There is Great Imminent Danger in Producing Generation of Young Citizens in Educational Institutions - ALAAFIN
His Imperial Majesty, Oba [Dr.] Lamidi Olayiwola Adeyemi
111, the Alaafin of Oyo, is indisputably a traditional ruler with
distinction..
Indisputably, the monarch brought elegance into the traditional institution, not only in Oyo but also in Yorubaland.
Obviously, the story of Yoruba is not complete if you leave out the Iku Baba Yeye, Alase Orisa as he is popularly called.
Not
only does he impresses the knowledgeable audience with his mastery of
colonial history, his captivating speeches usually attract rounds of
standing ovations that leave the audience wondering if he is indeed a
monarch or a visiting professor of African History.
A
story teller and incorrigible performer, Alaafin remained the first
African monarch to hold the John F. Kennedy Airport in the United States
(US) spell-bound with a large consignment of traditional drummers who
thrilled every passenger with delightful tunes.
It was
when the paramount ruler was invited by captains of industry of the
American Chambers of Commerce and Industry held at Dallas some years
ago.
Among the Obas in Yorubaland, he distinguishes himself as a custodian of Yoruba’s cultural heritage.
When Alaafin speaks in Yoruba and English Languages, you marvel at his depth of knowledge.
You just don’t want him to stop. He is a repertoire of history and knowledge.
Despite
the fact that he is 82, when he begins to talk about historical events
both local and international, with statistics and date, then you wonder
how he remembers all these things.
He is a beauty to
behold when he dances rhythmically to traditional music, as his dance
steps go in tandem with tunes of the music. .
The
contributions of Oba Adeyemi to the preservation and promotion of Yoruba
culture, his efforts toward the unity and progress of the Yoruba as
well as promotion of the traditional institution are unquantifiable.
He is an epitome of intelligence, repository of knowledge culture and symbol of intellectualism in royalty.
In
an exclusive interview with one of our Editors, BODE DUROJAIYE, to
commemorate his 81th birthday held recently, the royal phenomenon spoke
on wide range of contemporary issues.
EXCERPTS
ON TRADITIONAL INSTITUTIONS
Obas
must be educated, literate, enlightened, civilized, dynamic, current,
lively and not only open to new ideas and suggestions, but must not be
too rigid, conservative, myopic and parochial if he must be a successful
Oba of the 21st Century. While Obas must be above board in personal
conducts, they must be a respectable dung hill. Settlement of
inter-personal, inter-ethic and communal disputes or conflicts is
another critical area where the Oba could be very central in democratic
consolidation and sustainability. This is due to the fact that conflict
is part and parcel of human coexistence but peaceful resolution of
conflict is one of the hallmarks of democracy and development.
If we adopt the traditional methods of conflict resolution as alternative to the modern judiciary, it would go a long way in improving our current justice system which has not only been over-stretched but also grossly abused. The position here is that the Oba at the centre of traditional justice system could achieve rapid peaceful resolution of inter-personal and communal disputes which have become clog on the wheel of our progress and development.
The Obas have been doing this at the local level but this need to be backed and strengthened by formal governmental authority and recognitions. Apart from the advisory role given to the traditional institutions in the current democratic dispensation, Obas should be seen as the coordinator of general community development as he has natural capability to successfully act as adjudicator, mediator, intercessor and facilitator of community projects and programmes.
If we adopt the traditional methods of conflict resolution as alternative to the modern judiciary, it would go a long way in improving our current justice system which has not only been over-stretched but also grossly abused. The position here is that the Oba at the centre of traditional justice system could achieve rapid peaceful resolution of inter-personal and communal disputes which have become clog on the wheel of our progress and development.
The Obas have been doing this at the local level but this need to be backed and strengthened by formal governmental authority and recognitions. Apart from the advisory role given to the traditional institutions in the current democratic dispensation, Obas should be seen as the coordinator of general community development as he has natural capability to successfully act as adjudicator, mediator, intercessor and facilitator of community projects and programmes.
Obas plays a distinctive
role as the ultimate source of supernatural power and authority that sanction and reinforce public morality. It is pressed into full service to maintain social order, peace and harmony.
role as the ultimate source of supernatural power and authority that sanction and reinforce public morality. It is pressed into full service to maintain social order, peace and harmony.
African
traditions believe that success in life; including the gift of
off-spring, wealth and prosperity, are all blessings from the gods and
ancestors. They accrue to people who work hard, and who strictly adhere
to the customs, and traditional norms of morality of the community,
people who strictly uphold the community ideal of harmonious living.
Only such people could entertain a real hope of achieving the highly
esteemed status of ancestor-hood in the hereafter. The vast majority of
norms, taboos and prohibitions is directed towards protecting the
community and promoting peace and harmony. Communal farmland, economic
interests like the market-place, stream, or shrine are generally
surrounded with taboos, including who may or may not enter, and when and
under what circumstances people are permitted or not to enter such
places’’.i
In other words, traditional rulers have been
grossly under-utilized given the enormous potentials inherent in their
offices, positions and influence. Therefore, they should be accorded a
pride of place in our development strategies so that we can fully tap
their enormous natural potentials and powers. Obas must be seen as the
symbols of the people’s past, custodian of their history and past,
upholder and preserver of their culture, customs, an epitome of cultural
norms and values of the society such as truth, discipline, courage and
responsibility.
Obas must show a sympathetic understanding for the traditions, customs and religion of the people. Without sounding fetish or anti-Christ, the Oba must not only be knowledgeable in the history and customs of his people but he must also be sympathetic to the traditional religions, festivals and rites of his kingdom. This is to ensure that he continues to enjoy the respect, obedience and reverence from his people because his authority and power actually come from the traditions of the people.
Unfortunately, over the years, some traditional rulers have shown total disregard to traditions and customs of their people by engaging in a host of other heinous acts. How do we fathom an Oba who drinks alcohol publicly, an Oba cursing his citizens; an Oba who abuses wearing of crown, and Oba who desecrates culture and traditions?.
Obas must show a sympathetic understanding for the traditions, customs and religion of the people. Without sounding fetish or anti-Christ, the Oba must not only be knowledgeable in the history and customs of his people but he must also be sympathetic to the traditional religions, festivals and rites of his kingdom. This is to ensure that he continues to enjoy the respect, obedience and reverence from his people because his authority and power actually come from the traditions of the people.
Unfortunately, over the years, some traditional rulers have shown total disregard to traditions and customs of their people by engaging in a host of other heinous acts. How do we fathom an Oba who drinks alcohol publicly, an Oba cursing his citizens; an Oba who abuses wearing of crown, and Oba who desecrates culture and traditions?.
ON NATIONAL SECURITY
The police must employ native intelligence services in a bid to effectively tackle critical security challenges confronting the country. Security of any country is critical for development, economic prosperity and democratic principles to thrive adding that the critical issue is the way a country deploys its strategic security responses to protect the citizens. Nigeria is not the only country facing security challenges today. The fundamental thing is how you deal with these challenges. We can sustain national security operations or options by using native intelligence gathering as a response to national security threat.
The Old Oyo Empire lasted 600years because of effective native internal security. It is important for government to take holistic view on information gathering as a system for addressing insecurity. It must take into consideration the need to harmonise the roles of law enforcement and security agencies and the need to deploy technologies required for identification of criminal suspect. Three quarter of the universe is in a state of unrest due to lack of effective internal security...
The police must employ native intelligence services in a bid to effectively tackle critical security challenges confronting the country. Security of any country is critical for development, economic prosperity and democratic principles to thrive adding that the critical issue is the way a country deploys its strategic security responses to protect the citizens. Nigeria is not the only country facing security challenges today. The fundamental thing is how you deal with these challenges. We can sustain national security operations or options by using native intelligence gathering as a response to national security threat.
The Old Oyo Empire lasted 600years because of effective native internal security. It is important for government to take holistic view on information gathering as a system for addressing insecurity. It must take into consideration the need to harmonise the roles of law enforcement and security agencies and the need to deploy technologies required for identification of criminal suspect. Three quarter of the universe is in a state of unrest due to lack of effective internal security...
However,
we must commend service Chiefs, the Inspector General of Police,
State Commissioners of Police for their un-relentless commitment in
combating crimes and criminal activities.
In Our
metropolis for instance, criminal activities in Oyo town and its
environs such as stealing, burglary and kidnapping have been
drastically reduced due to concerted efforts of the officers and men.
My people have not been reporting about any untoward acts by the police. The officers and men are indeed responsible, dutiful and diligent to their duties.
My people have not been reporting about any untoward acts by the police. The officers and men are indeed responsible, dutiful and diligent to their duties.
ON ECONOMY
The youths are often called the potential leaders of the nation hence their role in building a sustainable economic development is essential by integrating them into the national policies and decision making. They need an active involvement in participating with the current political and economic leaders to foster inter-generational dialogue hereby enhancing adequate transitional shift. They should equally be actively involved in the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) agenda. This is because they constitute the major resource base for any country that want to embark on any meaningful development project. Young people must be trained and as quickly as possible, to provide leadership in Agriculture, Industry, Government and Economic Development Projects. They must be developed intellectually, morally, socially and with relevant skills to face a rapidly advancing technological world.
Nigeria has a youthful population of close to 70 to 80 million, which is about 55 to 60 per cent of her population. Of this youthful population, more than 80 per cent are unemployed while about ten per cent are under-employed. The estimated 10 per cent in employment are burdened and depressed with near total dependence of relative and family members. Given the right combination of motivation, knowledge, ideas and opportunities, Corps members are more than able to establish productive and creative businesses. Engaging in entrepreneurship will lift you from being “job seekers” to “job creators,” and also from social dependence to self sufficiency. With self-employment, you can also contribute to the upkeep of your families. Entrepreneurship in Nigeria is a major avenue to increasing the rate of economic growth, create job opportunities, reduce import of manufactured goods and decrease the trade deficits that result from such imports. The influx and encouragement of youths into ventures will definitely help salvage our wasting economy.
There is therefore need for both the Federal and State Governments to place values on education and skills acquisition as the only way out of present economic doldrums. Youths need to develop an acute appetite for learning and knowledge without which civillisation crumbles. Nigerian youths need to hunger for relevant facts and skills, thereby seeking solutions to the challenges facing us through enhanced mental capacity. This is the foundation to any true renaissance.
ON POLITICS
Unless political parties brace up and refocus their operational modes, there may not be end to brazen impunity, monumental corruption, alarming poverty as well as unemployment rates characterized by irresponsible leadership in the country.For political parties to live up to their responsibilities and be reckoned with as responsible, certain rules must be enforced to aid pragmatic governance. Political parties should be able to organize debates for both the incumbents and new aspirants, in order to ensure that credible and dedicated candidates who are really determined to serve the people are given the mandate. With such steps, if adhered to by political parties will prevent most aspirants who have no clear-cut and result oriented programme of actions for the people, but only with the ulterior intention of treasury looting and amass of ill-gotten wealth to the detriment of the teeming impoverished populace. In the 21st century, the country needs personalities with high cerebral to phantom the much desired development for the well being of all and sundry.
Common indices of the well-being of the society should include peace, the existence of rule of law, socio-economic progress and the safety and comfort of the citizenry. Unfortunately these ideals have not been achieved in the country because of the tendency of those in positions of authority seeking their personal well-being first and sometimes try to do this at the expense of the down-trodden people. They place themselves in advantageous positions by subverting the commonly accepted rules of conduct and goal attainment.
ON EDUCATION
There
is great imminent danger in producing generation of young citizens in
educational institutions, who possess little or no appreciation of the
past, as a people, and as a nation. Society, through leadership in
public service, must begin to de-emphasize rewards for corruption and
ill- gotten wealth, but rather put emphasis on hard work, innovation,
Productivity and humanitarians. These are features of the values of
which are part of the culture of America and Japan, leaders of the west
and East. They are basic waits which brings out the beauty of the human
spirit to solve complex social, political and economic problems. A right
thinking person should be worried about the prevailing corrosive moral
turpitude that has become the daily diet in the nation’s political life,
in consistencies in policy formulation and implementation in the
education sector, and palpable, unambiguous hunger for education among
the terming youth population. The wave of poverty and unemployment has
made nonsense of young peoples’ determination to honestly pursue
excellence.
The Country must have a culture that is pro- life, in which a change in orientation and social values from materialism and acquisition of stupendous wealth, for the purpose of oppressing the less- privileged, to a more human social order, where every human life is valued as sacred and inviolable, must take place. The value placed on human life will inform policy makers in government to realize that there is a higher purpose to their calling as public officials. We must realize the formulating and implementing policies which will serve to benefit only the children of the wealthy, stifle intellectual curiosity in academic institutions, frustrate teaching professionals and parents and make our best brain find greater comfort in overseas schools (or local cult groups) will not serve the interest of our country. Government must consciously bring education to the reach of all its citizens, through increased subsidized funding of indigent groups, and viable public- private partnerships in research and development ventures. The employment of private financing options in critical areas of innovation and infrastructural development, which polytechnics and other vocational centres can very well contribute.
There is need for encouragement of private enterprises to make endowments to particular field in colleges and universities especially in agriculture, financial and petroleum fields. This will further ensure that these fields continue to attract, train and retrain expertise within the educational system rather than losing bright stars emphasis, to the industrial sector. The continued liberalization of the tertiary education sector, if not controlled, will only result in a faster rate of producing “university graduates” with low quality, due massive strain on teachers and teaching facilities. In this regard, the historian submitted that the curriculum at the secondary level and vocational schools need to be more industry- focused, with greater emphases on practical skills. This will ensure, over time that we gradually progress towards the build- up of a critical mass of highly skilled technical manpower for use by the industrial and manufacturing sectors. The creeping denial of a good measure of university autonomy is unacceptable. The policy of uniformity by any method enforced can only breed mediocrity.
The Country must have a culture that is pro- life, in which a change in orientation and social values from materialism and acquisition of stupendous wealth, for the purpose of oppressing the less- privileged, to a more human social order, where every human life is valued as sacred and inviolable, must take place. The value placed on human life will inform policy makers in government to realize that there is a higher purpose to their calling as public officials. We must realize the formulating and implementing policies which will serve to benefit only the children of the wealthy, stifle intellectual curiosity in academic institutions, frustrate teaching professionals and parents and make our best brain find greater comfort in overseas schools (or local cult groups) will not serve the interest of our country. Government must consciously bring education to the reach of all its citizens, through increased subsidized funding of indigent groups, and viable public- private partnerships in research and development ventures. The employment of private financing options in critical areas of innovation and infrastructural development, which polytechnics and other vocational centres can very well contribute.
There is need for encouragement of private enterprises to make endowments to particular field in colleges and universities especially in agriculture, financial and petroleum fields. This will further ensure that these fields continue to attract, train and retrain expertise within the educational system rather than losing bright stars emphasis, to the industrial sector. The continued liberalization of the tertiary education sector, if not controlled, will only result in a faster rate of producing “university graduates” with low quality, due massive strain on teachers and teaching facilities. In this regard, the historian submitted that the curriculum at the secondary level and vocational schools need to be more industry- focused, with greater emphases on practical skills. This will ensure, over time that we gradually progress towards the build- up of a critical mass of highly skilled technical manpower for use by the industrial and manufacturing sectors. The creeping denial of a good measure of university autonomy is unacceptable. The policy of uniformity by any method enforced can only breed mediocrity.
ON WOMEN AND RURAL POVERTY
Widespread
and persistent hunger and poverty are fundamental contradictions in
today's world. On the basis of the "one-dollar-a-day threshold",
findings revealed that there are 1.2 billion poor people in developing
countries. Of these, 780 million suffer from chronic hunger, which means
that their daily intake of calories is insufficient for them to live
active and healthy lives. Nigeria as a nation is a country of 140
million citizens. Also, statistics from the Food and Agricultural
Organisation [FAO] showed that with the existence of over 780 million
chronically hungry people in the developing world today, there is
something fundamentally wrong in the distribution of food and the
resources with which to access it.
The concept of development stands not only on the quantitative value of growth but also on the qualitative factors of livelihood, which is the fulfillment of basic human necessities i.e. provision of basic infrastructure, shelter, food, health, education and safe water. These are big challenges for the governments of developing countries. In developing countries, national development requires a major re-ordering of human society. The economy of any nation is as important as the lives of individuals within the nation. To ensure this quality therefore, there is urgent need to keep the economy buoyant at all times. This to say the least is responsibility of all citizens – male and female, young and old. Poverty alleviation is a microcosmic strand out of the many divergent means of achieving national development. According to former Secretary-General of the United Nations, Boutrous Ghalli, for maximum use of human capital, all human resources should be fully utilized for maximum output. He said development has to do with improvement of human well – being, removal of hunger, disease and ignorance, and productive employment for all. Its goal must be to end poverty and satisfy the priority needs of all people in a way that can be productively sustained over future generations.
Poverty is on the increase, as over 30 percent of the populace live in poverty. These reports, by the United Nations Development Programme [UNDP] identify women and children as groups that are most vulnerable. Most of the poor in Nigeria are women who as a result of poor educational opportunity and the responsibilities of matrimonial homes have to fight to survive. Many of such women engage in inferior economic enterprises that are sole entrepreneurial activities with a very low financial base. This situation is what the World Development Report defined as poverty “the inability to attain a minimum standard of living. The National Population Commission (NPC) puts the population of women in Nigeria at 68.3 million and the female population are contributing 70 percent of labour force in agriculture. It was no surprise therefore that the present administration under President Muhammadu Buhari, and the ruling party, All Progressives Congress [APC] identified alleviation as a major prerequisite to national resuscitation.
The need to address poverty, equity and gender arises from the fact that both men and women are both integral parts of national and economic development policies and programs. It is realized that improvement in the quality of life of the people as productive agents must be the central objective of development policies for economic development. Improvements in human development directly affect an economy positively. The development of a nation is based on both the human capital as well as physical capital of that nation.
Focus on human resources development is one of the fastest and most effective means of alleviating poverty and achieving national rebirth in the country. This would be better done through an emancipation and empowerment of the female gender. The present administration is doing its best to revamp the economy and is committed determined to improve sociology economic lives of the teeming impoverished citizens. We must laud their unalloyed efforts.
The concept of development stands not only on the quantitative value of growth but also on the qualitative factors of livelihood, which is the fulfillment of basic human necessities i.e. provision of basic infrastructure, shelter, food, health, education and safe water. These are big challenges for the governments of developing countries. In developing countries, national development requires a major re-ordering of human society. The economy of any nation is as important as the lives of individuals within the nation. To ensure this quality therefore, there is urgent need to keep the economy buoyant at all times. This to say the least is responsibility of all citizens – male and female, young and old. Poverty alleviation is a microcosmic strand out of the many divergent means of achieving national development. According to former Secretary-General of the United Nations, Boutrous Ghalli, for maximum use of human capital, all human resources should be fully utilized for maximum output. He said development has to do with improvement of human well – being, removal of hunger, disease and ignorance, and productive employment for all. Its goal must be to end poverty and satisfy the priority needs of all people in a way that can be productively sustained over future generations.
Poverty is on the increase, as over 30 percent of the populace live in poverty. These reports, by the United Nations Development Programme [UNDP] identify women and children as groups that are most vulnerable. Most of the poor in Nigeria are women who as a result of poor educational opportunity and the responsibilities of matrimonial homes have to fight to survive. Many of such women engage in inferior economic enterprises that are sole entrepreneurial activities with a very low financial base. This situation is what the World Development Report defined as poverty “the inability to attain a minimum standard of living. The National Population Commission (NPC) puts the population of women in Nigeria at 68.3 million and the female population are contributing 70 percent of labour force in agriculture. It was no surprise therefore that the present administration under President Muhammadu Buhari, and the ruling party, All Progressives Congress [APC] identified alleviation as a major prerequisite to national resuscitation.
The need to address poverty, equity and gender arises from the fact that both men and women are both integral parts of national and economic development policies and programs. It is realized that improvement in the quality of life of the people as productive agents must be the central objective of development policies for economic development. Improvements in human development directly affect an economy positively. The development of a nation is based on both the human capital as well as physical capital of that nation.
Focus on human resources development is one of the fastest and most effective means of alleviating poverty and achieving national rebirth in the country. This would be better done through an emancipation and empowerment of the female gender. The present administration is doing its best to revamp the economy and is committed determined to improve sociology economic lives of the teeming impoverished citizens. We must laud their unalloyed efforts.
However, both Federal and
State Governments must focus on human resources development as one of
the fastest and most effective means of alleviating poverty and
achieving national rebirth in the country. Hunger and poverty will
remain at unacceptable levels unless purposeful action is taken to give
them higher policy priority, mobilise resources to fight them directly,
as well as towards agriculture and rural development. Placing the
Millienium Development Goals [MDGs] at the centre of financing for
Development is a step in the right direction.
ON CULTURE AND TRADITIONS
I
am disturbed at the gradual extinction of Yoruba Customs and
traditions, and how modernisation has been allowed to bombard Yoruba
traditions. As things move at the present time, it will be disastrous if
we fold our arms allowing our traditions to dwindle into oblivion in
the face of permissiveness.
How many Yoruba sons and daughters can brilliantly articulate their local language? It is frightening that our own language is dangling on the pit of extinction while preference is accorded foreign language, which is English. Languages often hold the only record of a people’s history, including their songs, stories, praise poetry and ancient traditions. In particular, many indigenous cultures contain a wealth of information about the local environment and its floral and faunal resources, based upon thousands of years of close interaction, experience, and problem-solving. With the extinction of a language, therefore, mankind also loses access to local understanding of plants, animals, and ecosystems, some of which have important medicinal value, and many of which remain undocumented by science.
Thus, the survival of threatened languages, and the indigenous knowledge contained within, is an important aspect of maintaining biological diversity. Languages are now becoming extinct faster than birds, mammals, fish or plants. Of the estimated 7,000 unique languages spoken in the world today, nearly half are likely to disappear this century, with an average of one lost every two weeks. It is most likely that in less than 50 years from now, even some major Nigerian languages, if not encouraged, can become extinct, and lecturers in our Universities would have cause to excite their students with great lectures in a course on, say, ‘ancient’ Igbo or “ancient” Yoruba languages, and of which they would speak thus, with nostalgia, ‘They once flourished in the distant past but have now become extinct’. This is a disheartening possibility for anyone who cares about our indigenous languages, the history and unrecorded knowledge they carry within them.
African traditional religion clearly plays a distinctive role as the ultimate source of supernatural power and authority that sanction and reinforce public morality. It is pressed into full service to maintain social order, peace and harmony. Traditional Africans believe that success in life; including the gift of off-spring, wealth and prosperity, are all blessings from the gods and ancestors. They accrue to people who work hard, and who strictly adhere to the customs, and traditional norms of morality of the community, people who strictly uphold the community ideal of harmonious living. Only such people could entertain a real hope of achieving the highly esteemed status of ancestor-hood in the hereafter. The vast majority of norms, taboos and prohibitions is directed towards protecting the community and promoting peace and harmony. Communal farmland, economic interests like the market-place, stream, or shrine are generally surrounded with taboos, including who may or may not enter, and when and under what circumstances people are permitted or not to enter such places.
Stealing is abhorred. It is in fact, an abomination to steal things relating to people’s vital
life-interests and occupation. Religion may be distinct and separate from
morality, as many scholars have rightly argued. For traditional Africans, however, the line dividing the two is very thin indeed. African traditional religion plays a crucial role in the ethical dynamics of the different groups. In the traditional African background, ‘gods serve as police men’. African traditional world-views invariably outline a vision of reality that is, at once ethical in content and orientation. Human beings and their world are the focal centre of a highly integrated universe. Human conduct is seen as key in upholding the delicate balance believed to exist between the visible world and the invisible one.
What is more, as Africa continues to re-write its history and stride into the Millennium, there is urgent need for leaders in the continent to begin a systematic documentation of what they have in the name of cultural property. These should include objects made by our forefathers, the monuments of the land and things created by us today that would become of historic importance tomorrow. Africa is opening up herself to the world in a way that she had never done in the past. We are no longer ‘’the Dark Continent’’ and Africans are no longer ‘’the primitives’’ the civilizations that ounce flourished in Africa have become the issue in
the Art world today. The head-count of our cultural property should be properly and fully documented. in this regard, our museums have the primary responsibility to ensure that such National Registers are created. These great cultural materials across Africa put together today, belong to Africa and to humanity collectively.
While we cannot deny the advantages of rapid expansion in our modern world, such progress on the other hand imperils the irreplaceable heritage of nature and culture, essential to the equilibrium and happiness of mankind. This, in turn, leads to a situation where cultures vanish with the disappearance of the economic and social systems which brought them into being. Even human groups, the victims of thoughtless and too sudden evolution, perish, and for the human sciences such as history of art, archaeology, and anthropology, loss ensues, as well as frustration and misery for mankind if all the objects and places of historic importance are not appropriately recorded and documented.
How many Yoruba sons and daughters can brilliantly articulate their local language? It is frightening that our own language is dangling on the pit of extinction while preference is accorded foreign language, which is English. Languages often hold the only record of a people’s history, including their songs, stories, praise poetry and ancient traditions. In particular, many indigenous cultures contain a wealth of information about the local environment and its floral and faunal resources, based upon thousands of years of close interaction, experience, and problem-solving. With the extinction of a language, therefore, mankind also loses access to local understanding of plants, animals, and ecosystems, some of which have important medicinal value, and many of which remain undocumented by science.
Thus, the survival of threatened languages, and the indigenous knowledge contained within, is an important aspect of maintaining biological diversity. Languages are now becoming extinct faster than birds, mammals, fish or plants. Of the estimated 7,000 unique languages spoken in the world today, nearly half are likely to disappear this century, with an average of one lost every two weeks. It is most likely that in less than 50 years from now, even some major Nigerian languages, if not encouraged, can become extinct, and lecturers in our Universities would have cause to excite their students with great lectures in a course on, say, ‘ancient’ Igbo or “ancient” Yoruba languages, and of which they would speak thus, with nostalgia, ‘They once flourished in the distant past but have now become extinct’. This is a disheartening possibility for anyone who cares about our indigenous languages, the history and unrecorded knowledge they carry within them.
African traditional religion clearly plays a distinctive role as the ultimate source of supernatural power and authority that sanction and reinforce public morality. It is pressed into full service to maintain social order, peace and harmony. Traditional Africans believe that success in life; including the gift of off-spring, wealth and prosperity, are all blessings from the gods and ancestors. They accrue to people who work hard, and who strictly adhere to the customs, and traditional norms of morality of the community, people who strictly uphold the community ideal of harmonious living. Only such people could entertain a real hope of achieving the highly esteemed status of ancestor-hood in the hereafter. The vast majority of norms, taboos and prohibitions is directed towards protecting the community and promoting peace and harmony. Communal farmland, economic interests like the market-place, stream, or shrine are generally surrounded with taboos, including who may or may not enter, and when and under what circumstances people are permitted or not to enter such places.
Stealing is abhorred. It is in fact, an abomination to steal things relating to people’s vital
life-interests and occupation. Religion may be distinct and separate from
morality, as many scholars have rightly argued. For traditional Africans, however, the line dividing the two is very thin indeed. African traditional religion plays a crucial role in the ethical dynamics of the different groups. In the traditional African background, ‘gods serve as police men’. African traditional world-views invariably outline a vision of reality that is, at once ethical in content and orientation. Human beings and their world are the focal centre of a highly integrated universe. Human conduct is seen as key in upholding the delicate balance believed to exist between the visible world and the invisible one.
What is more, as Africa continues to re-write its history and stride into the Millennium, there is urgent need for leaders in the continent to begin a systematic documentation of what they have in the name of cultural property. These should include objects made by our forefathers, the monuments of the land and things created by us today that would become of historic importance tomorrow. Africa is opening up herself to the world in a way that she had never done in the past. We are no longer ‘’the Dark Continent’’ and Africans are no longer ‘’the primitives’’ the civilizations that ounce flourished in Africa have become the issue in
the Art world today. The head-count of our cultural property should be properly and fully documented. in this regard, our museums have the primary responsibility to ensure that such National Registers are created. These great cultural materials across Africa put together today, belong to Africa and to humanity collectively.
While we cannot deny the advantages of rapid expansion in our modern world, such progress on the other hand imperils the irreplaceable heritage of nature and culture, essential to the equilibrium and happiness of mankind. This, in turn, leads to a situation where cultures vanish with the disappearance of the economic and social systems which brought them into being. Even human groups, the victims of thoughtless and too sudden evolution, perish, and for the human sciences such as history of art, archaeology, and anthropology, loss ensues, as well as frustration and misery for mankind if all the objects and places of historic importance are not appropriately recorded and documented.
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