Tension in the Paradise: A Paradigm Shift in Urban Violence in Nigeria

Abstract

There had been a tremendous increase in the record of urban violence in the past decade and a clear tendency consistent increased. There is an average of ten (10) (reported) incidents of violence per day in each urban city in Nigeria regardless of it magnitude, an average of three hundred and fifty (350) crimes committed across the country per day regardless of it magnitude. This work reveals the effects of violence on development in Nigeria. The motive behind any group conversing for a right is seen as a collective bargaining for the public good. Conversely, this motive had dwindled down the lane taking a strange manoeuvrings and becoming a shift to personal aggrandizement and self glorifying egocentric motives. The Relative Deprivation theory is adopted in this work to effectively buttress the root cause of the problem of violence. This paper recommended institutional remedies and strengthened of internal democracy so as to ensure essential political, economical and social services for the citizenry and to mitigate religious bigotry, ethnic chauvinism and regional sentiments in the polity.