Prospects of Community Crime Control Initiatives in an Era of Terrorism: Lessons from Lagos State, Nigeria

Abstract

Terrorism has arguably become one of the foremost security challenges besetting Nigeria today. Not only has the country lost so much interms of human and material resources to several terrorist attacks, the social and political colourations of this phenomenon have become the newest threat to Nigeria’s corporate existence. Although the deployment of the combined team of the armed forces, the police, and allied state security services by government has recorded some successes, it is believed that much more successes would have been recorded if this response took the local people into confidence, especially because in many cases, the insurgents live and operate among these people. Against this backdrop therefore,  and drawing from the success stories of the neighbourhood crime control  groups in Lagos State, this paper explores the prospects of community crime control initiatives in fighting terrorism. The paper is anchored on the twin theories of community participation and partnership policing, and relies on data generated through indepth interviews and focus group discussions from purposively selected members of identified community crime control groups, Police personnel, community leaders and members across four Local Government Areas of Lagos State. The paper advocates the enlisting of community based crime control groups in the crusade against terrorism because of  their closeness to the people and the enormous goodwill they enjoy. This way, the government would make the crusade against terrorism more participatory and inclusive aside engendering a sense of identification with and continuing responsibility for the exercise.

Key Words: Terrorism; Informal crime control; Nigeria