The monsters we have created

I woke up early again today (this is starting to become a routine) and the first thing I did after picking up my phone is to open readcash.

It's funny how some weeks back, the first place I usually check every morning is WhatsApp or nairaland.com, but these days I check out this community first.

After replying to comments on my article, I read a couple of articles and engaged with other people here before heading for nairaland to get updates on what's going on around my country and the world.

An upsetting headline

After scrolling through some headlines, I saw something really upsetting. It's a news article originally posted by premiumtimes, so I went directly to their website.

Can you imagine the audacity? Criminals now write letters to boldly tell a community that they will be robbed. Everyone in the community is in a state of panic and some have even started to leave.

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Translation:

We the boss of bosses are coming to greet you in no distance time, if you like, you can report to the police, that does not concern us. Whoever we visit and refuse to give a good amount of money to us, shall be killed or the person might even lose both money and his life

This is crazy! I mean, they even told them they are free to report to the police. The residents in the community are asking the general public to beg the robbers, meaning they don't have much faith in the police.

Do you know what's worse? The comments! I checked the comments on nairaland and it's really heartbreaking. Someone said "Better than DSS (Department of State Services) and EFCC (Economic and Financial Crimes Commission) that will just jump on you without notice or warrants"

In essence, he is saying at least they got a notification, unlike security agencies that will just break into your home without warning or notice. Everyone is now comfortable with the way things are.

How did things become this bad?

While reading the news article, I suddenly remembered HappyBoy's article: Unrest in Nigeria: We are the monsters you made, And he was right when he said we are the cause of our problems.

We encourage these things by not speaking against them, some persons even support them. Someone said if you don't speak against evil, then you're a part of it.

There's this case of a group of persons that goes around killing security personnel in the eastern part of the country, the media called them unknown gunmen. When they started, most people were praising them that they were taking out policemen.

In this part of the world, a lot of us don't like the police due to the horrible experiences we had at their hands.

So when the unknown gunmen started murdering policemen, people called it Justice, karma, a taste of their own medicine. But things got out of hand.

The unknown gunmen suddenly started killing innocent people and all hell broke loose. The army got involved and the East became a hot zone.

Innocent people got caught in the battle between the army and unknown gunmen. A lot of lives were lost because people encouraged the activities of the unknown gunmen.

Don't even get me started with the issues bordering around internet fraud. As HappyBoy said in his article;

Internet fraud is now seen as a normal thing. You see parents advising their children to go into it.

Yes, parents encourage their children to do fraud. Every week we hear cases of internet fraudsters that have been arrested by security agencies, and it keeps increasing.

How did it get this bad? Young boys and even girls join the gang of fraudsters every day despite the risk of getting arrested. They are the keyboard warriors that fear nothing and must make money to the detriment of others.

They post pictures online of their lavish lifestyle and brag about the proceeds they got from their criminal enterprise. They receive lots of likes and are even encouraged to keep "winning".

The average youth who has little to no income sees all the likes and praise a fraudster receives and believes there's nothing wrong with being a criminal. He too goes into it and the cycle continues.

But what happens when the money no longer comes in like before? They explore other "lucrative" businesses like kidnapping, armed robbery, and ritual killings.

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The monsters in our country

Right now, things have gotten worse than before. Criminals now write letters and openly announce their mission before it's carried out.

The politicians are not even helping matters, they started this whole mess. When it's time for an election, young men are recruited and given arms to help rig elections.

After the election is over, what do you expect those young men to do with the guns they have been given after the elections are over? They go into armed robbery and kidnapping. Heck, some of them even kidnap the same politicians that gave them guns in the first place.

Closing thoughts

The situation all over the country has gotten worse and at this point everyone is scared. Some people do believe things will be better if youths are leaders of the country, but is that right?

Those old politicians that are now wreaking havoc in the country were once youth. How did it all start? They started from small leadership positions.

Things that happen in even small faculty politics in the university goes to show how things are on a national level. You have already started rigging faculty elections now, what will you do if you're running for president of the country tomorrow?

I believe the change we seek is in every one of us and we all have to come together to combat the menace that's threatening our society.

Speak against evil when you see it, be mindful of what you say on social media, and don't get involved in crime, no matter how small.

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Thanks for reading and a happy Sunday to you all 💗💗💗

September 5th, 2021