Violence today...and the future

Let’s not delude ourselves by thinking violence in Nigeria in just “boko haram in the north”. This “culture” of violence is being cultivated silently in our midst – breeding an even bloodier future looming.

Nearly everywhere around us, aggressive (vocal) confrontations and a desire to hurt or eliminate the other person continues to be the normal recourse in ever-present incidents of conflict – between siblings, spouses and “friends”. Vices like secret cultism – a machination for the sole purpose of perpetuating violence – still thrives within and outside our secondary and tertiary educational institutions.

What we are witnessing today in the form of boko haram and other expressions of violence, is the consequence of the neglect of past decades. This trend does not look likely to end because our children and siblings indulge in violent enterprise daily. Across the country, in a variety of circumstances and for a variety of purposes, they are indoctrinated, coerced and even motivated to indulge in violence. A more insecure future beckons if we do not take collective action, and urgently.

Since we have refused to mend our ways so as to experience the peace we all crave, we should at least give our children (whom we claim to love so much) a fighting chance of having peace by teaching them that it will take expressions of kindness in the face of anger, love where revenge would feel better by every one of them, every time, to replace the existing culture of violence with a peaceful one.