Book Description

Fifty five years after its independence from Britain, Nigeria remains a country whose citizens have yet to come to terms with the reality and implications of their country as a nation. Karl Maier, in his book, This House Has Fallen: Nigeria In Crisis, observes that the different (ethnic) groups that constitute the country perceive Nigeria as the other. These groups, religious, political, cultural or social, hardly see Nigeria as a responsibility worth pursuing collectively. They do not see the necessity of collaborating with fellow occupants to advance Nigeria beyond a mere historical happenstance or "geographical expression." The problem, it can be argued, resides in the difficulty of interpreting the multiple "ethic" narratives into a cohesive national narrative capable of spawning a spirit of nationhood and community. In essence, Nigeria is a country with a "fractured memory" and this memory fundamentally threatens its viability as a nation. In an attemp to address the country's fractured national memory, the Human Rights Violation Investigation Commission (HRVIC), dubbed the "Oputa Panel", was constituted to examine atrocities committed against Nigerians from 1984 to 1999, a period spanning five military dispensations. At the end of the commission's meetings in 2002, its reports were subsequently rejected by the Federal Government and its recommendations discarded. It is my assertion that the Oputa Panel was a rare opportunity for Nigeria to create a new national narrative-a shared memory-through the processes of national healing and reconciliation. Given the failure of formal political processes to reconcile the "fractured" Nigerian memory and identity, it is essential to inquire about why this process and others before it succumbed to failure. Since religion is a salient feature of the Nigerian society, it can function as an actor in furthering the process of reconciliation in areas where political action has fallen short. The Catholic Church in Nigeria, as an expression of religion and its capacity for good, has significant resources that can stimulate a new process of reconciliation and memory shaping.