INTERFAITH & CONFLICT MANAGEMENT IN NIGERIA

BY

TANKO AHMED fwcSenior Fellow, NIPSS, Kuru - Nigeria

INTRODUCTION

My views and contribution to a Forum

SYMPOSIUM ON INTERFAITH AND CONFLICT MANAGEMENT IN NIGERIA: A DISCOURSE WITH PROFESSOR JOHN PADEN WITH THE NATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR POLICY AND STRATEGIC STUDIES (NIPSS) AND ITS PARTNERS HELD ON WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 13, 2014 AT THE NICON LUXURIES HOTEL, ABUJA

‘The empires of the future are the empires of the

mind’

- Winston Churchill

Churchill on Policy & Strategy

• Churchill considered as a leader and thinker who put his ideas or intentions into action, then monitored and evaluated the outcomes.

• The same format, in modern policymaking process and strategic planning captures the NIPSS’s mandate of ‘policy and strategy’.

Religion in Interfaith Discourse

Religion, the core of the interfaith discourse, is the new ‘empire of the mind’.

It has acquired the minds of our citizens and possesses the power of state.

Religion is expressed in terms of money and wealth;

It guarantees influence and controls resources. Religion courses war; it is modern conflict, and

a threat to societal peaceful existence.

Dangers of Modern Religiosity

The mind is the seat of the Spirit which is the currency of religion.

Our spiritual ecosystem is sick because religion has turned into poison instead of medicine for the cure of societal ills.

Religion prescribes outdated sermons in excess, like expired and overdosed drugs.

Unleashed on strong African natural, but naïve spiritual base, modern religiosity is as tragic as it is an apocalyptic disaster to all Africans, particularly Nigeria.

A CHALLENGE FOR NIPSS

NIPSS in the business of knowledge management, or policy and strategy.

The call for strategic response to issues of interfaith puts the onus on NIPSS, to confront the phenomenon headlong;

Public Officers in research and studies must weld the instruments of ethics and social justice.

It is time to be bold, not only on paper or within the comfort of Kuru enclave, but to the outside world - LOUD, CLEAR and EFFECTIVE.

THE WAY FORWARD

Internal reform of NIPSS’s mission and vision must include ethical codes and practice.

To provide institutional strength required

for confronting the spiritually-polluted external environment.

Alternative Means

Failure in reform and institutional strengthening might usher in ethical dissent by committed Public Officers.

Guerilla government tactics, by small pockets of disciplined, principled and able public officials could effectively resist religiosity in our personal and national affairs.

CONCLUSION

• NIPSS is to see that all policies are transformed from ‘intentions’ to ‘actions’ for ‘outcomes’ and subjected to monitoring and evaluation.

• In attribute to Winston Churchill’s ‘the empires of the future are the empires of the mind’ we are already here.

THANK YOU!