There is one recent lesson from a safety conscious north that citizens can apply to fight insecurity in their communities.
Safety applies with equal force to the individual, to the family, to the employer, to the state, the nation and to international affairs. Safety, in its widest sense, concerns the happiness, contentment and freedom of mankind.”
– William M. Jeffers, former President, Union Pacific Railroad Co. (1946)
Last week, Northern politicians taught us a great lesson on safety conscious attitude following President Tinubu’s idea to invade Niger Republic. Tinubu’s Nigeria moved to force the Niger military junta to give up power after overthrowing a democratically elected government. The northern bloc however opposed the idea. This is based, everyone suspects, on the people’s extraordinarily strong ethnic, economic and cultural ties. The ties extend not only to Niger but also to Chad and Cameroon. Thus, beyond the geopolitics of colonial heritage and ECOWAS regional cooperation, the northern power bloc recognized that war along this Sahel belt poses existential threats to their common existence and survival.
At the local national level, the bloc was keenly aware that war with Niger will engulf seven contiguous states of Sokoto, Kebbi, Katsina, Zamfara, Jigawa, Yobe and Borno in the ensuing conflict. There are no borders between these Nigerian states and Niger Republic. Their people are not only cousins but have also continued to relate as if they are not in different countries – as if the two countries are one. Nigeria and Niger also share strategic natural assets that are managed to promote development and avoid economic and social damage to each nation and its people. Building a rail line from Nigeria to Maradi and supplying a third of the electric power needs of Niger Republic were strategic policy decisions to promote peaceful coexistence and assure socioeconomic security of communities and peoples of the two countries.
It was therefore not surprising that the northern lobby opposed the move. What gave me cause for reflection was the subtext of this opposition, namely, the community safety consciousness that fueled it. This consciousness reflects something we often overlook which, as Jeffers said above, is that individuals, groups and communities are primary promoters of safety and security in any nation. If the north’s keen awareness of their region and its potential dangers were to be complemented with other efforts to manage aberrant behaviour at their budding stages, government could then focus only on safety and security issues that defy community resolution. Unfortunately, safety consciousness is something that has not been fully developed in our communities to assist in winning the war against crime and criminalities in Nigeria. We all, as individuals, families and communities, think little of safety consciousness.
Safety is a common need of every individual, family, and community. However, specific needs and appropriate courses of action for managing safety will vary between and among individuals and communities for historical, economic, cultural and even religious reasons. Howbeit, the search for community safety begins with safety consciousness, the quality of being aware of one’s surroundings given that there are safety concerns in every location. Citizens need to be aware that every location is subject to negative influences, including crimes and criminalities. Thus, being safety conscious predisposes everyone to be alert to the possibility of dangers around them.
I do not remember, for instance, if I were ever taught how to describe an accident or crime scene, including how to properly identify and describe people I see. It is this sort of training that leads citizens to accurately describe a criminal suspect or getaway cars of criminals. Yet these are knowledge and skills that ought to be taught to children at the primary school level and repeated up to high school. Because these basic training is deliberately left for security training schools, citizens go about their daily duties and concerns without being conscious of things around them, people near them, and things that could spell potential danger in their communities. Others make conscious efforts not to know what is happening around them, sometimes because they do not want to be seen as nosey or meddlesome. Our default attitude is to leave safety and security problems to government.
Lack of safety consciousness in our society appears to be at the root of the inadequacies in crime fighting among public safety and security agencies. It could also account for why companies are often very vulnerable to security breaches. Nigerian commercial and public sector organisations are faced with large-scale theft as much from insiders, if not much more, as they are by outside agents. And yet, only a very few of these organisations create, sensitize, and implement safety conscious policies, including those embedded as motivations to avoid aberrant behaviour in the terms of engagement with staff and contractors.
Absence of citizen safety consciousness also has an adverse effect on the credibility of public and private owned security organisations. Their capacity and competence are often called into question even when citizens starve them of information and other complementary support they need to manage aberrant behaviours from the inchoate to their matured stages. An example is the Southeast sit-at-home and unknown gunmen phenomenon which the citizens of the region humoured until they developed into a monster that is now consuming everyone. Citizen apathy and lack of attention to emerging violent separatist rhetoric inevitably birthed adverse consequences that negatively impacted the economic and socio-political health of the region. Many parents, for instance, understood that their children were being recruited and proselytized but did nothing to stop them from crossing into the red line of criminality.
There are several factors that inhibit the development of safety consciousness in the Nigerian citizen. The media ignorantly or unconsciously help to promote conflict by their lack of understanding and poor analyses of emerging socioeconomic and political trends with implications for national security. The media do not also conduct deep-rooted investigations of factors that predispose youths to aberrant behaviour. In addition, there is inadequate sensitization and training by other socialization agencies such as the family, schools, and churches. In other words, there is poor exposure to safety-fostering activities at the family, community, school, and other community-type environments that lead to early development of safety conscious skills and interest. Concerned agencies tend to only conduct half-hearted safety measures only when a community hears the crack of guns in neighbourhoods or when thieves break in and steal.
What is the way out? At the end of the day, training at all levels and in all forms is fundamental to the operation and development of safety consciousness. Several studies confirm that lack of training on safety consciousness at family, community and higher social levels, and defects in training schemes for safety management professionals are among the basic reasons for deficiencies in Nigerian crime management. The community where we live and do business is a great place to be for most people. But every community, residential or business, is constantly under threat of bad things happening. Apart from natural disasters, most threats come from residents or visitors who implement negative actions that lead to grief in the communities. This is what happens in every community where people are constantly mugged, raped, stolen from at gunpoint, have their pockets picked or their stores vandalized, and others are kidnapped for ransom. There are many ways that the peace of every community can be shattered.
Additionally, commercial organisations devote a tiny percentage of their CSR budget for projects directed towards accelerated sensitization and development of young people in our communities. DSP Ebere Amaraizu who coordinates Police Campaign Against Cultism and other Violent Crimes (POCACOV) once suggested setting up youth sports centres as an effective project to redirect youths to positive lifestyles.
We tend to leave people in charge of safety agencies to the task of protecting us from security challenges. In doing this, we forget that crime or criminality is hatched in our communities by people who are known to us. There is no criminal that does not have an operational base in a community; they are not spirits. The process of becoming a criminal is so long that safety conscious citizens will not fail to notice its manifestation in their budding stages. Thus, criminality is in part the result of failures by socialization agencies to nurture good citizens and guide their wards away from corrupting influences. The responsible agents and agencies are parents, siblings, neighbours, and colleagues of all types, including those from work, church, school, or associations. When people are trained or sensitized in security and safety consciousness, the fight against crime will be more efficiently managed.
Safety awareness training is therefore the first step, followed by prevention skills. Both can be approached by not-for-profit organisations as complementary support to the crime prevention efforts of public agencies with responsibility for safety management.
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