Thought for the Week, October 5, 2025

On Friday, September 26, 2025, the ancient city of Ibadan witnessed the colourful and celebratory enthronement of its new monarch.  While congratulating the new Olubadan, His Royal Majesty Rasheed Adewolu Ladoja, President Tinubu, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, and former Governor Peter Obi addressed him as “brother”.  They and those who spoke like them improperly addressed the monarch.

Appropriate manner of addressing monarchs may differ according to monarchical rank and context. But monarchs, as a sign of respect, are addressed formally.    That is why a monarch is not addressed as “brother”.  Not even “elder brother”.  Even if the monarch is your brother or son, as long as he is a monarch, this formality is to be respected.

In terms of country and context, the British monarch is first addressed as “Your Majesty”, then “Sir” or “Ma’am” in conversation.  Other members of the royal family, such as Prince or Duke), are addressed as “Your Royal Highness” initially, then “Sir” or “Ma’am”.  In Saudi Arabia, the monarch is addressed as "Your Royal Highness" or "Your Majesty".  In Japan, he is addressed as “His Majesty the Emperor” Here in Nigeria, traditional rulers like the Oba, Emir, or Obi are never casually but always formally addressed, that is, by their full titles.

Perhaps we can explain this improper use of language by a well-known fact, and that is, the marginalization of humanities from our curriculum.  Improper use of language is one of the casualties of this marginalization. Competence in use of language, and even good manners have gone down a slippery slope. 

Improper use of language, and inappropriate behaviour are symptoms of anthropological poverty.  Anthropological poverty (pauperisation anthropologique), to borrow the words of Cameroonian philosopher Englebert Mveng, is at the root of our developmental anemia, at the root of poverty in all other dimensions of our existence as individuals and as a polity.  Not knowing what it means to be human, which is what we would have learnt from the humanities, we resort, sometimes unknowingly, to speech and conduct lacking in finesse.  We get casual in our use of language. 

In our land of diversities—ethnic, religious, linguistic and cultural—we fail to cultivate a spirit of dialogue because we are yet to take the humanity of others seriously.  That, too, is a symptom of anthropological poverty.  We do not take the humanity of others seriously because we do not take our own humanity seriously.  And when we do not take our humanity seriously we resort to acts of incivility in social and conventional media.  Our attitude of command and control—an unhappy hangover of prolonged military rule—our bullying and intimidating conduct, these make due process unattractive.  Why should I queue if I can push my way through?  It is the attitude and conduct found among the leaders and the led.

Marginalization of the humanities in our system of education has led to untold consequences.  History is the memory of a people.  Without it, they are like computers without memory.  When the teaching of history is considered less important, citizens are formed who can neither enter into the network of relationships that human existence is, nor act collaboratively and responsibly in the task of working for the common good. 

Neglect of the study of literature breeds a generation of human beings who are violent and vulgar in their use of language.  Neglect of the arts has dulled our collective sense of beauty, and it is manifest in pervasive urban decay in Nigeria, the continuous deterioration and deformation of our cities into unplanned and over-populated junkyards.  Beauty has deserted our cities because we have banished her from our minds by marginalizing art.

We do need more security.  There is no doubt about that.  But where there is no virtue there is no security.  Technological education must go with ethical education.  Study of ethics is domiciled in the faculty of humanities, not in the faculty of science and technology.  But technology does not teach virtue because technology does not teach morality.  It teaches the student how to accomplish what is possible, not how to differentiate what is right from what is wrong.  That is what education has become in Nigeria, and in many countries of the world.  That is the result of over-regulation of the education sector by government in this country.  Recent experiences point to the sad fact that things have not changed.  Government and its agencies still pretend to monopolize knowledge on how schools are to be run.  Our policy makers have prioritized education in science and technology to the detriment of studies in humanities because we are in a hurry to meet up with the rest of the world when it comes to technology. 

The problem, however, is that technology without virtue is another name for science without conscience.  It breeds individuals who can make money and operate machines but who cannot relate with others.  Such is the consequence when what ought to be a joint effort of all who are concerned becomes the prerogative of technocrats who install a gigantic bureaucracy that stifles initiatives.  Policies are meant to serve the people.  The people are not to be subservient to policies.  But that is the dream of living in a free country, not in an empire that masquerades itself as a federal republic.  Nigeria de-emphasizes the study of philosophy, history, arts, academic theology, because she wants to catch up with leaders of the computer age and race.  She ends up breeding Yahoo boys and girls and cultists on campuses.

        In Nigeria, we are locked up in our homes, in our cities, because of fear of armed robbers.  In fact, to protect ourselves from robbers we live behind bars.  And when we venture into freedom, kidnappers are waiting.  By way of a paradox, we all live and are locked up in a country that poses lifelong insecurity because our system of education—at the service of a reductionist notion of development—is more concerned with machines (science and technology) than with the human beings who are to be served by the machines (humanities).

        But let us go back to Ibadan.  And that, for two reasons: Ibadan is the cradle of university education in Nigeria, and Ibadan is where the event of a new monarch reminds us that we must address monarchs formally and with respect.

On Sunday, September 28, 2025, two days after his enthronement, His Royal Majesty Olubadan Oba Ladoja went to the Catholic Church of the Ascension in Bodija, Ibadan for thanksgiving.  He knelt to receive blessings from the Archbishop Emeritus of Ibadan, the Most Rev. Felix Job.

After blessing the Monarch, at Mass that morning, the Archbishop, in a demonstration of respect and propriety, called him, “Kabiyesi”.

       

Father Anthony Akinwale, OP