Some Nigerians have demanded action against ritual killings in the nation, advocating for the police digital upgrade and empowerment, media campaigns, employment and education to assist in stemming the tide.
They made the remark while responding to the survey conducted by the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Akwa Ibom, Cross River and Rivers on upsurge of ritual killings especially in the Southern parts of the country.
They identified power, unemployment, eroded value system, greed, cultism, quest for fast money and position in the society, among others as factors promoting the ritual killings.
Speaking in AKwa Ibom, Prof. Aniekan Brown, a lecturer in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology, University of Uyo, decried that the fall in moral standards led to the rise in ritual killings in the country.
He attributed the causative factors to high level of unemployment, poor socialisation, influence of those who got wealthy through such means and fear of the poor state of the economy among others.
According to him, when people who were hopeless are suddenly rich as a result of ritual killings, they become an encouragement and enforcer.
Brown explained that the level of education and socialisation of some people might make them to believe that getting involved in such killings would give some protection, luck, and some level of societal position.
He said that this also encourage the crime and called for social reorientation of the people, especially the youth, through sensitization campaigns.
Brown also said that government should create avenues for massive employment of the youth, encourage education and sensor home videos containing ritual killers’ success stories.
He also called for the implementation of the existing laws and sanction to deter offenders, lamenting that state governors have shied away from encouraging the execution of death sentences.
Similarly, a Clergyman, Minister Simon Udoh of the Church of Christ, Uyo, also re-echoed moral decadence in the society as part of the causes of ritual killings.
Udoh accused some religious leaders of abandoning the teaching of morals in churches to concentrate on preaching materialism.
He added that some Church leaders were no longer bothered about their members’ source of wealth but commended those with fat envelopes of tithes.
According to him, Nigerians must return back to God, have respect for human life since only God can create life and take.
“Ritual killing itself is an indication of some dead of norm; standard acceptablity of life are fallen.’’
Udoh said that instead of querying sudden richness, some Nigerians would celebrate the wealth, and stressed the need to stem the tide.
He, however, called on government to create jobs for the youths to reduce the level of crimes in the country.
He alleged that the most ritual killings were done by the yahoo boys, saying that before they were using phones and computers to deceived people.
“But recently another dimension had been put into it, the yahoo boys get into Internet to invite mostly girls, hypnotize them and take their body parts and make money.’’
He also alleged that some traditional leaders were corrupt and criminally minded too, saying that they should not be given the issue of security to handle in the country.
“I am one of those who are seriously opposed to allowing our traditional rulers to get involved with issues of security in the country.
“What we need to do is to bring our trained security personnel closer to the people, whether regional or National security,” Okon said.
He called for the adoption of digital and artificial intelligence in the country’s security sector, saying that security has gone beyond carrying gun and running around town in the name of securing people.
He said that the security should be improved to the extent that ‘’if something is happening for instance in Uyo,’’ a security man staying in Lagos would detect it.
Okon called on the government to fund security agencies, give them the needed gadgets to be placed at strategic places in the country to prevent crime.
He urged the politicians to give employment to their respective constituents in order to reduce frequent ritual killings in the country.
Also in Cross River, Prof. Grace Etuk, the Head of Department, Social Works, University of Calabar said that massive employment of the youth would bring down the rate of crime especially ritual killing.
According to her, when a young person stays for five to 10 years without finding a job or a means of survival, such a person might easily be lured into such activities.
‘’Whether they eventually get rich or not is another issue but the chances of ritual killings will become slimmer if these youths are gainfully employed and make a living for themselves.
‘’Beyond this, is also the lure to gain the respect of the society because as we speak, the society only respect people with money, whether they have integrity or not.
‘’The ultimately the problem is the quest for money and the most vulnerable group are the girls because everyday on social media, a girl is killed by one ‘Yahoo boy’.’’
Etuk said that this was because the girls were also looking for money as ‘’they believe that the guys they meet on social media, even without knowing them, can change their lives and their families’.’’
She, however, said that the problem was not so much of the poor security architecture of the nation but poor awareness and greed of some Nigerians especially girls.
‘’This is because the police cannot follow people to their private meetings where these ritual killings take place,’’ Etuk said.
On his part, Mr Solomon Eremi, Public Relations Officer, Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corp (NSCDC), Cross River Command, added greed as the major factor responsible for ritual killings in the nation.
He said that the situation was rampant among youths who did not want to work but want to make too much money while some girls went for”hook ups” with mystery men for money.
Eremi called for the review and implementation of the existing laws of the nation and expressed the need for stiffer penalties.
Similarly, Mr Effiok Nyok of Partnership for Peace in the Niger Delta, a Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO), said that eroded value system and poor sense of justice contributed to ritual killings.
He claimed that a situation where people took lives repeatedly, yet there were no convictions of the ritual killers, meant that ‘’the nation has lost its sense of Justice.’’
He said that the police were not to be blamed as they were under-funded, adding that instituting a regional security outfit was no solution since they were same people that would man the offices.
In Rivers, Mr Bosinde Araikpe, a Security Relations Consultant based in Port Harcourt, said that the crime was driven by a combination of socio-cultural, economic, and psychological factors.
He stated that many individuals believe human body parts could be used in rituals to attain wealth, power, and protection.
According to him, ritual killings are fuelled by traditional beliefs, occult practices, and the high levels of poverty and unemployment rates that push desperate individuals to seek wealth through illegal means.
“We have also seen instances where some politicians and businesspeople are allegedly involved in human rituals to gain influence, power, or financial success.,” he claimed.
Araikpe further identified secret cults in universities and communities as a major factor promoting ritualistic practices, thereby influencing young people to engage in such crimes.
He emphasised that previous efforts to address the menace had not yielded the desired results due to ineffective policing, corruption, and a weak justice system but recommended stricter laws with harsher penalties to combat the crime.
He called for the training and equipping the security agencies to track and prosecute offenders, as well as address corruption within the police and judiciary.
‘’Additionally, the government needs to sensitise the public on the dangers of ritual killings through media campaigns.
“There is also a need to integrate human rights and ethical education into school curricula and engage religious and traditional leaders in discouraging ritual practices,” he added.
In his remarks, Chibuisi Okonkwo, a Specialist Security Consultant at Beacon Security and Intelligence Limited, called for job creation and skill acquisition programmes to reduce the desperation for quick wealth.
He advocated for the establishment of a community surveillance and reporting system to encourage residents to alert law enforcement about suspicious activities.
“This includes setting up neighbourhood watch groups to monitor and expose ritualistic practices, as well as monitoring herbalists and spiritualists to prevent them from engaging in ritual-related activities,” he added.
Okonkwo further urged the government to implement programmes aimed at steering young people away from cultism and crime, while also providing rehabilitation for individuals involved in criminal occult practices.
Also speaking, SP Grace Iringe-Koko, spokesperson for the Police Command in Rivers, stated that although the command had not received any reports of ritual killing in the past year, it remained prepared to tackle the crime.
She identified cultism as the most common crime in the state and expressed concern over the growing get-rich-quick mentality among youth.
Iringe-Koko, who stressed the importance of instilling moral values in children, observed that many young people were no longer interested in education or learning a trade, believing instead that they could amass wealth quickly through crime.
“It is important for individuals to inform family members of their whereabouts so that, in the event they become incommunicado, their families will know where to begin to search for them,” she advised. (NAN)
