Criminality in the Eastern Niger Delta Area of Nigeria: Implications for Nation Building
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Date
2018
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Faculty of Arts, Federal University of Dutsinma, Katsina State
Abstract
Nigerian citizens and people of the Eastern Niger Delta area have witnessed unprecedented violence and acts of terrorism resulting in unquantifiable loss of lives and property that has affected the economic growth and development of the area and Nigeria at large. Criminality has engendered widespread insecurity and fear that has hindered economic and business activities in this area of Nigeria that is endowed with enormous oil and gas resources. Since the advent of crude oil exploration in Nigeria in 1956, the nation has not witnessed this magnitude of destruction of her national oil and gas assets. Criminal activities such as youth restiveness, militancy, pipeline vandalism, oil theft, kidnapping, abduction, assassinations, armed robbery, political thuggery, vandalisation of national power installations among other crimes, have imposed serious challenges on governance and nation building.
igeria has lost over 60 of her crude oil foreign exchange earnings needed urgently to deflate the economy at this period of global economic recession to criminality in the Eastern Niger Delta. The main thrust of this paper is to critically examine the implications on nation building of the recent upsurge in violence and vandalism by terrorist groups in the Eastern Niger Delta area of Nigeria. The study will adopt a historic-structural, multi-disciplinary and analytic approach to this problem. The analysis has shown that a mono-product economy, poor leadership, loss of traditional values, an all pervading corru ption and a culture of impunity are impediments to nation building.
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Keywords
Criminality, Nation Building, Implications