New ideas: Culture of crime

By Amb Dhano Obongo

June 16, 2017 (SSNA) — A few days after the Easter break, a friend of mine, a colleague, was exiting his vehicle to enter the Vivacell office to verify his data card which had an error. Suddenly a motorbike snatcher came quickly and grabbed his bag from his hand in brand daylight.

When I heard of this incident, I was shocked. How could such a thing happen in brand daylight in downtown Juba where there is a large presence of police and secret security personnel. And next door was the police training center (Buluk). This has motivated me to write about such crime.

Of course, the police and all the security forces should be commended for combating crime in the past year through enforcement, investigation, prevention, and community engagement.

Congratulations are in order to the police chiefs and leaders of security forces throughout our beloved county. However, with gaps, shortages and incompetency in several fields, achievements are commendable and to be congratulated.

Adverse factors in South Sudan include poverty, unemployment, and lack of an efficient judicial system, poor parenting, peer pressure and bad examples. They render the end of the process of a difficult order.

Crime prevention is a responsibility of more than security agencies. Required actions involve cleaning, improved judicial system, economic empowerment, education, family integrity, and zero tolerance for corruption. This renders crime prevention a wholesome responsibility of all community institutions. Failures force individuals into crime. We need durable solutions addressing the sources of crime.

God bless the Republic of South Sudan.

The author may be reached at email address: [email protected].