Nigeria’s growing army of mad youths

ACCORDING to a consultant psychiatrist at the Benue State University Teaching Hospital, Makurdi, Dr Michael Agbir, there has been a 30 per cent rise in psychiatric cases among the nation’s youths in the last four years. The shrink, who said the trend was more noticeable among ladies, traced the rise to issues such as domestic violence, sexual assault, betrayal and increase in societal abuse, especially rape cases. He also identified pains during child birth as one of the other causes.

The statistics is hardly a surprise but keen observers will note that the trend is not restricted to the female gender because on a daily basis, the army of young madmen and women on Nigerian streets keeps growing. However, while there is no doubt about the effect of the factors highlighted by the psychiatrist on the mental stability or otherwise of an individual, it is also clear that the cause of this ugly trend in the nation transcends physical abuse; it is more as a result of emotional and psychological trauma.

Anyone who picked up a Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) form for the purpose of gaining admission into a tertiary institution does so believing that acquiring the additional qualification would enhance his chances of being employed. So, he goes through the rigour of a higher institution hoping that on completion not only does he stand a chance of improving the quality of his life; a few people would also be positively affected by his good fortune. However, if that does not happen first, second and third year after graduation, he begins to have a warped view of his self-worth and ability. He begins to see himself as a failure. Before long, his mental fabric being weakened, he becomes despondent, depressed or even schizophrenic, especially if he comes across one or two of his school mates doing well while he remains an observer on the journey of life.

All the tiers of government may generate as many reasons as they can fathom for the rising incidence of unemployment in the country but these will cut no ice with the youth. The only thing that would interest them is the provision of employment opportunities. Until the government takes seriously the issue of creating and facilitating job opportunities for the youth, the rising rate of the youth turning mad will not wane.

Unfortunately for many of the youth, they have no one to turn to. Their fathers are out of job, their mothers’ trading businesses are ruined, their uncles are broke, their aunties are penniless and their siblings are not any better than they are. And to worsen an already bad matter, there is no buffer from the state. They are left to find their way through the labyrinth of misery and anguish without any modicum of succor from anywhere.

As if being out of employment due to no fault of theirs is not enough, not only are the youth described as lazy by their rulers, they are also relentlessly assaulted by the seemingly unflagging and unending plundering of the nation’s patrimony. In Nigeria, it is another day, another scandal. And the perpetrators of these acts are averse to millions, they are attracted to billions, and they scoop same from the treasury with impunity. It is so bad that those saddled with stemming corrupt practices have turned corruption champions. Now, isn’t the aroma of a delicious meal, which assaults the nostrils of a very hungry person but is not within his reach, a punishment potent enough to unfasten the screws of his brain and release him into the world of the deranged? Isn’t deprivation in the midst of opulence a gateway to lunacy?

The land is not just a vast one of pervasive helplessness; it is also one of insidious hopelessness. With life in Nigeria becoming increasingly nasty, brutish and short as a result of rising insecurity of life and property, the number of the psychotic in the country cannot but swell. Many Nigerians are paranoid at night because of armed robbers. Many consider taking a stroll on the streets a dangerous adventure for the fear of kidnappers, while they see boarding commercial vehicles as a suicide mission because of the likelihood of becoming a victim of ritual killing. Now, if a person lives perpetually in fear when will he not become a mental case?

The primary duty of leadership is solving problems. Our leaders need to stop telling us what the problems are; we know them too well. What we need them to do is to show us the way out of the problem. That is why they are leaders. There is no problem without a solution. As Clare Boothe Luce said, there are no hopeless situations; there are only men who have grown hopeless about those situations. Our leaders need to get out of their hopelessness-induced lethargy and find solutions to the problem of rising unemployment in the country to save the youth from ending up on Madness Avenue.

As often portrayed in Nollywood films, there is hardly any difference between the lunatic and their handlers. So, if more Nigerians are going round the bend, pray what is the state of the minds of their rulers?

 

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