Save Nigeria's child, save Nigeria's future

THE present age is daily dared by innumerable overpowering criminal offences. Many youths are often arrested for sex- related offences while many are involved in bombing activities. These have almost ravaged the nation beyond repair. If we do not take serious steps, it is very sure the nation will witness untold catastrophe in the nearest future.

We should always remember that idle hands are devil's workshops. Most of the youth who join insurgence groups are idle and that is the reason they are easily co-opted. They are children with persistent disruptive and aggressive behaviour who often violate fundamental human rights and vandalise properties of other fellows. Yet, we can fix such by restructuring their character. We can teach them how to be tolerant, thereby, reducing the social disorder in the society. All we need do is to build their character because the totality of a child hinges on his character make-up.

It is high time we invested heavily in changing the lives of our young ones. We need to develop their character in order to prevent avoidable tragedy in the future. Recent high-profile findings have shown the reasons why we need to pay more attention to the youngsters. According to The Denver Youth Survey on the study of more than 1500 high-risk youths, children between the age of 11-12 had police contact because of delinquency.

The U.S. Department of Justice, in collaboration with the education system, cannot take the case of the youth with levity. That is the reason why the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention works daily, both in enlightening and sensitising the youth on the advantages of embracing good character. We need to wake up now and begin to train our children on wholesome character so that they may not rise up tomorrow and destroy all we today build.

We need to start from the family and then move on to the school system. We must also reach the community and the religious societies. Youngsters have great innate potentials that can benefit the nation. Steadfastly doing this, they will surely turn a new leaf instead of joining hoodlums and insurgence groups. It will make them have good choices in the world of confusion;it will make them patriotic to their nation and our land will be free of threat.

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