MORAL CONCIOUSNESS: A SINE QUA NON FOR DEVELOPMENT AND CIVIL RULERSHIP IN NIGERIA.
BY REV. ANDREW O. ONAZI, CSsR.
BY REV. ANDREW O. ONAZI, CSsR.
INTRODUCTION
Nigeria a giant Africa never had. It is a truism that every nation has within itself the potential seeds of both glorious rise and degrading downfall. These two extreme polarities are ever in a constant dialectical conflict, where each one vies for predominance over the other. In between this dialectical conflict are the people who constitute the society. And in the choice they make lies their destiny.
Nigeria as nation is richly blessed by God, both naturally and humanly. Given its blessedness, Nigeria is supposed to be a country that should ranked among the greatest in the world. But our political history since independence could be liken to the story of a strong, wealthy and extravagant giant who suddenly become crippled, impoverished and beggarly at the peak of his fame. Nigeria has been floating in the air like an aircraft whose pilot has been mystified by a deep fog. Ours is the story of a Nation in a crisis of development.
Moral conscience is the source for moral behavior and thus it is essentially the repository of timeless truths and principles-the internal or natural law. As such, moral conscience forms the basis of every true human society and human value. It then becomes necessary to say that any sane human society that is aspiring for the good of all its citizenry cannot do without it. Hence, morality is the bed-rock or rather the foundation upon which a true development and good rulership could be found or built. Reasoning along this same line of thought, one cannot but say that until Nigerians and their leaders recognize this fundamental there can be no reasonable or true development or rulership in the country.
The issue of morality in general arose giving the fact that man can choose freely, we can be ourselves and so are responsible for what we make of ourselves. But this ability to choose freely would amount to nothing, however, if we could not know which choices, among the multitude of choices that present themselves to us daily, are good ones. But we can; judgments distinguishing good choices from bad ones are called conscience. As an essential prerequisite of moral good and evil, conscience is a basic existential principle, just as free choice is.
Man is a moral being. Through his natural reason, he is able to discover a natural law which directs him to do good and avoid evil. Such a law should guide his conduct and behavior in his relationship with others. It is this norm of behavior that bound people living together in a giving society. When a person follows this natural inclination towards good conduct, he is able to cultivate a healthy relationship with others. Morality, therefore, deals with this type of relationship. It has to do with those ethical principles that safeguard the right of the individual in the society and points out to him his reciprocal duties and responsibilities. From the philosophical point of view morality has to do with the nature of moral obligations and it analyses or describes the values, obligations, finality, freedom, good conscience of moral actions of the individual within any given society. While from the point of view of religion, morality has to do with the way we ought to live in relation to one another and the deity.[1] And this moral life is fundamentally guided by human response in love to the principles operative in religion.
Etymologically, development is understood as expansion by a process of growth or growths or differentiation of some entity along lines natural to its kind. This idea of development refers to the movement or progress made from a less developed stage to a more developed stage. The 19th century evolutionists adopted this understanding of development and applied it to their theories. The theory holds that organisms, individuals, races, and even societies were intrinsically bound to improve themselves, that changes were progressive, and so on. Borrowing a leave from here, the post Enlightenment thinkers such as Auguste Comte and Immanuel Kant, argued that human society progresses from less developed stages to more developed stages. Although when Hegel developed his theory of development latter, he denied that Africa and Africans partook in development. He said Africa had not entered the path of human history and as such had no place in the developmental path of the world. It is very easy to wave this assertion of Hegel aside as a racist sentimentality, the crucial point remains, till date, so much is being said about Africa’s developmental paralysis in contrast to the enormous developmental strides being experienced in most part of the world.[2]
The term ‘development’ is a multidimensional concept. It can be viewed in various ways ranging from qualitative, moral, social, spiritual, economic and so on. Thus, it becomes imperative when discussing the concept that the context at which is being discussed be clearly defined or stated. As such in this write up, we shall be looking at development from economic and socio-political perspective as it bears on morality in Nigeria.
Nigeria a giant Africa never had. It is a truism that every nation has within itself the potential seeds of both glorious rise and degrading downfall. These two extreme polarities are ever in a constant dialectical conflict, where each one vies for predominance over the other. In between this dialectical conflict are the people who constitute the society. And in the choice they make lies their destiny.
Nigeria as nation is richly blessed by God, both naturally and humanly. Given its blessedness, Nigeria is supposed to be a country that should ranked among the greatest in the world. But our political history since independence could be liken to the story of a strong, wealthy and extravagant giant who suddenly become crippled, impoverished and beggarly at the peak of his fame. Nigeria has been floating in the air like an aircraft whose pilot has been mystified by a deep fog. Ours is the story of a Nation in a crisis of development.
Moral conscience is the source for moral behavior and thus it is essentially the repository of timeless truths and principles-the internal or natural law. As such, moral conscience forms the basis of every true human society and human value. It then becomes necessary to say that any sane human society that is aspiring for the good of all its citizenry cannot do without it. Hence, morality is the bed-rock or rather the foundation upon which a true development and good rulership could be found or built. Reasoning along this same line of thought, one cannot but say that until Nigerians and their leaders recognize this fundamental there can be no reasonable or true development or rulership in the country.
The issue of morality in general arose giving the fact that man can choose freely, we can be ourselves and so are responsible for what we make of ourselves. But this ability to choose freely would amount to nothing, however, if we could not know which choices, among the multitude of choices that present themselves to us daily, are good ones. But we can; judgments distinguishing good choices from bad ones are called conscience. As an essential prerequisite of moral good and evil, conscience is a basic existential principle, just as free choice is.
Man is a moral being. Through his natural reason, he is able to discover a natural law which directs him to do good and avoid evil. Such a law should guide his conduct and behavior in his relationship with others. It is this norm of behavior that bound people living together in a giving society. When a person follows this natural inclination towards good conduct, he is able to cultivate a healthy relationship with others. Morality, therefore, deals with this type of relationship. It has to do with those ethical principles that safeguard the right of the individual in the society and points out to him his reciprocal duties and responsibilities. From the philosophical point of view morality has to do with the nature of moral obligations and it analyses or describes the values, obligations, finality, freedom, good conscience of moral actions of the individual within any given society. While from the point of view of religion, morality has to do with the way we ought to live in relation to one another and the deity.[1] And this moral life is fundamentally guided by human response in love to the principles operative in religion.
Etymologically, development is understood as expansion by a process of growth or growths or differentiation of some entity along lines natural to its kind. This idea of development refers to the movement or progress made from a less developed stage to a more developed stage. The 19th century evolutionists adopted this understanding of development and applied it to their theories. The theory holds that organisms, individuals, races, and even societies were intrinsically bound to improve themselves, that changes were progressive, and so on. Borrowing a leave from here, the post Enlightenment thinkers such as Auguste Comte and Immanuel Kant, argued that human society progresses from less developed stages to more developed stages. Although when Hegel developed his theory of development latter, he denied that Africa and Africans partook in development. He said Africa had not entered the path of human history and as such had no place in the developmental path of the world. It is very easy to wave this assertion of Hegel aside as a racist sentimentality, the crucial point remains, till date, so much is being said about Africa’s developmental paralysis in contrast to the enormous developmental strides being experienced in most part of the world.[2]
The term ‘development’ is a multidimensional concept. It can be viewed in various ways ranging from qualitative, moral, social, spiritual, economic and so on. Thus, it becomes imperative when discussing the concept that the context at which is being discussed be clearly defined or stated. As such in this write up, we shall be looking at development from economic and socio-political perspective as it bears on morality in Nigeria.
THE CRISIS OF DEVELOPMENT IN NIGERIA
Life in Nigeria has become one long stretch piece of monotonous repetition of failure and uncertainties. Nigeria seems rooted in one spot and has over the years been revolving around the same axis. There have been successions of governments but the routine continuous. Even those things that seem to have the appearance of motion eventually careers towards a dead end. All the countries infrastructures inherited from both the colonial masters and the first generation indigenous government are dilapidating and no new ones are been erected to replace them. Some of these structures have either become a monument or artifact to show the once upon a time in this country when our people dreamt dreams of greatness. Fr. John Okwoeze Odey describes the political history of Nigeria as an undulating landscape of brave ambitions and cataclysmic failure; a chronicle of the enduring struggle between a nation’s lofty dreams and its harsh, unyielding realities; the heart-breaking saga of a people whose material trajectory has made the full circle from privation to affluence and then again privation.[3]
Thematically, over the last eight years, the same issues have been constant in the country’s socio-political and economic history. This did not only buttress the fact of our moving around the same point but also made it possible to predict where the country could be heading next at each point in time. In the course of the year we may have to pass through the same routine. In each of these years the government would announce a sharp increase in the price of petroleum products and the organized labor congress would mobilize and go on strike and the government would pretentiously offer to go into dialogue with them and at the end it would revert to the original price it had in mind. And after a gap of some months break, then ASUU would also go on strike protesting the poor state of facilities in the country’s universities and the quality of education in our higher institution of learning in general. The government as usual would step into dialogue with the academians with truck loads of promises. This could be followed by strike again by the organized labor congress probably demanding for the implementation of an earlier signed agreement between the body and the federal government.
For the past eight years, there have been insistence cry from the masses given the epileptic state of the power sector, the country’s refineries and the poor state of roads in the country. Within these periods the federal government had made volumes of promises and even pretentiously allotted huge sum of money to themselves in the name of these various sectors. Hence, Nigerians have been reduced to the condition of utter destitution by their leaders. The nation is in a state of political siege as a handful of irresponsible people seem to be determined to turn it into a miniature concentration camp. As such millions of Nigerians at home cannot afford to eat good meal for many days. And truly Nigeria now looks like the greatest giant that Africa never had.
What then could be responsible for all these misfortunes that have befallen us as a nation? Or is it in our star? The answer to these questions is very obvious and known to us all. It is an answer that is been chorused every where, in the street, in the media, in the churches, in the market places, in the schools etc, by both the young and aged. We all know it. It is bad leadership, a consequent of a morally deprived society. But the most amusing thing about this is that every body including even those that had one time or the other have been involved in the governing of this country also point out that the problem of this country is bad leadership. This keeps one wondering, who then is this bad leader that is responsible for the woes of this great country.
Apart from the aforementioned, our understanding of the concept of development and of leadership is faulty. We lack the understanding of what I refer to as a collective sense of development. Collective sense of development here means a development that is meant for the common good of everyone in the country as against the restrictive and individualistic development that is targeted towards ones immediate family members or to a lesser degree to one’s immediate community. This explains the reason why nothing that belongs to either the state or federal government respectively thrives. In Nigeria, leaders are not meant to serve the people but to go grab their own share of the “national cake”, the bigger of this cake one is able to grab determines the quantity of the rewards, applauds, and praises one will get from the society in the form of traditional titles and honorary degrees from various traditional rulers and universities within the country. This is the root of the high rate of corruption in the country. The effect of these is that it has left Nigerians in the grip of a grave national crisis which has left the country on the verge of total socio-political and economic paralysis.
Life in Nigeria has become one long stretch piece of monotonous repetition of failure and uncertainties. Nigeria seems rooted in one spot and has over the years been revolving around the same axis. There have been successions of governments but the routine continuous. Even those things that seem to have the appearance of motion eventually careers towards a dead end. All the countries infrastructures inherited from both the colonial masters and the first generation indigenous government are dilapidating and no new ones are been erected to replace them. Some of these structures have either become a monument or artifact to show the once upon a time in this country when our people dreamt dreams of greatness. Fr. John Okwoeze Odey describes the political history of Nigeria as an undulating landscape of brave ambitions and cataclysmic failure; a chronicle of the enduring struggle between a nation’s lofty dreams and its harsh, unyielding realities; the heart-breaking saga of a people whose material trajectory has made the full circle from privation to affluence and then again privation.[3]
Thematically, over the last eight years, the same issues have been constant in the country’s socio-political and economic history. This did not only buttress the fact of our moving around the same point but also made it possible to predict where the country could be heading next at each point in time. In the course of the year we may have to pass through the same routine. In each of these years the government would announce a sharp increase in the price of petroleum products and the organized labor congress would mobilize and go on strike and the government would pretentiously offer to go into dialogue with them and at the end it would revert to the original price it had in mind. And after a gap of some months break, then ASUU would also go on strike protesting the poor state of facilities in the country’s universities and the quality of education in our higher institution of learning in general. The government as usual would step into dialogue with the academians with truck loads of promises. This could be followed by strike again by the organized labor congress probably demanding for the implementation of an earlier signed agreement between the body and the federal government.
For the past eight years, there have been insistence cry from the masses given the epileptic state of the power sector, the country’s refineries and the poor state of roads in the country. Within these periods the federal government had made volumes of promises and even pretentiously allotted huge sum of money to themselves in the name of these various sectors. Hence, Nigerians have been reduced to the condition of utter destitution by their leaders. The nation is in a state of political siege as a handful of irresponsible people seem to be determined to turn it into a miniature concentration camp. As such millions of Nigerians at home cannot afford to eat good meal for many days. And truly Nigeria now looks like the greatest giant that Africa never had.
What then could be responsible for all these misfortunes that have befallen us as a nation? Or is it in our star? The answer to these questions is very obvious and known to us all. It is an answer that is been chorused every where, in the street, in the media, in the churches, in the market places, in the schools etc, by both the young and aged. We all know it. It is bad leadership, a consequent of a morally deprived society. But the most amusing thing about this is that every body including even those that had one time or the other have been involved in the governing of this country also point out that the problem of this country is bad leadership. This keeps one wondering, who then is this bad leader that is responsible for the woes of this great country.
Apart from the aforementioned, our understanding of the concept of development and of leadership is faulty. We lack the understanding of what I refer to as a collective sense of development. Collective sense of development here means a development that is meant for the common good of everyone in the country as against the restrictive and individualistic development that is targeted towards ones immediate family members or to a lesser degree to one’s immediate community. This explains the reason why nothing that belongs to either the state or federal government respectively thrives. In Nigeria, leaders are not meant to serve the people but to go grab their own share of the “national cake”, the bigger of this cake one is able to grab determines the quantity of the rewards, applauds, and praises one will get from the society in the form of traditional titles and honorary degrees from various traditional rulers and universities within the country. This is the root of the high rate of corruption in the country. The effect of these is that it has left Nigerians in the grip of a grave national crisis which has left the country on the verge of total socio-political and economic paralysis.
MORALITY AND DEVELOPMENT
Man is a social being. The implication of this is that no man is an Island unto himself. Man lives in community with other men. In this communal existence, man lived out his destiny. People are naturally inclined to society; they need one another to exist and be fulfilled. Among the reason for this need is the fact that every choice involves self-limitation as well as self-fulfillment. Some possibility must be set aside in order to pursue others. To realize oneself as much as possible, one must accept limitation. Only genuine community can make up for this limitation. In such a community one identifies with others by love and so is fulfilled in them in ways in which one can never be fulfilled in oneself. Man is also a rational being, which means he has cognitive capacity. It is this that differentiates man from the animals. Man has free will, which according to moral theologians is the mark of the image of the Creator in man. The bible says that man, out of all the things created by God, is created in the image and likeness of the God. According to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, God created man a rational being, conferring on him the dignity of a person who can initiate and control his own actions. Man is rational and therefore like God; he is created with free will and is master over his own acts.
Without the above mentioned qualities that define the essence of man, there is no way man could be held responsible for his acts. And as such morality would have no place in the human society. The very basis of the imputability and responsibility of man’s action is the very fact that man has freedom. Freedom is the power, rooted in reason and will, to act or not to act, to do this or that, and so to perform deliberate actions on one’s own responsibility. By free will one shapes one’s own life. Human freedom is a force for growth and maturity in truth and goodness; it attains its perfection when directed towards God, our beatitude[4], and of course one’s neighbors as well.
You might be wondering, how does all these relate to the topic of development? Again I would have to refer us to the scriptures and the Catechism of the Catholic Church. In the story of creation in the book of Genesis, we see God mandating man to till the earth and domesticate the animals, birds of the air and fish in the sea. In other words, God has from the very beginning given to man the responsibility to develop the earth. And as such it will amount to disobedience to any man that goes contrary to this injunction. And according to the Catechism of the Catholic Church freedom is exercised in relationship between human beings. This again strikes at the core of the man’s existence as a social being. What this translates into is that each person’s act should promote the common good of all in the society. And this is what development is all about, that is, the harnessing together of each person’s giftedness along with the natural resources present within a giving community for the promotion of the common good. In this sense development, for Fr. Bruno Y. Ikuli, means an improvement in living conditions for the average person. This means development entails increase in workers’ income; and, more than that, it means access to housing, education, healthcare, nutrition and greater life expectancy.
Already we have mentioned that freedom is power rooted in reason and will propelling man to act. Which means that man’s freedom comes to play in the act of choice making, and each day man faces the challenges of making choice from the multitude of opposing options that present themselves to man. And these choices are not abstract but as we see in the introduction that within the society in which man lives there exist a dialectical conflict between two extreme polarities, which we referred to as seeds or potentials present in a giving nation for either its glorious rise or degradation downfall. It is in other for man to do that which is good for him and for the common good of all that the Creator, from the very beginning, placed within man conscience; its voice, ever calling him to love and to do what is good and avoid evil.[5] Hence, it implies that if man should follow the dictate of his conscience there would be nothing like underdevelopment anywhere and every one would be self sufficient since the resources present in such a community would be properly managed and distributed accordingly to meet the basic necessity of each and every one in that society. This is more so given the fact that conscience is a judgment of reason whereby the human person recognizes the moral quality of a concrete act that is going to perform, is in the process of performing, or has already completed.[6]
Hence, poverty, in all its ramifications, and underdevelopment in which human beings are subjected to live below the standard of human dignity is an intrinsic abuse of freedom. Where the economic, social, political and cultural condition that are necessary for the exercise of this freedom is disregarded or violated there exist a disruption of neighborly fellowship, which is at the core of defining the essence of man as a social being, and a rebellion against the divine truth. Such wicked act injures the moral life that is supposed to exist in a society thereby exposing both the weak and strong in temptation. Thus, moral conscience, according to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.1777, present at the heart of the person, enjoying him at the appropriate moment to do good [development] and avoid evil [underdevelopment]. It also judges particular choices, approving those that are good and denouncing those that are evil. It bears witness to the authority of truth in reference to the supreme Good to which the human person is drawn, and it welcomes the commandments. When he listen to his conscience, the prudent rulership can hear God speaking [till the earth or develop the earth].
In a community certain persons make choices on behalf of the community as a whole, if those who do so act within the limits of their authority, their choices involve every member of the community willy-nilly. It is true that besides supporting or acquiescing in acts of communities of which they are members, individuals can resist. But such resistance to a legitimate act of community partly or wholly nullifies the individual’s existential membership in that community. Development is an act of man done in freedom, which it is an option which man freely went for, and community too, as such development and morality are inseparable. Morality urges man to act in conscience, in freedom and in knowledge for the common good of every one in the society. This act necessarily involves the development of not just the man’s physical or surrounding environment but should also take the whole of the human person into consideration.
Morality comes to bear on development giving the fact that it, first and foremost, has to do with the product of a cognitive and free choice of a human act; and secondly, development has to do with the promotion of the common good and the continuous effort on the part of man to be that being which he ought to be, which he has come to know and as such working consciously to fulfill. Again this affirms the fact that development had been divinely obligated upon man by the Creator himself. Thus morality is not just a measure of development but also it is its foundation or basis.
MORALITY AND RULERSHIP
In the preceding section we have been looking at development visa-a-vis morality. And we situated this within the essential qualities of man, rationality, freedom and will. We posited that development is not just a human necessity but also a divine injunction upon man by the Creator. This already forms the basis of the relationship between morality and development apart from being a product of human act. In this section we shall be looking at morality as it bears upon rulership. And this also has its bearing on the essence of man as a rational and social being. Man lives in relation to other men in the society. Man, as we had seen earlier on, is endowed with freedom and will. It is in order to avoid chaos that would have arose if each and every one is allowed to exercise his freedom in the society that the concept of rulership finds its meaning and relevance to man. Persons in a giving society or community gave up their rights to act on issues that pattern to the common good. Here is the limitation we mentioned above. But this individual limitation is taken up and fulfilled by the community in which the individual exists[7], in particular now by those who have the mandate to act on behalf of every one in the community.
It is very common for all to turn their eyes to our political leaders when the issue of leadership or rulership and their cohorts is raised. This is a very normal phenomenon since these constitute the very stratum of leadership whose influence is directly felt by all as the custodians of the common good. They are entrusted with the collections and distributions of wealth and resources. They are also responsible for the organization, production and distribution of such essential commodities and services as electricity, water, telecommunication, and mass media. They are meant to provide education to all, maintain our roads and other vital services; they see to the running of our health care system, ensure that our financial and social security are adequately taken care of. Hence, their decisions are valid irrespective of ethnic, religious, cultural or ideological divided. As such when things go wrong they are the ones to be held responsible since we have collectively given them our mandates to be custodians of our welfare and their responsibility is therefore enormous. The sacred mandate of the people is a bond that must not be broken.
The issue of moral consciousness has its antecedent in the fact that man is, in addition to being a rational and social being, a moral being. And as such has the capability to know what to do in order to develop his environment. Hence, it becomes more binding on the ones who have been given the mandate to make the provision for the basic necessity of life in a view to making life more and more comfortable for those who have place them in charge of their resources. Consequent upon this fact, William E. May argued that, our moral life can be described as an endeavor, cognitively, to come to know who we are and what we are to do if we are to be fully the beings we are meant to be, and cognitively, to do what we ourselves come to know we are to do if we are to be fully the beings we are meant to be. This description, of course, rests upon some presuppositions. The first is that, man has the capacity to find out who he is and who he ought to be; and secondly that, at every giving moment we are always at the becoming stage, which means we are not yet the beings we ought to be yet at any given moment, but that we are capable of becoming such. And this is what development presupposes, a continuous movement towards the attainment of that being we ought to be. Man has a dignity that sets him apart from all other created beings, and as such when he is subjected to live below this dignity due to underdevelopment then there is a gross abuse of human dignity.
The responsibility to constantly bring man to the realization of his true being is that of the rulership and his entire cohort who have been given the mandate by all in the society. And it is expected of them to make those choices that daily would bring about the common good and promote the wellbeing of all in the society. The interest of ‘the all’ and that of ‘the individuals’ in the society should be synthesized by them to bring about a harmony of interest in the society that would lead to development. This is so given the fact that development must necessary take the whole person into consideration and not just apart. It is in a bit to avoid clashes of interest that would arise in a community that is constantly caught up in the dialectical conflicts seeking for dominance that necessitated the concept of rulership in the human society. Hence, development could be seen in the face of these conflicts to be a movement from thesis to antithesis to synthesis and back again. It is this fact that William E. May tries to capture above in the words “cognitive endeavor”. Development is a cognitive endeavor in the sense that the leaders of a community have to constantly seek out the best for their community. This is not just enormous because it is a mandate given to the rulership and his cohorts by their people but that it is also a mandate given to them by the Creator of all things. No authority, says St. Paul, exist outside the will of God. As such the rulers here below are merely acting as stewards on behalf of the creator. This would require accountability on the part of the rulers on how well they managed or executed this mandate given to them both by the masses first and secondly by the Creator.
As such development is indeed a cognitive endeavor on the part of the rulership and his entire cohort. This does not remove the role or responsibilities of the other members of the community, since development is a team work. But already the buck of the work is on the rulership that has the mandate of the people to do the thinking and decision on their behalf. Here is where moral consciousness comes to play. Since moral consciousness involves the capacity to judge and know the good from the evil, the rulership is then bound to be in touch with his conscience. We have seen earlier on that development is a divine mandate upon man and as such the Creator places within man the conscience to be a guide that would enable him carry out fully this mandate. Though God does not compel man to do that which he places in his conscience since that would amount to violating his freedom, and this has been responsible in some quarters to the problem of underdevelopment that is seen in there, but a ruler who has the interest of the masses at heart would follow his conscience and the result is good rulership and development. Man cannot run away from his conscience and as such even those rulership and their cohorts who have failed to do those things that would bring about the common good know that what they are doing is wrong and against human dignity.
The systematic effort to discover who we are and what we are to do if we are to be fully the beings we are meant to be is, when carried out that resulted to what we often refer to as development and this is not devoid of the contributions of moral consciousness. This is base on the fact that development is a human act, and as such a judgment could be made as to its morality. It could be judge to be either good or bad giving the effect of it to the dignity of man and the natural law. Man is both the agent and beneficiary of development.
Man is a social being. The implication of this is that no man is an Island unto himself. Man lives in community with other men. In this communal existence, man lived out his destiny. People are naturally inclined to society; they need one another to exist and be fulfilled. Among the reason for this need is the fact that every choice involves self-limitation as well as self-fulfillment. Some possibility must be set aside in order to pursue others. To realize oneself as much as possible, one must accept limitation. Only genuine community can make up for this limitation. In such a community one identifies with others by love and so is fulfilled in them in ways in which one can never be fulfilled in oneself. Man is also a rational being, which means he has cognitive capacity. It is this that differentiates man from the animals. Man has free will, which according to moral theologians is the mark of the image of the Creator in man. The bible says that man, out of all the things created by God, is created in the image and likeness of the God. According to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, God created man a rational being, conferring on him the dignity of a person who can initiate and control his own actions. Man is rational and therefore like God; he is created with free will and is master over his own acts.
Without the above mentioned qualities that define the essence of man, there is no way man could be held responsible for his acts. And as such morality would have no place in the human society. The very basis of the imputability and responsibility of man’s action is the very fact that man has freedom. Freedom is the power, rooted in reason and will, to act or not to act, to do this or that, and so to perform deliberate actions on one’s own responsibility. By free will one shapes one’s own life. Human freedom is a force for growth and maturity in truth and goodness; it attains its perfection when directed towards God, our beatitude[4], and of course one’s neighbors as well.
You might be wondering, how does all these relate to the topic of development? Again I would have to refer us to the scriptures and the Catechism of the Catholic Church. In the story of creation in the book of Genesis, we see God mandating man to till the earth and domesticate the animals, birds of the air and fish in the sea. In other words, God has from the very beginning given to man the responsibility to develop the earth. And as such it will amount to disobedience to any man that goes contrary to this injunction. And according to the Catechism of the Catholic Church freedom is exercised in relationship between human beings. This again strikes at the core of the man’s existence as a social being. What this translates into is that each person’s act should promote the common good of all in the society. And this is what development is all about, that is, the harnessing together of each person’s giftedness along with the natural resources present within a giving community for the promotion of the common good. In this sense development, for Fr. Bruno Y. Ikuli, means an improvement in living conditions for the average person. This means development entails increase in workers’ income; and, more than that, it means access to housing, education, healthcare, nutrition and greater life expectancy.
Already we have mentioned that freedom is power rooted in reason and will propelling man to act. Which means that man’s freedom comes to play in the act of choice making, and each day man faces the challenges of making choice from the multitude of opposing options that present themselves to man. And these choices are not abstract but as we see in the introduction that within the society in which man lives there exist a dialectical conflict between two extreme polarities, which we referred to as seeds or potentials present in a giving nation for either its glorious rise or degradation downfall. It is in other for man to do that which is good for him and for the common good of all that the Creator, from the very beginning, placed within man conscience; its voice, ever calling him to love and to do what is good and avoid evil.[5] Hence, it implies that if man should follow the dictate of his conscience there would be nothing like underdevelopment anywhere and every one would be self sufficient since the resources present in such a community would be properly managed and distributed accordingly to meet the basic necessity of each and every one in that society. This is more so given the fact that conscience is a judgment of reason whereby the human person recognizes the moral quality of a concrete act that is going to perform, is in the process of performing, or has already completed.[6]
Hence, poverty, in all its ramifications, and underdevelopment in which human beings are subjected to live below the standard of human dignity is an intrinsic abuse of freedom. Where the economic, social, political and cultural condition that are necessary for the exercise of this freedom is disregarded or violated there exist a disruption of neighborly fellowship, which is at the core of defining the essence of man as a social being, and a rebellion against the divine truth. Such wicked act injures the moral life that is supposed to exist in a society thereby exposing both the weak and strong in temptation. Thus, moral conscience, according to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, no.1777, present at the heart of the person, enjoying him at the appropriate moment to do good [development] and avoid evil [underdevelopment]. It also judges particular choices, approving those that are good and denouncing those that are evil. It bears witness to the authority of truth in reference to the supreme Good to which the human person is drawn, and it welcomes the commandments. When he listen to his conscience, the prudent rulership can hear God speaking [till the earth or develop the earth].
In a community certain persons make choices on behalf of the community as a whole, if those who do so act within the limits of their authority, their choices involve every member of the community willy-nilly. It is true that besides supporting or acquiescing in acts of communities of which they are members, individuals can resist. But such resistance to a legitimate act of community partly or wholly nullifies the individual’s existential membership in that community. Development is an act of man done in freedom, which it is an option which man freely went for, and community too, as such development and morality are inseparable. Morality urges man to act in conscience, in freedom and in knowledge for the common good of every one in the society. This act necessarily involves the development of not just the man’s physical or surrounding environment but should also take the whole of the human person into consideration.
Morality comes to bear on development giving the fact that it, first and foremost, has to do with the product of a cognitive and free choice of a human act; and secondly, development has to do with the promotion of the common good and the continuous effort on the part of man to be that being which he ought to be, which he has come to know and as such working consciously to fulfill. Again this affirms the fact that development had been divinely obligated upon man by the Creator himself. Thus morality is not just a measure of development but also it is its foundation or basis.
MORALITY AND RULERSHIP
In the preceding section we have been looking at development visa-a-vis morality. And we situated this within the essential qualities of man, rationality, freedom and will. We posited that development is not just a human necessity but also a divine injunction upon man by the Creator. This already forms the basis of the relationship between morality and development apart from being a product of human act. In this section we shall be looking at morality as it bears upon rulership. And this also has its bearing on the essence of man as a rational and social being. Man lives in relation to other men in the society. Man, as we had seen earlier on, is endowed with freedom and will. It is in order to avoid chaos that would have arose if each and every one is allowed to exercise his freedom in the society that the concept of rulership finds its meaning and relevance to man. Persons in a giving society or community gave up their rights to act on issues that pattern to the common good. Here is the limitation we mentioned above. But this individual limitation is taken up and fulfilled by the community in which the individual exists[7], in particular now by those who have the mandate to act on behalf of every one in the community.
It is very common for all to turn their eyes to our political leaders when the issue of leadership or rulership and their cohorts is raised. This is a very normal phenomenon since these constitute the very stratum of leadership whose influence is directly felt by all as the custodians of the common good. They are entrusted with the collections and distributions of wealth and resources. They are also responsible for the organization, production and distribution of such essential commodities and services as electricity, water, telecommunication, and mass media. They are meant to provide education to all, maintain our roads and other vital services; they see to the running of our health care system, ensure that our financial and social security are adequately taken care of. Hence, their decisions are valid irrespective of ethnic, religious, cultural or ideological divided. As such when things go wrong they are the ones to be held responsible since we have collectively given them our mandates to be custodians of our welfare and their responsibility is therefore enormous. The sacred mandate of the people is a bond that must not be broken.
The issue of moral consciousness has its antecedent in the fact that man is, in addition to being a rational and social being, a moral being. And as such has the capability to know what to do in order to develop his environment. Hence, it becomes more binding on the ones who have been given the mandate to make the provision for the basic necessity of life in a view to making life more and more comfortable for those who have place them in charge of their resources. Consequent upon this fact, William E. May argued that, our moral life can be described as an endeavor, cognitively, to come to know who we are and what we are to do if we are to be fully the beings we are meant to be, and cognitively, to do what we ourselves come to know we are to do if we are to be fully the beings we are meant to be. This description, of course, rests upon some presuppositions. The first is that, man has the capacity to find out who he is and who he ought to be; and secondly that, at every giving moment we are always at the becoming stage, which means we are not yet the beings we ought to be yet at any given moment, but that we are capable of becoming such. And this is what development presupposes, a continuous movement towards the attainment of that being we ought to be. Man has a dignity that sets him apart from all other created beings, and as such when he is subjected to live below this dignity due to underdevelopment then there is a gross abuse of human dignity.
The responsibility to constantly bring man to the realization of his true being is that of the rulership and his entire cohort who have been given the mandate by all in the society. And it is expected of them to make those choices that daily would bring about the common good and promote the wellbeing of all in the society. The interest of ‘the all’ and that of ‘the individuals’ in the society should be synthesized by them to bring about a harmony of interest in the society that would lead to development. This is so given the fact that development must necessary take the whole person into consideration and not just apart. It is in a bit to avoid clashes of interest that would arise in a community that is constantly caught up in the dialectical conflicts seeking for dominance that necessitated the concept of rulership in the human society. Hence, development could be seen in the face of these conflicts to be a movement from thesis to antithesis to synthesis and back again. It is this fact that William E. May tries to capture above in the words “cognitive endeavor”. Development is a cognitive endeavor in the sense that the leaders of a community have to constantly seek out the best for their community. This is not just enormous because it is a mandate given to the rulership and his cohorts by their people but that it is also a mandate given to them by the Creator of all things. No authority, says St. Paul, exist outside the will of God. As such the rulers here below are merely acting as stewards on behalf of the creator. This would require accountability on the part of the rulers on how well they managed or executed this mandate given to them both by the masses first and secondly by the Creator.
As such development is indeed a cognitive endeavor on the part of the rulership and his entire cohort. This does not remove the role or responsibilities of the other members of the community, since development is a team work. But already the buck of the work is on the rulership that has the mandate of the people to do the thinking and decision on their behalf. Here is where moral consciousness comes to play. Since moral consciousness involves the capacity to judge and know the good from the evil, the rulership is then bound to be in touch with his conscience. We have seen earlier on that development is a divine mandate upon man and as such the Creator places within man the conscience to be a guide that would enable him carry out fully this mandate. Though God does not compel man to do that which he places in his conscience since that would amount to violating his freedom, and this has been responsible in some quarters to the problem of underdevelopment that is seen in there, but a ruler who has the interest of the masses at heart would follow his conscience and the result is good rulership and development. Man cannot run away from his conscience and as such even those rulership and their cohorts who have failed to do those things that would bring about the common good know that what they are doing is wrong and against human dignity.
The systematic effort to discover who we are and what we are to do if we are to be fully the beings we are meant to be is, when carried out that resulted to what we often refer to as development and this is not devoid of the contributions of moral consciousness. This is base on the fact that development is a human act, and as such a judgment could be made as to its morality. It could be judge to be either good or bad giving the effect of it to the dignity of man and the natural law. Man is both the agent and beneficiary of development.
MORAL CONCIOUSNESS, DEVELOPMENT AND CIVIL RULERSHIP IN NIGERIA
Morality is a dimension of relationship between peoples, that dimension which is expressed in terms of obligation or duty or call. The relation between situation and principles, rules, or values which has been so much debated in recent times is of immediate interest in so far it has underlined that our morality is ultimately justified as a respect for persons and not for abstractions such as rules, principles or values. In Nigeria we have some good moral principles, rules or values but only on papers and not in practice. But morality as a dimension of relationship, especially as it affects upon development and rulership, can be considered as a human phenomenon which exists in every human society and as such most be practiced according to its ideological or religious basis. In essence to talk about morality in any giving human society immediately applies to or calls to mind such ideologies as seen practice in such a society. Where there are good ideologies consequently you find morality as well. And there cannot be a meaningful development in any where in the world without good ideologies. Ideas, they say, rules the world.
The current development crisis in Nigeria is as a result of the fact that up till this moment our leaders have no concrete idea of what we want this country to be like. They lack the idea of what the nation Nigeria should be. Almost fifty years after independence we are still groping as it were in the dark not knowing where we are heading to. It is very easy for us as said earlier on to point accusing fingers to the leaders as those responsible for our woes as a nation. Yes, there is no doubt about this. But it is also important for us to realize that leaders are not born but they are made. Leaders are the product of their society. To some extent, the kind of persons at the herm of affairs of any giving society mirror the level or state of morality of that society. If a society is good there is no doubt that the leaders or the rulership would likewise be good. You cannot house a child in poultry and expect it to come out in the odor of roses. Leadership position is both systematic and complementary. That is to say we cannot adequately talk of rulership without taking into account those factors that go into the making of a ruler. For one to be either good or bad requires the input of other things and persons somewhere.
Hence, in talking about morality and the rulership in Nigeria, we have necessary to also talk about the morality of the person governed by these rulers. As such for morality to come to bear on the issue of the crisis of development in Nigeria, both the rulership and the ruled must of necessity be people of uprightness. Granted that those who have authority must do all in their power to uphold the sanctity of the mandate entrusted to them, which many of them are visibly and vigorously violating, it is not the members of the National House of Assembly, or the Senate or the Presidency alone who are responsible for the rot in Nigeria. When we talk about corruption in Nigeria, it cuts across board; it is not only the leaders who are corrupt. When a person gets elected to the position of leadership in Nigeria, for instance, and he refuses to take or give bribe, the members of his own immediate family and community would be the first to criticize him as been foolish. Or what do we make out of the various chieftaincy titles and honorary doctorate degrees awarded to those who have been steeply involved in the plunging of this country into the abyss of misery and suffering currently witness. Or the messenger or the secretary in the office who would not want to attend to people if their palms are not grease. Or again what about the police man at the high way that instead of protecting people collect N20 from drivers. What do we say of the pastor or the imam who refuse to preach about corruption simply because of the fat offerings or donations that they get from these same persons who are engaged in destroying this country with their selfish act? The list goes on and on.
We complain of the decay been witnessed in our social system and as such accused the rulers and their cohorts as been corrupt and selfish. But have we on our part made any minimum effort to handle these structures as our own personal properties instead of seeing it as no man’s properties or government’s properties? How do we use the roads, how do we dispose our refuse, how do we treat people’s houses that have been rented to us? Have we co-operated fully with one another to see that things are done properly? Thus all the parts that enter into building the system must therefore be questioned and held responsible else our talk about morality as it concerns development and rulership in this country would not be completed. We are all guilty to some extent. The legacy of both the military and civilian administrations is a legion of looting of the nation’s resources and shameless flaunting of the loot by leaders, their cohorts and stooges; the animated decimation of our social life; the organized destruction of our economy; the brutal repression of our fundamental rights; the castration of our democratic institutions; the dehumanization of our national infrastructures of all categories; the corrosive pollution of our moral life; the ungodly contamination of our national values; the imposition of pervasive, grinding, heinous and aching poverty on the masses or our people. These constitute the political and socio-economic disorder in today’s Nigeria. All these are happening because morality has been thrown out of the Nigerian system.
Development only thrives in an environment of morality. With the current situation, attitude and condition in Nigeria, it will be difficulty for us to get any meaningful development. What we need in Nigeria today is a complete reorientation of Nigerians. A reorientation that will curb us of our misconstrued about development and rulership, of all the useless ideologies that had kept this nation in the bondage of underdevelopment. Some persons in this country would want to excuse the lack of development of Nigeria by saying that after all it took the developed countries centuries to get to where they are today and that Nigeria is still too young; it will get there some day. But the truth is that it would not have taken those countries those numbers of years to come to where there are today had they been exposed to the much improved scientific and technological knowledge that Nigeria has been expose to and still decided to remain in the primitive stage. Such a naïve kind of attitude would not help us. We all in Nigeria have to realize and accept our responsibility for the rot in our society. We have to go back and listen once more to our conscience, especially as this has to do with our obligation and duty in the society. It is important that we all should be responsible to one another, especially as it has to do with the carrying out our civic duties.
There is no future for a people who deny their past, says Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. this is true of Nigeria. Too often we have failed as a people to look back and make concrete assessment of how it all began in order to fudge ahead. We and our leaders pretend that all is well, but the truth is that all is not well in Nigeria. According to a Swazi proverb, before we know where we are going, we must know where we are and where we have come from. Until Nigerians and their leaders stop and take a proper look at their past to see where the have abandoned the path of morality that today is the cause of the rot been witnessed in all the fabrics and systems of this country, there can be no meaningful development. Imperatively this is so because morality is a sine qua non for development and good rulership. This inevitably means that for us to have good rulership in this country that would initiate and placed this country on the path of development we all must appropriate within ourselves the principles of morality. Good rulers or leaders do not fall from heaven. They are taken from among their society or community. If a society is morally sound, it will produce morally sound leaders or rulers.
Conclusively, I would like to reiterate the point made by Chukwudifu A. Oputa. He states that to arrive at a progressive reconciliation of any nation, that nation must try to look at its past no matter how bleak or gloomy that past is. Having seen what happened in yesteryears, the nation will resolve, it will not happen again…. Let us see ourselves as we were and then let us resolve that is not good enough for Nigeria. Let us forge ahead and build a better nation.[8] This can only be achieved if morality is enthroned in Nigeria. Until then Nigeria will continue to be the giant Africa never had.
End note
[1] Michael Ifeanyi Mozia. Christian Morality and Charisms. (Ibadan: Secreprint Nigeria Limited, 2000), Pp. 1-2
[2] Cf. Bruno Yammeluan Ikuli. The Philosophy of the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD). (Ibadan: Hope Publications, 2006) Pp. 13-14
[3] John Okwoeze Odey. Active Nonviolence Resistance: The Moral and Political Power of the Opressed. (Enugu: Snaap Press Limited, 1996), p. 16
[4] CCC, no. 1731
[5] The Catechism of the Catholic Church, no. 1776
[6] Ibid., no. 1777
[7] Germain Grisez. Christian Moral Principles: The Way of the Lord Jesus, Vol. 1. (Chicago: Franciscan Herald Press, 1983) p. 53.
[8] Efeturi Ojakanminor. Nigeria’s Ghana Must God Republic: Happenings. (Iperu-Remo: The Ambassador Publication), p. 1.
Morality is a dimension of relationship between peoples, that dimension which is expressed in terms of obligation or duty or call. The relation between situation and principles, rules, or values which has been so much debated in recent times is of immediate interest in so far it has underlined that our morality is ultimately justified as a respect for persons and not for abstractions such as rules, principles or values. In Nigeria we have some good moral principles, rules or values but only on papers and not in practice. But morality as a dimension of relationship, especially as it affects upon development and rulership, can be considered as a human phenomenon which exists in every human society and as such most be practiced according to its ideological or religious basis. In essence to talk about morality in any giving human society immediately applies to or calls to mind such ideologies as seen practice in such a society. Where there are good ideologies consequently you find morality as well. And there cannot be a meaningful development in any where in the world without good ideologies. Ideas, they say, rules the world.
The current development crisis in Nigeria is as a result of the fact that up till this moment our leaders have no concrete idea of what we want this country to be like. They lack the idea of what the nation Nigeria should be. Almost fifty years after independence we are still groping as it were in the dark not knowing where we are heading to. It is very easy for us as said earlier on to point accusing fingers to the leaders as those responsible for our woes as a nation. Yes, there is no doubt about this. But it is also important for us to realize that leaders are not born but they are made. Leaders are the product of their society. To some extent, the kind of persons at the herm of affairs of any giving society mirror the level or state of morality of that society. If a society is good there is no doubt that the leaders or the rulership would likewise be good. You cannot house a child in poultry and expect it to come out in the odor of roses. Leadership position is both systematic and complementary. That is to say we cannot adequately talk of rulership without taking into account those factors that go into the making of a ruler. For one to be either good or bad requires the input of other things and persons somewhere.
Hence, in talking about morality and the rulership in Nigeria, we have necessary to also talk about the morality of the person governed by these rulers. As such for morality to come to bear on the issue of the crisis of development in Nigeria, both the rulership and the ruled must of necessity be people of uprightness. Granted that those who have authority must do all in their power to uphold the sanctity of the mandate entrusted to them, which many of them are visibly and vigorously violating, it is not the members of the National House of Assembly, or the Senate or the Presidency alone who are responsible for the rot in Nigeria. When we talk about corruption in Nigeria, it cuts across board; it is not only the leaders who are corrupt. When a person gets elected to the position of leadership in Nigeria, for instance, and he refuses to take or give bribe, the members of his own immediate family and community would be the first to criticize him as been foolish. Or what do we make out of the various chieftaincy titles and honorary doctorate degrees awarded to those who have been steeply involved in the plunging of this country into the abyss of misery and suffering currently witness. Or the messenger or the secretary in the office who would not want to attend to people if their palms are not grease. Or again what about the police man at the high way that instead of protecting people collect N20 from drivers. What do we say of the pastor or the imam who refuse to preach about corruption simply because of the fat offerings or donations that they get from these same persons who are engaged in destroying this country with their selfish act? The list goes on and on.
We complain of the decay been witnessed in our social system and as such accused the rulers and their cohorts as been corrupt and selfish. But have we on our part made any minimum effort to handle these structures as our own personal properties instead of seeing it as no man’s properties or government’s properties? How do we use the roads, how do we dispose our refuse, how do we treat people’s houses that have been rented to us? Have we co-operated fully with one another to see that things are done properly? Thus all the parts that enter into building the system must therefore be questioned and held responsible else our talk about morality as it concerns development and rulership in this country would not be completed. We are all guilty to some extent. The legacy of both the military and civilian administrations is a legion of looting of the nation’s resources and shameless flaunting of the loot by leaders, their cohorts and stooges; the animated decimation of our social life; the organized destruction of our economy; the brutal repression of our fundamental rights; the castration of our democratic institutions; the dehumanization of our national infrastructures of all categories; the corrosive pollution of our moral life; the ungodly contamination of our national values; the imposition of pervasive, grinding, heinous and aching poverty on the masses or our people. These constitute the political and socio-economic disorder in today’s Nigeria. All these are happening because morality has been thrown out of the Nigerian system.
Development only thrives in an environment of morality. With the current situation, attitude and condition in Nigeria, it will be difficulty for us to get any meaningful development. What we need in Nigeria today is a complete reorientation of Nigerians. A reorientation that will curb us of our misconstrued about development and rulership, of all the useless ideologies that had kept this nation in the bondage of underdevelopment. Some persons in this country would want to excuse the lack of development of Nigeria by saying that after all it took the developed countries centuries to get to where they are today and that Nigeria is still too young; it will get there some day. But the truth is that it would not have taken those countries those numbers of years to come to where there are today had they been exposed to the much improved scientific and technological knowledge that Nigeria has been expose to and still decided to remain in the primitive stage. Such a naïve kind of attitude would not help us. We all in Nigeria have to realize and accept our responsibility for the rot in our society. We have to go back and listen once more to our conscience, especially as this has to do with our obligation and duty in the society. It is important that we all should be responsible to one another, especially as it has to do with the carrying out our civic duties.
There is no future for a people who deny their past, says Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. this is true of Nigeria. Too often we have failed as a people to look back and make concrete assessment of how it all began in order to fudge ahead. We and our leaders pretend that all is well, but the truth is that all is not well in Nigeria. According to a Swazi proverb, before we know where we are going, we must know where we are and where we have come from. Until Nigerians and their leaders stop and take a proper look at their past to see where the have abandoned the path of morality that today is the cause of the rot been witnessed in all the fabrics and systems of this country, there can be no meaningful development. Imperatively this is so because morality is a sine qua non for development and good rulership. This inevitably means that for us to have good rulership in this country that would initiate and placed this country on the path of development we all must appropriate within ourselves the principles of morality. Good rulers or leaders do not fall from heaven. They are taken from among their society or community. If a society is morally sound, it will produce morally sound leaders or rulers.
Conclusively, I would like to reiterate the point made by Chukwudifu A. Oputa. He states that to arrive at a progressive reconciliation of any nation, that nation must try to look at its past no matter how bleak or gloomy that past is. Having seen what happened in yesteryears, the nation will resolve, it will not happen again…. Let us see ourselves as we were and then let us resolve that is not good enough for Nigeria. Let us forge ahead and build a better nation.[8] This can only be achieved if morality is enthroned in Nigeria. Until then Nigeria will continue to be the giant Africa never had.
End note
[1] Michael Ifeanyi Mozia. Christian Morality and Charisms. (Ibadan: Secreprint Nigeria Limited, 2000), Pp. 1-2
[2] Cf. Bruno Yammeluan Ikuli. The Philosophy of the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD). (Ibadan: Hope Publications, 2006) Pp. 13-14
[3] John Okwoeze Odey. Active Nonviolence Resistance: The Moral and Political Power of the Opressed. (Enugu: Snaap Press Limited, 1996), p. 16
[4] CCC, no. 1731
[5] The Catechism of the Catholic Church, no. 1776
[6] Ibid., no. 1777
[7] Germain Grisez. Christian Moral Principles: The Way of the Lord Jesus, Vol. 1. (Chicago: Franciscan Herald Press, 1983) p. 53.
[8] Efeturi Ojakanminor. Nigeria’s Ghana Must God Republic: Happenings. (Iperu-Remo: The Ambassador Publication), p. 1.
