By Tony Okafor
When the reported ransom demand for the abducted chairman of Jezco Group, Chief Sir Joseph Ezeokafor, rose from N700 million to a staggering N1.5 billion, something more frightening than the money itself happened in our society.
Some people looked at the figure and concluded: “Kidnapping has become a lucrative business.”
That is precisely the mindset we must kill before kidnapping kills our society.
There are young people somewhere hearing such figures and doing the mathematics. They see criminals demanding hundreds of millions and, instead of asking how wicked such an act is, they may be wondering: “How can I join?”
We must condemn that ambition without hesitation.
Kidnapping is not entrepreneurship. It is not wealth creation. It is not a shortcut to success. It is organised cruelty—the conversion of another human being’s freedom, fear and life into money.
A society that begins to admire kidnappers because of the fortunes they extort has already lost a dangerous battle.
Our youths must be taught a different arithmetic: honour over ransom, hard work over extortion, skill over violence, service over criminality.
Parents must talk to their children—not only about getting rich, but about getting rich rightly. Schools must teach character alongside certificates.
Religious institutions must preach against the glorification of sudden wealth. Traditional rulers, community leaders and public figures must stop celebrating unexplained affluence.
And the state must make crime genuinely unattractive. Kidnappers must be pursued, prosecuted and punished through due process, while their financial networks and collaborators are dismantled.
Communities must refuse to shelter, celebrate or protect criminals.
We must raise a generation that sees a kidnap victim not as a ransom opportunity, but as someone’s father, mother, brother, sister or child.
Let the billions demanded by kidnappers never become an inspiration for our children. Let them instead become evidence of the depth of our national tragedy.
Our generation shall never praise kidnappers. Our children shall not inherit their values. And our society shall never mistake criminal wealth for success.
