ANALYSIS OF BUILDING SECURITY COMPONENTS AND NEIGHBOURHOOD CRIME IN MINNA, NIGER STATE

Abstract

Criminality rate relating to urban insecurity keep mounting on daily bases due to government failure to provide adequate security. Cities inhabitants have been victims of one form of crime or the other and over half of the crimes occurred in our neighbourhoods. Provision of building security components has long been associated with reduction of crime due to its involvement in prevention of unauthorized access or damages to life and property. The aim of the study is to examine building security components and neighbourhood crime in Minna. The study employed quantitative approach using structured questionnaire. A total of 420 residences were randomly sampled from eight (8) neighbourhoods in Minna. The study found that four (4) building security components emerge as the most provided security components for crime control in Minna and are according to their order of availability by the mean score value. These components are door/window burglar proof (M = 2.91) rank 1st, security lights (M = 2.85) rank 2nd, security fence (M = 2.58) rank 3rd and security/entrance gate (M = 2.30) rank 4th. The study found that economic, demographic and social factor influences neighbourhood crime in Minna, and each factor achieved level of reliability determined by the Cronbach’s Alpha value >0.70, economic (0.83), demographic (0.79) and social (0.75). The study also revealed that between 2015 to 2020 cases of serious crimes: Abduction (2.1%), murder (1.9%), armed robbery (0.9%), rape (2.8%) and kidnapping 0.5% are relatively low, indicating low level of urban insecurity in Minna. The study found that there is a moderate negative significant relationship between provision of housing security component and neighbourhood crime rate in Minna (rho= -.396, p= <.01). This implies that the higher the provision of housing security components the lower the neighbourhood crime rate in Minna. The study therefore recommends that, failure in the provision of adequate building security components is a driving force to high crime rate.