The Northern Chairman of the Christian Association of Nigeria, Rev. John Hayab, has advised youths to desist from cybercrime and money-making rituals, stressing that ill-gotten money cannot make them rich.
Hayab gave the advice in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria in Abuja on Tuesday.
He spoke against the increasing rate of youth involvement in the heinous acts popularly known as “Yahoo Yahoo” and “Yahoo-plus.”
He said, “The Bible does not discourage money-making or wealth creation; however, it says that the love of money is the root of all evil.
“Ill-gotten money cannot make you rich.
“Those involved in cybercrime and ritual killing take money that does not belong to them and must desist from it.
“Painful as it is, if they do that just to compete with others doing the same, then it is sad.”
According to him, many English words are used to describe certain actions, and such words tend to downplay the gravity of the acts.
“A word like financial embezzlement might sound pedestrian, but it means stealing money that is not your own.
“When you steal money, you are a thief.
“That is unacceptable because if that continues, these young people will become nothing but terrors in the future.
“No wonder they can abduct young girls and end up using them for criminal activities or rituals.
“When you begin to kill in order to make money, then you lose your humanity and your peace,” he said.
The cleric attributed the increasing youth involvement in such acts to what he described as the erosion of parental discipline.
“Parental discipline has been abandoned by many parents, and that is why you find some of them encouraging, endorsing, or even boasting about what their children are doing.
“Moral decadence has eaten deep into society, and that is why some parents accept this terrible and ungodly means of making money.
“Some parents will never allow that to happen in their homes,” he said.
According to him, if society ignores the trend and such children grow up to become leaders with aspirations to be chairmen, governors, senators, and members of the House of Representatives, things will become worse.
This, he said, is because they will use their ill-gotten wealth to buy their way into elective positions.
“So, I advise parents to teach their children to eschew laziness and embrace hard work, transparency, honesty, and integrity.
“As a nation, we must stand up and fight it,” the cleric said.
Hayab, who is also the Country Director of the Global Peace Foundation, a non-governmental organisation, said that to ensure proper youth upbringing, the organisation had made youth development one of its major focus areas.
According to him, the foundation has been promoting girl-child education in Nigeria, with the expectation that such efforts would help raise disciplined mothers.
He said the mothers would, in turn, train their children to become decent and responsible individuals who would care for others.
“We ensure that mothers are educated by mentoring young girls to grow and become responsible parents.
“We help girls to enrol in school and complete their education; otherwise, they could be enticed and recruited by the so-called ‘Yahoo boys,’ and that would be a shame,” he said.
(NAN)
Leave a comment