In the past decade, Nigeria’s name has become increasingly associated with crime, insecurity, and institutional decay, at home and abroad. Official corruption, weak institutions, terrorism, banditry, and the routine kidnapping of schoolchildren for ransom have normalised a national crisis that has eroded public trust and damaged the country’s global standing. The crimes not only persist; they have also become predictable.
Security failures assail defenceless communities, while the state often responds too weakly to restore confidence. The IMF said poverty reached 63 per cent of Nigerians by 2025, with 27 million people facing food insecurity, showing how insecurity and economic distress reinforce each other. The same IMF report said some capital spending took place outside the budget perimeter and that the federal government’s fiscal accounts contained a statistical discrepancy equivalent to 2.7 per cent of GDP, while Reuters reported that about 2 per cent GDP in public spending was not recorded in recent official budgets.
The numbers on violence are equally grim. Nigeria recorded 12,954 deaths from violent incidents in 2025, up from 12,162 in 2024, while banditry alone accounted for 3,974 deaths in 2025, according to Nigeria Watch reporting cited in local coverage. Nextier’s 2025 conflict database also reported 3,141 kidnappings in 1,274 incidents nationwide, with banditry, insurgency, and attacks on farmers feeding a wider security collapse. School kidnappings remain one of the most shameful symbols of this collapse. A recent report said at least 816 pupils were abducted in 22 school attacks since January 2023, underscoring how education itself has become a hostage to criminal enterprise. This is a governance problem.
When public money disappears, security institutions weaken, and accountability is absent, criminality thrives. The PFIPC scandal has deepened that perception, because a government already accused of poor fiscal discipline now faces controversy over a phantom agency and questionable budgetary allocation. The crisis has pushed many Nigerians to seek safety, dignity, and opportunity elsewhere. That exodus shows in rising emigration among young professionals, students, and families who no longer trust the country to guarantee basic security or a sustainable future. Reports of Nigerians facing tighter scrutiny, denial of entry, detention, or secondary screening at foreign borders reflect reputational damage attached to the passport.
A state does not become synonymous with crime by accident. It gets there through repeated failure of vision, character, and enforcement. Leaders have not only failed to act, they have normalised dysfunction, tolerated impunity, and treated public office as a private estate. The IMF’s warning about off-budget spending points to a deeper culture of opacity in public finance. If the state cannot keep clean books, secure its people, or restore institutional trust, crime becomes the operating environment. Until leadership becomes accountable, security professionalised, and public spending transparent, the country will continue to pay the price for bad leadership.
