International Journal of Research and Innovation in Social Science (IJRISS) | Volume IV, Issue III, March 2020 | ISSN 2454–6186

Proliferation of Kidnapping in Nigeria: Causes and Consequences

John, Wajim
 Department of Sociology, Federal University, Wukari, 200 Katsina-Ala Road, P.M.B 1020 Wukari, Nigeria

Abstract: – This scholarly article examined the proliferation of kidnapping in Nigeria: Causes and Consequences. The paper unveiled some common causes of kidnapping and their consequences in Nigeria as a nation state that is characterized by poverty, unemployment, insecurity, corruption, weak constitutional framework and poor policies implementation. Kidnapping simply connotes an act of illegally and forcefully capturing and detaining of human beings for the purpose of generating financial benefits from the relations of the detainee(s).Kidnapping has become a common criminal exercise and lucrative business in Nigeria of which the perpetrators often receive huge sum of money from their victims, sometimes the kidnappers’ victims are murdered whenever the amount of money needed from them are paid and to some extent not redeemed. Poverty, unemployment and moral decadence are said to be the commonest causes of the evil called kidnapping in Nigeria. Content analysis/qualitative sources of data collection were employed for the realization of this scholarly work. Amongst other recommendations it is recommended that government should create jobs for the unemployed youths in tandem with skills development training that will help curtail the high levels of idleness as the mother of evil thoughts, evil plans and evil actions among Nigeria youths; Federal and State governments should properly equip and deploy forest guards into our forests that are serving as safe habitats for the kidnappers in order to curb the menace.

Keywords: Kidnapping, Kidnappers, poverty, unemployment, Nigeria

I. INTRODUCTION

Kidnapping is one among the current major social problems that are negatively affecting the free movement of people and the socio-economic development of the country. Kidnapping which is mostly common in the southern parts of the country is now very popular in the Northern parts of the country due to different dimension of armed conflicts such as ethno-religious conflicts, farmers-herders conflict, Boko Haram insurgency among others. Most of the conflicts that have resulted to the proliferation of the evil known as kidnapping in Nigeria are mostly instigated my conflicts’ entrepreneurs who are gaining from the conflicts either directly or indirectly.