THE MENACE WE BRED: A REFLECTION ON OUR COLLECTIVE FAILURE

 THE MENACE WE BRED: A REFLECTION ON OUR COLLECTIVE FAILURE

By Tijjani Sarki | Zawaciki, Kano

3rd August, 2025

In powerful agreement and yet, in deep sorrow with the piercing questions raised by Al-Amin Isa, I feel burdened to go further, to ask not just who are these people? but rather.

How did we allow this to happen? How did our own become strangers to us violent, lost, and enraged?

The menace destroying our homes, our schools, and our peace did not fall from the sky. We created it. We fed it. We looked away while it grew. And now, we are living in its shadow.

1. PARENTAL NEGLECT: WHEN THE HOME LOSES ITS SOUL

Before we blame society, let us turn to where it all begins,the home.

A child’s first moral lesson is not in a textbook it is in a parent's presence, their words, their warmth. But what happens when homes become transit camps? When gadgets replace guidance, and TikTok becomes a tutor?

Today, many children are raised by screens, not parents. We gave them entertainment, but not ethics. We gave them luxury, but no love. We were present in the house but absent in the heart.

And now we ask, why are they angry? Why are they adrift?

We didn’t raise monsters. We left vacuums and something else filled the void.

2. THE FALL OF TRADITIONAL INSTITUTIONS AND THE SILENCING OF WISDOM

There was a time when the presence of an elder was enough to restore order. Their voices carried weight. Their stories taught us who we were.

Now, those voices are silenced. Brushed aside as “outdated.” Laughed at by a generation that no longer listens because no one ever taught them to value listening.

We severed the cord between generations. And with it, we lost memory, identity, and direction.

A people that forgets where it came from is destined to walk in circles.

3. CULTURE IN CRISIS: WHEN IDENTITY IS SOLD FOR LIKES

Once upon a time, we were a people of dignity. Of restraint. Of honor. But now? Our children know more about celebrities than community leaders. They mimic foreign lifestyles with no context, no filter, no boundaries.

Music that glorifies vice. Fashion that promotes disrespect. Content that erodes values faster than we can rebuild them.

Social media has become the new mosque, the new school.

We handed over our children and now we are shocked at what they’ve become?

We traded roots for trends. Now we are reaping confusion.

4. THE DEATH OF COMMUNITY: WHEN “NOT MY CHILD” BECOMES “NOT MY PEACE”

There was a time when every adult was a parent to every child. A wrong act by one child was corrected by many. Encouragement, correction, celebration, and mourning were shared duties.

Now? “It’s not my child,” we say. “It’s not my problem.”

But it is.

The child you ignore today will be the one you fear tomorrow.

A broken home is a tragedy. A broken community is a catastrophe.

We must return to the spirit of we,because if we don’t rise together, we will fall alone.

5. A FAILED SYSTEM: WHEN PROMISES REPLACE ACTION

Our schools are falling apart physically, morally, spiritually. Classrooms are overcrowded, teachers are underpaid, and students are uninspired.

Empowerment programs exist in theory, but disappear in practice. Youth are told to dream big while we hand them broken ladders.

They are not angry for nothing.

They are angry because they feel invisible.

A society that ignores the hunger of its young will one day be devoured by their rage.

6. POLITICAL USE AND ABANDONMENT: WHEN HOPE IS TURNED INTO A WEAPON

Nothing wounds deeper than being used.

Our youth are drawn into political games. Armed, deceived, drugged, promised heaven and dumped after the votes are counted.

They are not just campaign tools. They are not just thugs.

They are our sons. Our brothers. Our neighbours.

What we see on the streets is not just crime.

It is pain. It is confusion. It is disillusionment turned outward.

And now, with nowhere left to channel their hurt, they turn to chaos, because it’s the only language they think anyone hears.

7. WHEN THE MIMBAR DIVIDES INSTEAD OF UNITES

Once upon a time, the Masjid was the heart of the community a place of guidance, healing, reflection, and moral clarity. The Ulama were lanterns in the darkness, voices of mercy, pillars of unity.

But today, some pulpits have become podiums for division. Sermons once rooted in spirituality now spiral into ideological rivalries. Instead of addressing the moral crises in society, some clerics are locked in endless debates criticizing fellow scholars, promoting party-line positions, or defending group loyalties masked as theology.

These are not spiritual teachings. These are political battles wearing religious robes.

And while the Ummah bleeds, the youth stray, and families fracture these arguments solve nothing. They only stir confusion, alienation, and resentment.

We call on our Ulama: Restore the dignity of the mimbar. Return to the message of hope and healing. Speak to our hearts, not our divisions.

The masjid must once again become a sanctuary not a stage for sectarian strife.

IN CONCLUSION: THIS IS NOT A WARNING. IT IS A REALITY.

Al-Amin Isa asked: Who are these people?

I ask: Who raised them? Who ignored them? Who used them? Who failed them?

The answer is us. All of us.

We are not just victims.

We are contributors. This menace is ours. And until we confront that truth with honesty and urgency, we will continue to lose more than lives we will lose generations.

So, what do we do?

i.Parents: come back home not just physically, but emotionally.

ii.Elders: rise and speak. Your silence is too loud.

iii.Communities: rebuild the village. Be your brother’s keeper again.

iv.Governments: make education and youth development a national emergency.

v.Politicians: remember that your legacy is not in titles,it is in people.

vi.Ulama: lift us up, do not tear us apart.

Let us not write another tribute for another wasted life.

Let us write a new chapter of healing, of reckoning, of rebuilding.

We can change.

We must change.

Because the soul of our nation is not yet lost, but it is fading.

And time is running out.

 Tijjani Sarki, writing from Zawaciki, Kano