A 20 year old Nigerian based in Houston, Texas, United States of America, Faith Shonuga, has taken her anti-gun violence campaign to the Alief Community in a bid to stem the rising tide of gun violence and other related civil disturbances across the United States. Buoyed by her experiences as an intern with a Non Profit, Non-Governmental organisation Giffords, a body committed with the courage to fight gun violence, Faith aims at engaging key stakeholders and communities towards promoting peaceful coexistence in several multi-racial and cultural communities like Houston Texas. Faith, an undergraduate of Political Science at the University of Houston, Main Campus rallied key individuals and organizations to discuss ways of ensuring crime prevention, gun access, safety and justice amongst people.
At the event to drive home her anti-gun violence gospel, held at the Alief Community Neighborhood Centre, she interrogated thought-leaders and concerned partners on measures and appropriate strategies to curtail the worrisome rate of gun violence and other related concerns in many communities. In her presentation, she called to action the need for greater collaboration, regulations to prevent gun running, and put in place stern rules to restrict access to guns and reduce risk to life and property to the barest minimum. While sharing her story, faith had this to say; “I discovered Giffords at my school’s career and internship fair, then I did a research on the organisation. I was really inspired by their youth-led approach movement. Interestingly, I was accepted after my application to begin my journey in advocacy and community action”. She stated.
The ebullient young community advocate as part of her efforts leading to her stakeholders’ community campaign had previously engaged with some Texas state Senators and representatives at Austin the capital of the State of Texas to share her community’s reality and push for solutions rooted in justice and prevention. In the discussions, centered on Community Violence Intervention (CVI) and Building Safer Communities, speakers after speaker who were part of the panel of discussant shared their thoughts on the appropriate strategies to avert the negative impact of easy access to guns and exposure of communities to havoc of gun violence. According to one of the speakers Mr Damion Walker, Founder of Cognitive Justice International, more emphasis should be on transformative determination and systemic change through orientation and sensitization that violence is never a good option.
Another speaker Ms Gavriella Roisman, a defense attorney in Travis and Harris County has this to say; “If mass violence is a way of life, and if it’s not changing, then we need to find something else to change about how we live?”
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Ms Maggie Sun a Program Manager for Harris County Assistance Response Team (HART) in her submission suggested the need to pay closer attention to mental health, stressing that most perpetrators of gun-violence may be suffering from effects of mental health.
Despite some varied views on gun access and ways to mitigate community violence, all the speakers and participants were unanimous that partnership and greater public awareness was necessary to help checkmate civil violence and recurrent gun shooting incidents in several communities and schools in the United States of America.
The facilitator of the programme Faith Shonuga re-emphasized her quest to make a change within her community and the United States, where there’s high incidences of gun violence in schools, malls, and other public places, amongst others. There are several incidents of gun related violence within the United States due to its flexible gun rules, which conversation such as this intends to address.
According to some records available to Giffords, in 2023, Harris County, part of the Houston region, had the highest firearm fatality rate at 16.4 deaths per 100,000 people. Fort Bend County had the lowest at 8.5 per 100,000. Gun violence is rising nationally, and Houston’s three-county region has seen an increase of 30.6% in firearm fatalities since 2010. Further statistics show that guns are involved in 52 percent of suicide deaths, even though they are used in less than 5 percent of suicide attempts. Texas in 2023 reported 4,561 firearm-related deaths, with a crude gun death rate of 14.95 who died per 100,000 people. Black boys or men represent 52 percent of all gun homicide victims despite comprising just 6 percent of the US population.
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