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THE ROLE OF PUBLIC RELATIONS IN COMBATING CULTISM IN THE NIGERIAN INSTITUTIONS

1.1 INTRODUCTION

Cultism is undeniably one of the social vices setting the hand of the developmental clock of Nigeria backwards.    The  unabated  atrocities  of  secret  cults  in  the  Nigerian  educational institutions and even in the wider Nigerian society continue to take tolls on the lives of young and  old  Nigerians.    Many  young  people,  politicians,  academics  and  industrialists  have  been hacked  down  in  their  prime  by  the  cultists.    It  could  be  in  the  execution  of  a  contract  to assassinate and waste the life of their mentor’s real or imagined often political enemy.  Acting as hirelings, the cultists get their target in his residence or office or track him down on the way.  In most cases, the murderers ‘escape,’ not tracked down because they are serving the powers that be.  They do not face the wrath of the law because the event is linked to a political godfather, a sacred cow.  The dismayed Enugu State Development Association (ESDA) feared in 2005 that the  failure of  the  government  security  apparatus  to  arrest  and  prosecute  any  suspects  in  the numerous incidences of political murder in Enugu State showed that the government had a hand in the crimes and made speaking out very risky.  More often than not, however, it is in a clash between two cult groups, the one trying to demonstrate its stronger devilish powers over the other.  The cultists strike in one Nigerian educational institution today and a reprisal occurs the next day in another institution, claiming lives in both cases.  Sometimes, a chain of reactions is sparked off in many other institutions of higher learning.  This depicts their synergy and network of  existence  and  activities  in  a  country  already  ravaged  by  underdevelopment,  poverty  and misery (Onoh, 2006).  Widespread corruption in high places and endemic poverty in the society are precursors of cultism in the Nigerian educational institutions.  Due to poor agricultural planning, leadership ineffectiveness and mismanagement, millions of Nigerians, many of them children, are starving to death. Only  about  2% of  Nigerians, many of  them among the  present and former ruling classes,  control  over  60%  of  the  nation’s  financial  assets,  while  over  70%  of  the  Nigerian population live below the poverty line (Encarta, 2005e and Umar, 2007).   The cultists, mostly the youth, are merely responding to the societal contradictions in national socio-economic development.   

Nigeria,  with  the  natural  potentials  to  be  among  the richest countries in the world, a paradise on earth for all, is variously rated between the 13th and 21st poorest country and 1st or 2nd most corrupt nation in the whole wide world  (Eneh, 1985 and Eneh, 2006).   Successive military and civilian governments have paid lip-service to the eradication of secret cults in Nigerian schools.  Rather than thin out, these secret societies appear to grow by leaps and bounds, and to spread fast from the tertiary institutions of learning into the secondary and primary schools (The Guardian on Sunday, 2000 and Eneh, 2006). Only iron political will can stamp cultism out of the

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