Obiora Ike and the Challenge of Development in Africa

African philosophers such as Olusegun Oladipo, Lansana Kieta, Kwama Nkrumah and Kanu Ikechukwu proposed to revisit the semantic of the word “development”. From their viewpoint, instead of seeing economic growth as the DNA of development, we should actualize the notion as rather aiming at the universalities of cultures, which could ensure progress and development. Further aspects such as a) the worldview of the Bantu, b) the distribution of resources in large national giant nations as Nigeria, and c) faith-based organization and development with Obiora Ike, justify a closer reading of the concept. It shows that people-oriented development is better adapted to Africa than abstract concepts, which may not include strong reference to the African traditions and belief systems. Sustainable and integrative development should include all major faith groups, which are all part of development, understood as a social and economic investment with social responsibility and faith

Martin Luther King Jr: Non-violence resistance and the problem of terrorism in Africa

Martin Luther King Jr. cannot be said to have addressed the problem of terrorism in general because he proposed his philosophy of non-violence resistance within the context of the oppression, injustice, segregation, violence and discrimination suffered by the African Americans. Nevertheless, his philosophy captured ways by which we can fittingly address the problem of terrorism. Many of the methods of non-violence given by Martin Luther King Jr. are of paramount importance in the face of terrorism. His philosophy is basically important today in Nigeria owing to the fact that our unity as a country is threatened by the recurring activities of terrorism and as such we are at a cross road in the history of our country, where drastic decisions have to be taken to address this perilous trend. The philosophy of non-violent resistance as proposed by Martin Luther King Jr. is a veritable step towards a working solution, as it is not only an outcry against terrorism of any sort, but also an ideology that frowns against any form of action that results in the taking of human life or the carnage that comes with violence. His non-violent resistance theory which he developed after a deep study of Mahatma Gandhi’s theory of non-violence, is a radical approach towards the fight against violence of any sort inflicted on the African Americans of his time, an action borne of a passionate fight against racism. So, to aptly address the problem of terrorism in Nigeria, it is necessary we consult and apply some principles of the philosophy of non-violence resistance as postulated by Martin Luther King Jr.Seminary Of All Saints, Uhiele-Ekpoma Edo State, Nigeria.James M. Washington, A testament of Hope: The Essential Writings and Speeches of Martin Luther King Jr., New York: Harper One Publishers 1991.Simon Blackburn (ed), The Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1966.Mahatma Gandhi, Nonviolent Resistance Satyagraha, New York: Schocken Books, 1951.Gene Sharp, Sharp’s Dictionary of Power and Struggle: Language of Civil Resistance in Conflicts, New York: Oxford University Press 2012.Adam Roberts and Timothy Garton Ash(eds), Civil Resistance and Power Politics: The Experience of Nonviolent Action from Gandhi to the Present, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009.Joseph Omoregbe, A Philosophical Look at Religion, Lagos: Joja Educational Research and Publishers, 2011.“Mahavira” in Wikipedia the free Encyclopedia http://www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/mahavira (8-3-2014)9:45 pm.J. Crowther, Oxford Advanced Learners Dictionary of Current English, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995.Nwinya Stephen Chijioke, “Martin Luther Kings’s Philosophy of Nonviolent Resistance: A moral Weapon against Oppression “in WAJOPS.M.M Goldsmith, “Thomas Hobbes: Ancient and Modern” in Tom Sorell (ed,), The Rise of Modern Philosophy, the Tension Between the New and Traditional Philosophers from Machiavelli to Leibniz, New York: Oxford University Press, 1993.William K. Frankena, Ethics, New Delhi: Prentice Hall of India Limited. 1995.Michael Soroka, et al., Social Problems: A World At Risk, London: Allyn and Bacon, 1995.Yusuf Alli, “Why we met Obasanjo, by Shehu Sani” in The Nation Vol.9, May 29, 2014.Gene Sharp, Waging Non-violent Struggle, Boston: Porter Sargent Publishers, 2005.George Lefebre, The French Revolution from its Origins to 1793, New York: Colombia University Press, 1962.Arthur Herman, Gandhi and Churchill: The Epic Rivalry That Destroyed an Empire and Forged our Age, New York: Arrow Books Publications, 2009.Martin Luther King Jr. Stride Towards Freedom, Massachusetts, Beacon Press, 2010.The Nation, Thursday, 27th of February, 2014.James Melvin Washington (Ed.),Testament of Hope, San Francisco : Harper & Row, 1986.Hannah Arendt, On Violence, London: Allen Land Press, 1991.Olusegun Oladipo, Beyond Survival: Essays on the Nigerian Condition, Ibadan: Hope Publications 1999.John J. Ansbro, Martin Luther King, Jr.: The making of the Mind, New York: Orbis Books, 1982.30/125927