By Nosa Akenzua, Asaba
Students of Delta state origin have agreed to shun cultism, internet fraud, examination malpractice and other social vices in the society.
The students took the decision at a one-day sensitisation and awareness programme tagged “Delta State Student’s Summit” with theme “The Role of Student Leaders Towards Curtailing the Menace of Cultism and Other Social Vices held at the Mom Civic Centre, Warri on Wednesday.
The programme was organised by the Office of the Special Assistant to the Governor on Student’s Affairs in conjunction with the Delta State Oil Producing Areas Development Commission (DESOPADEC).
Chairman of the occasion and Managing Director of DESOPADEC, Bashorun Askia Ogieh in his remark said cultism had taken a frightening dimension in the society and called on student leaders to double efforts at re-orienting students on the need to shun cultism and other social vices in the country.
Represented Mrs Ewomazino Duku, the DESOPADEC boss called on students to channel their youthful energy into providing solutions to contemporary societal challenges bedeviling the country.
According to Bashorun Ogieh, “there is no time in contemporary history where the issue of cultism and social vices has assumed a frightening dimension as in our current dispensation.
“When we least expected the scourge of this cryptic narrative to peter out with time and the buy-in of more enlightenment in knowledge, dynamic aspirations and frontier expansion, the menace of cultism appears to remain formidable, mellifluously enticing and a sudden vacuum filler of the ordeals imposed by a disorganized society.
“This has sadly degenerated into a sinister cartel to unleash heinous offenses such as rape, banditry, public harassment or bullying, homicide and ritual killing among a cocktail of offenses.
“The menace of cultism as it is turning out today among Nigerian youths has eaten deep and festered sorely into the social fabric of the national community such that social disturbance has become a familiar and normal situation in the country”
Ogieh remarked that cultism has increased degradation of values and made most of the Nigerian youths to lose focus on their academic pursuits and future.
He said what was more baffling is the degeneration of the menace to primary and secondary schools that has literarily trapped the impressionable hearts of our teens, where the tender hearts of chickens are now being reset to crow!
“Whatever the verdict being peddled and believed, the sad case of the unfortunate death of 11-year old Sylvester Oromoni remains a sore point in the imminent danger posed by cult-related menace in the society.”
