On behalf of
the CLEEN Foundation, I warmly welcome you all to this press briefing, which is
being organized to publicly announce the
commencement of the 2013 edition of the National Crime Victimization and Safety Survey. The survey will cover the 36 states of Nigeria and Abuja, the Federal
Capital and is scheduled to commence from Monday,
June 17 - Monday, 8th July, 2013, lasting a period of three weeks.
The Importance of Crime Victimization Surveys
Worldwide, the paucity of official statistic on crime, necessitate the
conduction of Crime victimization surveys. Most often, official crime and
victimisation statistics are produced by the police, prisons and the courts.
However, such statistics, good as they may, do not cover the entire crime and
victimisation incidences due to dark figures (unreported crimes) and grey
figures (reported but unrecorded crimes). In response to the deficiencies
associated with official statistics on crime, criminologists designed the crime
victimization survey, which involves the study of a sample of a given
population to obtain data on the extent of criminal victimization during a
particular period, usually the past year - whether or not detected by or
reported to the police.
Questionnaires are designed to gather information on respondents’
experience of criminal victimization. The surveys provide rich data for
understanding the distribution of criminal victimization and the socio-demographic
characteristics of victims and criminals; offer information for better
understanding of criminality; and consequences of victimization; and extent of
fear of crime among different groups in different study locations
Sampling and Method of the Survey
Eleven thousand five hundred and eighteen respondents will be
interviewed in their homes using personal face-to-face interview and
multi-stage sampling technique. To ensure adequate representation of adult
Nigerian population, probability sampling procedure will be used to neutralize
any known form of bias that may affect the findings of the study. Respondents
will be males and females, age 18 years and above. Interviews will be
conducted throughout week days and weekends, to ensure that respondents of all
works of life are included in the sample.
Relevant information for the survey will be collected using structured
close-ended questionnaire, known for consuming less time for the respondents to
complete the questionnaires and the ease to be keyed into the computer. The
questionnaire is designed to capture respondents’ household/personal
experiences of crime victimization, human rights violations, road accidents;
perceptions of safety; firearms/gun ownership; police/security agencies
response to crime and general perception of crime and the criminal justice
system. The questionnaire is divided into 11 sections and an introduction. The
introduction in a general manner speaks to the interviewee of the aims and
objectives of the survey as well as how the questionnaires are to be carried
out. In doing this the interviewee is aware of what the survey is all about, so
as to make an informed decision whether to participate or not in the survey.
Sections 1-3 deal with respondents’ house hold and personal experiences
of crime victimization including sexual crimes. Section 4 is on economic and
financial crimes with special focus on measuring levels of corruption in the
country over the past 12 months. Section 5 focuses on fear of crime and
perception of safety, measuring how fearful the respondents are of becoming a
victim of any type of crime and its impact on their social behaviour. Section 6
looks at firearms and or gun ownership in the community. Informed by the
upsurge in violent crime, kidnapping and other forms of terrorism, the survey
sets to find out whether people own guns and other firearms in the community.
The tendency for communities with high ownership of guns and other firearms to
perpetuate violent crimes could be higher than communities without
firearms. Section 7 sets on community response to crime, trying to find
out the measures the respondents take to protect themselves in their homes.
Section 8 is on road safety and accidents, looking at the level of road
accidents in Nigeria and respondents attitudes to road safety issues. Section 9
measures public perception of governments and trust in public authorities in
Nigeria. Section 10 is on general perception of crime and criminal justice
institutions. Section 11 provides general assessment of conflict violence in
Nigeria, providing information on trend and public perception of security
agencies in addressing violent conflict in Nigeria. Finally, section 12
provides questions that would enable quantitative assessment of human rights
situation in Nigeria.
Addition of New Issues in the Survey
Following the geometrical increase in the rate of violent crime using
guns and other firearms, such as in kidnapping, armed robbery and other forms
of terrorism as is noticed in the North East and North central, the 2013
edition of the survey has introduced one new section on assessment of conflict
violence in Nigeria. This section sets to determine the most common conflict
that exists in the country and how often it has occurred in various communities
in the country. This section will also give an insight of the public perception
of the various security agencies in addressing violent crimes in the community.
Objectives
The objectives of the survey are to:
·
Generate reliable complementary
data to official statistics on crime, crime levels, perceptions of safety, as
well as their geographic, gender and socioeconomic distributions, which would
assist the Police, Federal Road Safety Commission and other law enforcement
agencies in deploying their human and material resources.
·
Provide the Federal Road Safety
Commission with reliable complementary data to their statistics on rate of road
accidents, response of government agencies to emergencies and Nigerians attitude
to road safety issues and values.
·
Identify states with high levels
fire arms and gun ownership, violent crimes and criminality in Nigeria.
·
Assess the level of community
interest and involvement in crime prevention and crime target hardening
measures.
·
Provide a general assessment of
conflict violence in Nigeria.
·
Provide quantitative assessment of
human rights situation in Nigeria.
Field Administration of Questionnaire
The field administration of the survey questionnaire is being handled by
the Practical Sampling International (PSI), a reputable social research firm
that has worked with the CLEEN Foundation over the years and has conducted
similar surveys for local and international organizations.
We would like to use this
opportunity to appeal to members of the public to welcome the interviewers when
they visit and provide truthful answers to the questions asked as they will
help policy makers in formulation of better policies on crime and safety issues
in Nigeria. If in doubt of the identity of the interviewers please contact the
survey coordinator, Raphael Mbaegbu at the following number:
08063292096
We
also use the opportunity to appreciate the
MacArthur Foundation, based in USA that have provided funding support for this 2013 edition of the National
Crime Victimization and Safety Survey. We thank you all for
taking out time out of your busy schedules to grace this press briefing, thank
you all for coming.
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