafficking, political thuggery and vandalism of national power installations, among other criminal acts, have become daily occurrences in the region. A new and scary dimension with its serious effect on our crude oil export and foreign exchange earnings has since been added to these social ills, following the recent upsurge in violent campaigns for secession by militant groups, particularly the Niger Delta Avengers in the area. The primary thrust of this paper is to ascertain the causes and the consequences of unemployment and criminality in the Eastern Niger Delta area of Nigeria. This study therefore adopts a historic-structural and multidisciplinary approaches to explicate this menace. The paper concludes that rising unemployment, poor infrastructural development, gaps in our tertiary educational system and corruption, are responsible for the rising wave of criminality in the area.
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Keywords
DYNAMICS, EASTERN NIGER DELTA AREA, CRIMINALITY, UNEMPLOYMENT