27 Feb 2018

The growing number of incidences in which the youths are perpetrators of violent and intrusive crimes such as murder has been described as worrisome.

According to statistics from Botswana Police Service report, last month (January 2018) 36 cases of murder were recorded, 31 of which were committed by people aged 40 years and below.

Of those 36 cases, the majority of the victims were still people aged below 40 as only six of the victims were aged between 41 and 70.  

Speaking in an interview recently, police spokesperson, Senior Superintendent Near Bagali said the advent of social media had exposed teenagers and adolescents to different media content from people of different backgrounds and behaviours.

He noted that what was sad was that the youth ended up emulating everything including the undesirable behaviour which they came across on social media platforms.   He pointed out that while social media was on its own a good thing, it was disappointing that some young people were not using it for purposes of adding value to their lives.

Further, Senior Superintendent Bagali said some students spent a lot of time on social media, and in the process got ditracted from their studies by focusing their attention on going through material that could destroy their future.

Lack of proper home structures and backgrounds, he added was one factor contributing to delinquent behaviour among young people as it meant that they could easily get influenced. He also mentioned peer pressure as another contributing factor to such behaviour especially for those youth with weak family backgrounds.

Senior Superintenden Bagali further cited lack of proper parenting as one cause of delinquent behaviour, saying most young people, especially those still at school spent most of their time at school away from parents, while their time after school was mostly reserved for household chores and not meaningful interactions with their parents. When giving a Christian overview on such behaviour, counsellor at University of Botswana Careers and Counselling Centre and Pastor at Lifeline Christian Centre, Pastor Simon Mulosu pointed out that young people were angry and upset, adding that the anger usually emanated from lack of emotional and psychological support.

Pastor Mulosu added that the major issue was lack of meaning of life which was supposed to be instilled by parents.

 Furthermore, he said children experienced a lot of things in different stages of life, noting that in the absence of proper parental guidance, young people would not develop any sense of what the meaning of life was.

He also said members of the society were also not being exemplary, noting that the absence of role models led to children being confused and spiritually empty and dissatisfied.

“As a result, young people take law into their hands and the society turns into anarchy,” he said. Pastor Mulosu said parents no longer led in homes and as a result children tended to take control.

The parents, he said were always physically absent either at work or psychologically absent because they were only concentrating on their electronic gadgets. Head of Child Protection under Department of Social Protection at the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development, Ms Ookame Mokabathebe said in order to raise desirable youth everyone in the society, being parents, teachers and social workers should play their part.

Ms Mokabathebe mentioned that as social workers, they had realised that parents tended to abdicate their responsibility to teachers while teachers also absolved themselves regarding the role they ought to play. She said the situation created confusion and resulted with students lacking guidance as they did not know who was in charge.

For the society, she said it tended to ignore other people’s children not knowing that guiding such children helped build a desirable society.

She said vulnerable children who were in an environment that could cause them to break the law as well as those who were already in conflict with law were offered psychological support by her department.

Ms Mokabathebe said her office worked hand in hand with the courts in supporting children convicted of crime.

She added that most of such children were those who had dropped out of school, noting that part of the support they were given was to have them enrolled at Ikago School of Industry to do industrial courses such as auto-mechanics, bricklaying, and welding and fabrication. ENDS