By Nnaji Martha
Robbery, either armed or not, across the institutions in Nigeria, is becoming a norm and equally a nightmare for some students, especially in lodges where most students stay for easy attendance to lectures and other school activities. Most of these incidents happen during the time that students are most likely to be away or have travelled back to their various places for holidays or to attend to pressing needs at home.
Most of these armed robbers don’t really think that these are students who are struggling to afford what they need for their schooling, especially those who come from poor backgrounds but, due to distance, have decided to live near the school for easy access.
One of the victims of these armed robbers, a student in ESUT’s Mass Communication Department, 200 Level (who kept her name and lodge anonymous for security purposes), narrated her ordeal with armed robbery when the school vacated for the Christmas and New Year holiday celebrations, and she left for her holiday as well.
In her words: “I left my lodge exactly on the first of January. I was the last student to leave my lodge, but my lodge caretaker was very much around. On the 5th, my immediate elder brother came back from Anambra State and went to my lodge to collect his box, which he had dropped off before going to “Light of the Nation” state. When he got to my lodge, he called and told me that my room had been burglarized. Everything in his box was made away with: his 2 packs of boxers, 2 packs of white singlets, 10-11 jean trousers, his up-and-down leather clothes, his customized jersey, footwears, and most importantly, the two hundred thousand naira (200,000) he had given me for my school fees and all other payments I needed to make in school.
Then my solar panel (the panel, 3 bulbs, and the light supplier), my school bags in which my Fundamentals of Broadcasting Media textbook is, my perfumes, my soap for washing, my sister’s phone, her traveling bag, and some other things I can’t remember now. Where all gone. When I came to repair my room door that was hijacked by the robbers, I went to the caretaker, who was still the only person in the whole lodge. All she could tell me was that, in her words, ‘eyaah, don’t you know that they steal in this lodge? Were you not told that people’s things were not safe here? Why did you not drop your keys with me like everyone else does? At least if you had done that, then if anything is lost, you could hold me responsible.’ That was all she could tell me.
“Her reaction made me more confused and several thoughts ran through my mind. ‘Could she be an accomplice or was she just being unconcerned?’”
It was a very sad and devastating moment for her and her family. It is also very worrisome that most of these cases are not always treated as they should be, and students keep falling victim to such incidents.
This no doubt calls for extra security measures in lodges and hostels within and outside the campus to ensure students’ safety on campus
