CONTINUED FROM LAST WEEK
A lecture given to the union of teachers in Ibadan in 1947.
IN view of this explanation, it will be seen that individual freedom must be subject to certain restraints of ethics, law, order and convention, and must be indivisible in its enjoyment; that knowledge is necessary to its use and that courage and strength are required to preserve it. This is true and beneficial freedom – the sort of freedom which enables all of us here to be free and yet to maintain order and good conduct.
Now what is national freedom? Is it in any way different from personal freedom? The answer is ‘Yes’ and ‘No’.
‘No’ in the sense that national freedom ought to be composed of those ingredients which constitute individual freedom. ‘Yes’ in the sense that historical facts and events have shown beyond doubt that national freedom tends to be exercised in the absolute as opposed to the relative sense.
We will not inquire tonight into the reason why nations in a community of nations behave towards one another in a different way from persons in a community of individuals. It is enough to note that they do so behave.
What goes by the name of economic and political nationalism on the part of a nation, would in an individual pass for lawlessness of the first order. Every nation, by virtue of its political sovereignty, feels free to do whatever it likes for its own benefits, without any regard or consideration for other nations. If A (an individual) takes what belongs to B (another individual) without B’s consent, and with intent to deprive B permanently of the property of that thing, that would be stealing. If A kills B without lawful excuse, that would be either murder or manslaughter. If A attacks B and takes away by force valuable things that are on the body of B, that would amount to robbery – a specie of aggravated larceny. All these are criminal offences, and the law visits them with severe punishment. Therefore, in a well-ordered society, right is might. But this is not the case with nations. Evils which are punishable in an individual, are perpetrated by nations with impunity. Every nation is a law unto itself. And all that is required to make this arbitrary, immoral, and indefensible position secure and absolute is military strength. In their dealing with one another, the watchword of a nation is ‘Might is Right’. The mightier a nation is, the more lawless and licentious it is capable of being.
History is full of myriad instances where a powerful nation has committed on a weaker nation, with impurity, acts of wanton murder, cruelty, ruthless spoliation, exploitation or even extermination. And all these are done by the powerful nation in the exercise of its national freedom of thought and action. The unrestrained exercise of its national freedom has led to wars down the ages.
It will be seen that national freedom differs from individual freedom in the sense that the former is exercised free from those restraints and moral checks to which the latter is subject.
But if nations are to derive any benefit from their freedom they must exercise it in the same manner and subject to the same restraint as individuals do in a community. Unfortunately, however, whilst there is a government in a community to enforce the observance by citizens of these legitimate restraints imposed upon them in the exercise of their individual freedom, there is no world government just yet to enforce similar observance by nations.
So far, we have considered national freedom in general. We may be permitted to ask: what sort of national freedom exists in Nigeria?
Personally, I should think that there is no such thing as national freedom for Nigeria – either of the good type nor of the bad. Our country is totally enslaved, and we as inhabitants therein are but only partially free. In any case not free in the same sense as Britons or Americans are in Britain or in the United States of America respectively.
Before the advent of white men, the various ethnical groups that constitute Nigeria were free in their own lands. But like other peoples of the world, they exercised their freedom in unrestrained and licentious manner. Inter-tribal, and inter-necine wars, have waged incessantly and relentlessly. The privileged class in a community oppressed and tyrannised over the unprivileged class. In their ignorance, the powerful and adventurous few assisted the pink-coloured people in their slave-raids. As a result, hundreds of thousands of people from Nigeria were carried to the West Indies and America as slaves – human beings who received during their voyage treatment much worse than that given to cattle transported from the Northern Provinces to the South. And because of our country and ourselves in political and economic bondage. Today, all those who are politically conscious in this country cherish a high yearning that someday not too far into the future we shall be free again. That is a legitimate national aspiration.
But in order that Nigeria may attain to national freedom, we require courage and strength to wrest it from our overlord. And we would require knowledge and a sense of spiritual values to be able to use our freedom to advantage. That is in such a manner that every citizen of Nigeria irrespective of status would feel equally free as others, and in such a way that Nigeria would live in peace, quiet, and tranquility with her neigbours.
Now, to cultivate courage, strength, knowledge, and a sense of spiritual values, education is our most potent weapon. By education, of course, I do not mean more literacy – the mere ability to read and write. A man may be educated without being literate and a literate person may be very ignorant indeed. Education therefore is something quite different from literacy. Indeed, literacy is the foundation on which an edifice of sound education may be securely built. But, on the other hand, this same literacy may be the firm basis on which a huge superstructure of abysmal ignorance may be erected.
The mischievous propagandist who has to deal with an illiterate mass would find it extremely difficult to disseminate his lies as widely and as easily as if he has to deal with a literate mass. This probably may account for the fact that the majority of people in Lagos more easily fall victims of fraudulent leadership than the majority of the provincial people. It may also be the explanation for the unexceptionable and offensive ignorance of the masses of British people about the inhabitants of their colonial territories. By their ability to read, a most extensive field of distorted, lying and libelous literature about the Colonies is open to the Britons.
I have said all these not in an attempt to discredit literacy; but merely to show that it is not the unalloyed good that it at first appears to be. In honest hands, literacy is the surest and the most effective, means to true education. In dishonest hands, it may be a most dangerous, in fact a suicidal, acquisition. Now, what is education, and in what way can it contribute to the attainment of national freedom? In my own humble opinion, education is that process of physical and mental culture whereby a man’s personality is developed to the fullest.
A man whose personality is fully developed never fears anything; he cringes not, and never feels inferior to anyone; no matter the colour, status, or strength of such a one; he is self-reliant, and will resist any form of enslavement until the last breath in him is exhausted. He may be an employee or a servant, but he is a self-confident and courageous servant who does his work with efficiency and probity, but with no thought of servitude. His breadth of mind enables him to exercise his freedom in such a manner as not to endanger the interests and freedom of others. He is a citizen of the world – free from narrow prejudices. He is what he is because the three main constituents of his entity – his body, brain, and mind – are fully developed.
Mens Sana in Corpore Sano.
It is dangerous to develop only one or two of those three constituents and leave the others or other undeveloped. A couple of illustrations will make this clear. Ifa man’s physique is fully developed but his brain and mind are left undeveloped or only partially developed, what we have is a being powerful enough to hew stones and draw water for others, and discernment that he is unable to appreciate and assert his human rights. The slave owner, the unconscionable capitalist, and the economic imperialist realize this fact well enough. Consequently, they see to it that their victims are so fed that they can work efficiently for their masters but so unaccustomed to brain and mind culture that they remain for a long while loyal slaves.
If a man’s body and brain are fully developed whilst the mind remains undeveloped or only partially developed, then you have a typical European who misuses the scientific and economic resources which a virile and hard-working nation has provided him. By his want of education, and lack of a sense of spiritual values, he denies freedom to a class, and by doing so, brings about a situation called revolution or war in which the freedom of all is seriously threatened and in some cases completely submerged by a deluge of war, as is now the case in Germany, Italy, and Japan.
If the mind alone is developed and both the body and brain are neglected, then we have the sorry figure of a religious fanatic who condemns everything, and everybody but himself, and whose only prophecy is one of pessimism, catastrophe and gloom for mankind; he is a slave to imaginary fears, and drags into bondage with him, those who believe in his arrant doctrines. If this tribunal development is indispensable to true education, then only few people in the world can claim to be educated. Even some Europeans are uneducated. Comparatively, these pink-coloured folks excel us in the bodies and brains of most of us. For this simple reason they have more cunning – I use CUNNING not WISDOM – to impose their rule upon us. If they are truly educated, that is if their minds are also well-developed, they would not stoop to the mischief of putting us in economic and political bondage. For then they themselves would be free in the true sense of the word and know full well that freedom being indivisible must be equally enjoyed by all those with whom they come into contact.
In the case of us Nigerians, only bodies are fairly developed. Our brains and minds largely remain undeveloped, and only partially developed in a few cases. For this reason, we make very contented and
docile slaves. Our dominant craving is for food, clothing, and shelter, and we do not seem to care how we get them.
In order to wrest our freedom from our British overlords, we need must develop our bodies and brains to the fullest.
And in order to benefit by that freedom, when won, we must also develop our minds to the fullest.
The surest foundation for the development of these things is, as we have said, literacy. But we also pointed out that this literacy may also be used as a basis for the cultivation of abysmal ignorance. Our British overlords have not failed to exploit the literacy of some of us to our own detriment. It is, therefore, our duty to see to it that as literacy spreads, we sow on its fertile soil seeds which will bear the fruits of correct political awareness leading to sane Nigerian nationalism. We must combat any educational scheme which tends to develop our bodies fairly well, our brains only partially, and tends to becloud our minds. For this is only a device for our permanent enslavement. But when our bodies, brains and minds are properly developed, we shall be free as individuals, and Nigeria herself will attain national freedom.
CONTINUES NEXT WEEK
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