The security situation in Nigeria is fast deteriorating with an increase in the number of child bandits across the country.
Recently, security operatives arrested three teenagers below the age of 16 for engaging in banditry operations in the Northwestern part of the country.
A picture seen by The Street Journal showed the three kids sitting on the ground, all wielding AK-47 rifles.
Nigeria
These three kids are not the first to have been arrested by security operatives. At the beginning of the year, this newspaper reported that the Osun State Police Command arrested an 18-year-old boy for conniving with Fulani herdsmen to mastermind the kidnap of his two nephews.
Due to starvation and harsh environmental conditions in the forest, the nephews died in the custody of their captors, even before the ransom could be paid.
Similar trends have also been reported in Bauchi, Katsina, and Zamfara where minors have been arrested for kidnapping and raping underaged girls.
This development can be attributed to lack of education, increased poverty levels, and poor parental upbringing.
Recently, the governor of Borno state, Prof. Babagana confirmed that fighters of the Islamic State of West Africa Province (ISWAP) paid as little as N5000 to recruit more fighters, many of whom are young men.
While security forces have continued to fight insurgency in the North East of Nigeria for over a decade, and more recently, banditry and kidnapping, the question of when this menace will end begs an answer.