Nigerian Youths and Cyber Crime – Dike Favour Charity

It breaks my heart when I see cyber criminals being persecuted or watch how the aftermaths of their actions hunt them for life.

Though, many of the youths who veered into cyber crimes are mere victims of circumstances, bad government and governance, poor parental upbringing, frustration, environmental influence, economic instability and wrong ideologies

Many Nigerian parents have actually failed in their responsiblity of raising God fearing and responsible children, these parents are quick to forget that children of today are the leaders of tomorrow. Whatever that is inculcated in a child is what he would give back to the society at old age.

Government at different levels has one way or the other failed the youths with the system of administration currently in place. How can government which is supposed to be a beacon of hope to her youths that provision of employment after their studies is guaranteed.

This is more worrisome when the youths have not been able to access any form of assistance through sponsorship from the government while in school, the youths are normally not captured in the so called empowerment program of the government, their school fees are not subsidized unlike in other climes where their youths enjoy free education.

The unemployed youths naturally become the most hit of the hyper inflation experienced in the country. It has become obvious to all and sundry that the government of the day does not have the interest of the youths at heart.

Many young people still have to fend for themselves inspite of the harsh economic weather, many are from broken homes, many are orphans, many have disowned by either their parents or guardians.

Inspite of these ugly situations,they still have to create a niche for themselves to survive.

With continuous hardship everywhere they go, the environment and peer groups begin to influence the youths especially as everyone wants to break away from poverty to live large and as well enjoy reasonable level of affluence. After hustling with little or no success, fraustration sets in and in most cases, frustration is seen written boldly on the face of Nigerians especially the youths. This normally lead to to some youths embracing “The end justifies the means”, ” Hustle must pay” and “street things and runz” slogans and philosophies.

At that point, many youths crave for easy money, so as to meet up to all their expectations and responsibilities imposed on them by the society and failed government.

In an attempt to escape the reality of their existence, wrong ideas on how to make it fast begin to creep into the minds of the young people who are forced to be responsible for their own upkeep early in life, with the resultant effects of venturing into fraud, pornography, piracy, spamming, hacking, cyber harrassments, Automated teller machine (ATM) spoofing and many other criminality just to survive.

It is a generally accepted axiom that there is always reactions to every action, the youths obviously aware the consequences of venturing into criminality are known to damn the consequences like sleepless nights, insecurities, fear and uncertainty about the future, untimely death and sometimes madness for some victims.

I am of the opinion that if the parents, church, government at all levels and other duty bearers play their part rightly and properly to make living worthwhile for the young people, the incidences of cyber crimes will reduce remarkably.