The recent story about the gruesome killing of a leader of the National Union of Road Transport Workers (NURTW) in Lagos State by hoodlums is yet another reminder of how far our young ones are derailing and the need to take calculated steps to reverse the trend for a better future of Nigeria.
Going by the story, Kunle, the NURTW Ajibade, of Ijeshatedo, Lagos State, was allegedly killed by members of a rival group following a fight that broke out between the two groups at a social event. The assailants were said to have stabbed the 28-year-old Kunle at his house and trailed him to a hospital where he was receiving treatment and shot him multiple times. He was being rushed to another hospital when he gave up the ghost.
Of course, stories like this are not strange in our society where cultism and gangsterism is now the order of the day. Many of our young ones, particularly the young men have become thugs, kidnappers, terrorists, rapists, drug addicts, bullies and all that. And as each day passes, you wonder what the future holds for Nigeria with this crop of people.
This challenge was the main topic for discussion at a youth training programme recently. The parents, guests and speakers were perturbed that our young men and boys are going astray. A good number of them have become internet fraudsters, many are out of school, some have become a big problem unto the country, making our villages and towns very insecure and difficult to dwell in. From the presentations and contributions, it was obvious that many of our young men have issues and need help. And the big question was, who will save our boys?
I particularly liked the perspective of one of the guest speakers, a psychologist, to the issue. He heaped the bulk of the blame on the society, families and parents. According to him, generations of the male children both in Nigeria and elsewhere have been raised to suppress their emotions. They are brought up to believe that being a male, they are not supposed to let out their emotions even when they are hurting. He said phrases like “be a man; men don’t cry; why are you behaving like a woman?’’ and many others depict that being a male, you are supposed to behave like a superhuman, you are discouraged from sharing your feelings with anyone.
The implication, according to him, is that with such mentality, many men have no option than to express their emotion through anger or other unruly behaviour. At any little provocation the person is ready to bring down the roof. Some do not mind inflicting injuries on others or even killing as it was in the case of Kunle. Just for a mere misunderstanding broken bottles and other dangerous weapons were being brandished by everyone.
The psychologist went further to point out that in a society like ours where there are high expectations from the male child, some of them are bound to get involved in all manner of crimes- internet fraudster, kidnapping for money, name it. He painted a scenario where two people, a young man and a young woman will graduate from the university at the same time. The woman may immediately get married and from then going forward, her husband will be expected to cater for virtually all her needs while on the other hand, her male counterpart’s preoccupation will be how to get a job, rent a house, get married and start his own family. Not measuring up to this high expectation, some young men get frustrated and take out their frustration on people around the society at any given time.
He also highlighted the problem of poor parental upbringing, deteriorating family values, socio-cultural norms among others. I cannot agree more with the psychologist. Yes, criminality or defiance has no sex barrier. Both male and female are involved in the negative acts but what is the percentage of both sexes? How many females  are among the agberos in our various motor parks across the country, many of whom make a living from hooliganism and thuggery? What is the percentage of the female sex among the homeless almajiri children seen mostly in the northern parts of the country? Recently I saw a squalor where some teenage almajiris live and I immediately concurred with the people who say that it may take a very long time to end Boko Haram insurgency, banditry and kidnapping in the country as those are avenues for them to protest against an unfair society in addition to the semblance of family tie these street kids get from them.
Some of these motor park touts under the umbrella of NURTW, who have today become a menace to the society are creations of some desperate politicians and other moneybags who allegedly have them on their pay roll and use them as private army and tools for destruction during elections. Perhaps that is the reason why the threats of proscribing the union by Lagos State law makers and a similar call by many concerned citizens across the country have never come to be.
Our leaders have capitalised on the high unemployment rate in the country to take advantage of the young ones. Many experts and researches have posited that unemployment is the root of violence in Nigeria as unemployed youths are more likely to be perpetrators as well as victims of crime.
Therefore, it is high time we began paying more attention to our boys than we currently do. Many of these boys are hurting, some are daily being abused at different places by different people even women but they can’t speak up because “they are men”. Pertinent issues concerning the girl child are constantly being brought to the lime-light both locally and globally.  Currently we have the 16 days of activism against gender-based violence with the theme: Orange the World: End violence against women now, and one is just imagining how good it will be for similar attention to be paid to the issues concerning the male child, especially their emotional issues by parents, family members and the larger society. I have no doubt that that will do the country a whole lot of good.

By: Calista Ezeaku