ESCALATING CRIME: WE NEED SOLUTIONS

Former Director of the United States of America’s domestic intelligence and security service - Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) - James Brien Comey who was dismissed in 2017, once made very pertinent observations about the escalating crime rate in his country.

The observations he made were actualised in an interview he had with the Associated Press (AP) in June 2016, and below is an extract from that interview:
“Violent crimes - from homicides and rapes to robberies - have been on the increase in major US cities, yet experts can’t point to a single reason why, and the jump doesn’t suggest there is a trend. It’s being reported at a local level, but in my view, it is not getting the attention at national level it deserves. I don’t know what the answer is, but do we have a problem...”

Interminably reading of violent incidents of crime (one of the offshoots of societal, moral decay) lately in our country’s media, I couldn’t help but think of Comey’s words.
There seems to be an intractable and morbid degeneration of societal morals, permeating our society in this country.

increase in violence

This is manifesting itself chiefly in a worrying trend in the increase in violence, lawlessness and eroded levels of ethical standards and decorum. Sexual immorality, public indecency acts like public drunkenness, unpalatable use of derogatory language in public places like local bus ranks, substance abuse, gender-based violence and abuse, almost across all sectors of our society, are some of the examples of the decline in morals.

It is an indisputable fact of life that for every effect, there is an underlying cause. Degenerative moral decay has its causes and effects. It is important for all stakeholders concerned to find out the causes and address them, finding lasting solutions, not only at local level, but at national, as well - exactly as Mr. Comey pointed out. Escalating crimes levels are some of the spin-offs of moral decay and decline.

Fighting crime should not only be left out to be a domain reserved exclusively for law enforcement agencies, but should be a collective, national effort. There is an urgent need for the concept of ‘nawe uliphoyisa’ to be embraced and applied with a concerted and committed national effort.

Our three arms of government need to be seen to be taking an active role, display a committed, political will to address moral degeneration in our society. No efforts must be spared in availing adequate resources to combat such. If it calls for amendments to existing legislation or table new, in order to improve moral standards, by all means that should be considered.

The Times of Swaziland newspaper last week, carried a worrying account of how sex workers - ladies of the night, as they are with ‘respect’, addressed - nightly brave the chilly, winter nights, encroaching on almost all street corners of the country’s cities, scantily dressed in spite of the biting cold, soliciting clients who will pay for their ungodly services. Some allegedly engage in lurid, top-drawer, sexual acts in secluded and dark corners of cities like Manzini - all for financial rewards.

Without any shadow of doubt, this is a real cause for concern. Some of us are cognisant of the dire financial situations they find themselves in, which compels some of them to resort to selling their sacred bodies in exchange for what I regard as nothing else but paid-for and voluntary rape. As much as desperate situations at times call for desperate measures, auctioning their bodies is morally wrong - period. The selling of God-created bodies, irrespective of any mitigating factors, is a stark pointer to the erosion of and an affront to ethical morals.

On one hand, we are increasingly inundated in our media with a perplexing surge in brutal accounts of armed robberies committed by a daring band of armed-to-the-teeth, dangerous robbers, who brutally hack employees in business centres, in a bid to induce them to hand over valuables like money collected by businesses at the end of the day. On the homicide side, young, school-going children with a bright future still ahead of them, have been brutally raped and had their lives cut short by devil-inspired rapists.

Some of the alleged rapists have not been apprehended. Others are allegedly known, but due to their alleged connections to the influential gods, are walking free, and are ready to pounce on their next victim.

CRIME sprees ESCALATING

Our law enforcement agencies seem to have their hands full, trying their best to halt the series of heinous acts and bringing the perpetrators to book. The crime sprees seem to continue unabated and the million dollar question is: What is going on? Why is violence and other acts of heinous crimes on the increase? What has turned some members of our society into such callous and brutal animal-like predators who do not give a second thought to the sanctity of life and the respect for one’s possessions?

Could these frightening effects be the result of the high unemployment rate that is currently facing the country? Is the breakdown of morality a result of an appalling breakdown in the level of sound, family values?

Has it got to do with our spiritual dispensation; maybe? Where we have turned our backs completely on the One who created the heavens and the earth? Are we reaping what we have been sowing both individually and nationally for years, maybe by despising God’s holy statutes and commandments? Are our law enforcement agencies understaffed and lacking adequate resources to combat the perplexing increase in crime rates?

Could the gradual but increasing moral decay due to external and/or internal factors like the pervasive political situation in the country, where nepotism and cronyism gives an unfair advantage to those with connections, side-lining the underprivileged in opportunities that can enhance the general lifestyle of the rank and file?

Everyone wants to make a decent living and dwindling economic resources are bound to change moral behaviours of society for the worse. The disadvantaged are bound to be frustrated, become reckless and desperate to make a living and resort to immoral means to achieve that end.

Not to be left out of the moral breakdown equation are the rampant, high levels of corruption permeating almost all spheres of our society. There is widespread looting of public funds in the government machinery. Job losses in the private sector are giving many people sleepless nights. Escalating prices of food commodities in the retail sector are stressing everyone. Such and many other factors have eroded moral values in our society.

The questions are numerous and demand answers if, as a nation, we are to continue enjoying the relative peace we have basked in for decades in this country.
To avoid a breakdown of moral values, it is imperative that both individually and nationally, we devise strategies of operating on sound, ethical standards. The family environment is where it should all begin.

Love of money

Our relationship with our fellow human beings is of major and paramount concern to Him. He warns us against the sin of coveting. Coveting can be described as an obsessed desire or envy for other people’s possessions. Love of money is a form of coveting and has brought ruin to and pierced the lives and hearts of many. The idolatrous worship of money has corrupted human morals to such an extent that mankind has the propensity and proclivity to kill for money - hence the brutal robberies that are taking place.

There would hardly be any need to try to rob or kill if we religiously and faithfully abide by the Command: “Thou shalt not covet” and refrain from having an unhealthy envy for our neighbour’s possessions, for instance. Being envious to the point of using any means to be like my neighbour or beyond, has led many on the road to destruction.

Striving for a betterment of life is not a sin. It is when the envy transcends the boundaries of moral benchmarks, resorting to using ungodly and unorthodox means to have material possessions when sin encroaches.
Desiring wrongfully and inordinately, without regard for the material or otherwise rights of others, has led many people to commit crimes, invariably landing some in jail.

Shalom!

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