The Socio-Economic Consequences of Protracted Conflicts in Post Colonial Nigeria

Abstract

The justification of this paper is that since after independence, and especially from the 1980’s to the present time, this great nation, Nigeria, has witnessed a series of communal conflicts. These conflicts sometimes assume the character of religious conflicts, but often take the shape of economic crisis. It is the contention of this paper that most youths who provide the ready militia for these conflicts are unaware of both the immediate and long term consequences of the conflicts, hence they continue indulging in an exercise that spells doom for the entire nation. The focus of this paper therefore is to identify some post-colonial conflicts that have some devastating effect on the socio-economic life of the people. It is not the interest of this paper to determine the validity of the perspectives of the conflicting parties which is responsible for the causation and escalation of the conflict. What is our concern is to reveal and expose the consequences of conflict, in order to let our readers, and indeed, the youths to know that conflict is an ill-wind that does not do well to anybody. At the end of this paper, our readers would realize that peace should be considered supreme among humanity’s highest values. This work relied much on secondary source materials.