Question Of The Day: Should Parents Of Convicted Cultists Be Punished As Well?

Cultism is one of the problems confronting the educational sector in Nigeria today. From our tertiary institutions to even secondary schools today, we find the existence of various cult groups with various evil motives. 

When there's a clash among cult groups, it usually leads to the death of innocent lives. Properties are also destroyed. A very good example of how injurious cultism can be is the unfortunate loss of five people in the Obafemi Awolowo University in 1998. They were killed by cultists allegedly sponsored by the then vice-chancellor, Wale Omole.

As part of measures to discourage the spread of cultism, a bill titled "Unlawful Societies and Cultism (Prohibition) Bill, 2020" before the Lagos State House of Assembly seeks to amend anti-cultism laws within the state. It has scaled the second reading stage. One of the amendments to existing laws against cultism in the state seeks to include punishment for parents found guilty of cultism.

[sponsors] 

The speaker of the Lagos House of Assembly, Mudashiru Obasa said, "Parents of cultists found guilty of cultism in the state might be liable for punishment, if the Bill for a law to provide for the prohibition of unlawful societies and cultism in Lagos and for connected purposes is passed.

differentiate between the types of cultism in the country so that we won’t solve one problem and create another. We need to look at the way and manner weapons are used. The existing law should be seriously looked into."

This is the same argument made my actress Etinosa in June that girlfriends of Yahoo boys should equally be arrested alongside their boyfriends. However, in the case of cultism, it is slightly different. While a girlfriend to a yahoo boy is very likely to know that her boyfriend is involved in cybercrime, that may not necessarily be true of a parent of a cultist.

Cultism is something practiced in secrecy. It is abhorrent. Cultists don't go about telling their parents that they are cultists. This makes it very difficult to talk about punishing parents. Tell us what you think about this.