Īpart from the atrocities in the orbit of NBM, most members of the confraternity are involved in fraud and cyber crime. He maintains that violence has in fact become the cult's official policy. Offiong claims that the group's initial goal of promoting black consciousness and fighting for the dignity of Africans and their freedom from neo-colonialism has deteriorated into self-serving behaviour that is "notoriously and brutally violent". While the atrocities committed by campus cult members are well-known, very little is known about other activities of the Neo Black Movement. NBM usually state that they are not identical with Black Axe for propaganda purposes. īehind the welfare facade of the Neo Black Movement hides indeed the most dreaded Nigerian campus cult, the Black Axe confraternity. Nonetheless, law enforcement officials who have investigated members in recent years, for example in Canada, the UK and Italy are convinced that the movement has strayed far from its original path. In its own words, the Neo Black Movement of Africa is a "registered non-partisan, non-religious and non-tribal organisation that sincerely seek to revive, retain and modify where necessary those aspects of African culture that would provide vehicles of progress for Africa and her peoples". For example the Neo Black Movement of Africa. Highly organised Nigerian confraternities/campus gangs operate worldwide. The Neo Black Movement often claim to be entirely unrelated to Black Axe in public statements, however the symbol is shown on their posters. Sale of drugs takes place both in Nigeria and abroad, and sales abroad have earned a small percentage of the sellers significant amounts of money. A study states "most of them use drugs ( cocaine, heroin, marijuana, etc.) either as occasional users or addicts, or as peddlers." Of 77 respondents to a survey, 12.2% dealt drugs, while 60.3% were addicts themselves. Among the area boys are both sellers and users of illegal drugs. To aid in collecting money during traffic jams, the area boys place nails in the road and dig up the streets. One of the methods Area Boys use for extortion is to surround pedestrians, drivers, and passengers in vehicles, which are stuck in traffic, and force them to pay for some actual or fictitious service before letting them go. They extort money from passers-by, public transporters and traders, sell illegal drugs, act as informal security guards, and perform other "odd jobs" in return for compensation. Nigerian criminal gangs rose to prominence in the 1980s, owing much to the globalization of the world's economies and the high level of lawlessness and corruption in the country.Īrea boys (also known as Agberos) are loosely organized gangs of street children and teenagers, composed mostly of males, who roam the streets of Lagos, Lagos State in Nigeria. Organized crime in Nigeria includes activities by fraudsters, bandits in northern Nigeria (such as looting and kidnappings on major highways), drug traffickers and racketeers, which have spread across Western Africa. Nigeria, South Africa, United Kingdom, Ireland, France, Germany, Spain, Italy, Netherlands, Sweden, United States, Canada, India, Japan, ThailandĤ19 scams, drug trafficking, weapon trafficking, prostitution, contract killing, extortion, illegal diamond smuggling, robbery, fraud, money laundering, human trafficking, kidnapping JSTOR ( October 2015) ( Learn how and when to remove this template message).Unsourced material may be challenged and removed.įind sources: "Organized crime in Nigeria" – news Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. mw-parser-output cite.This article needs additional citations for verification.