REMEDY TO CHILD ABUSE-NIGERIAN CONTEXT

Abstract

One of the biggest human right abuses rocking the well-being and posterity of our society is child abuse. This practice which is any act or series of act either by parents, care-givers, or strangers often results in harm on the victim. Painfully, since children are in most cases vulnerable and incapable of defending themselves, they become easy targets of victimization. In Nigeria, this social ill unarguably has been on geometric rise with no seemingly remedy at sight. As research has shown, this problem is operational through physical forms which include, beating, lacerations, sexual violations like rape, pornography, female genital mutilation, child labour, street begging, child trafficking, child marriage, forced prostitution, neglect, emotional trauma, kidnapping, and so on. Child abuse over the years has confined most of its victims within the prison of fear, loss of self worth, hatred, bitterness, violence, sexual promiscuity, and different cognitive complications. Some others later resort to lifestyles of antagonism, gangsterism, and hostility, thus turning themselves into social miscreants. Succinctly put, child abuse dwarfs its victim’s potentials and nibble off their opportunities, potencies and efficiencies. The thrust of this research is to take a look on issues related to child abuse among Nnewi Christians of Anambra state. This it did by examining the concepts and various issues relating to child abuse which exists in Nnewi. Exploration on why this problem seemed to have been perpetuated was also made. The apparent lacuna vis-à-vis the roles of the government, parents and guardians in stemming this social insanity and aberration was ex-rayed. This study adopts primary and secondary methods in data collection which were socially analyzed. The study concludes that child abuse in Nnewi can only be resolved through a synergic efforts of the government, parents and guardians, religious bodies, and other relevant agencies.