Emerging Security Threats: Factors and Implications for Nigeria’s Socio-Economic Development 2015-2019
Silas Epron

Abstract
The backwardness in Nigeria's socio-economic development has been attributed to several factors such as corruption, bad governance, poor policy implementation, insurgency and, a host of others. However, in more recent times, a new set of emerging security threats such as kidnapping, banditry, herders/farmers conflicts and cybercrime (yahoo-yahoo) seems to complement earlier mentioned factors in the threatening of Nigeria's socio-economic development by posing threats to lives and property, crippling local businesses and scaring away foreign investors. States such as Zamfara, Taraba, Adamawa, Katsina, Borno, and e.t.c have so far, felt the consequential effects of these emerging security threats. Government‟s effort to bring the menaces to a standstill to avoid possible breakdowns seems to have yielded no positive result. The historical method of research and analysis was employed in the study. The findings revealed that Nigeria‟s socio-economic development have been affected by the emergence of kidnapping, banditry, and cybercrime, with unemployment as one of the major leading factors. The major thrust of this paper is to figure out the possible factors behind these emerging security threats which seem to be a sliding force in Nigeria's slow socio-economic development and to recommend possible solutions that can serve as a way forward for Nigeria. The paper recommends among others, the need for government to create more job opportunity, more social programs, and to re-enforce its security agencies.

Full Text: PDF     DOI: 10.15640/jeds.v7n2a11