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A Professor of Sociology, Department of Anthropology, Sociology and Reconciliation Studies, Bethel University, Minnesota, United States of America (USA) Samuel Zalanga, has identified moral and ethical failure as the real challenge facing Nigeria and Africa, noting that the failure in Africa was part of a broader degeneration in morality and ethics.
Zalanga, who delivered a distinguished Alumni Lecture to the Faculty of Social Sciences of the University of Jos, argued that the said failure was worse in Africa because it has taken place where old institutions have been destroyed while the new but effective ones have not developed to substitute them.
He said, “The Fragile Dignity of Humanity and the disappearance of human: Neo-liberalism and the suspension of the ethical in the struggle for national development.
“The most scaring thing about this moral and ethical failure and hopelessness in the Nigerian context is that many people trust in religion as the solution or panacea of the nation’s or continent’s problems. Yet, from the perspective of a careful observer, empirical evidence about the role of religion in contributing to nation-building, national and human development in the past 50 years is a terrible failure as measured by the claims of the religions.”
He argued further that if what is happening to poverty, inequality and unemployment is worsening, no matter the economic growth in the country, number of new cell phones, new millionaires or new buildings in the country, that country is not developing but declining.
Zalanga therefore submitted that Nigeria needed a liberation theology movement that could use religion to contribute meaningfully to the struggle for a more just society and human dignity for all, adding that there was need to go beyond blaming the Western world for all African’s problems. Africans, nay Nigerians, must hold themselves accountable wherever necessary.
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