JUDE ORINYA AZUKA
DEPARTMENT OF PHILOSOPHY
NNAMDI AZIKIWE UNIVERSITY, AWKA
08030441373
judeazuka@gmail.com


Abstract
The increasing wave state failures since the end of the Cold War have become a disturbing
phenomenon. This paper examines the causes and effects of state failure in Africa. It employed
analytic method to critically examine the different views on state failure. The work argues that the
faulty foundation on which most African states were built on is one of the major reasons why
African states are the major victims of failed states in the world. A look at the recent ranking of
failed states in the world reveals that African states dominate the first thirty countries in the
Fragile State Index (FIS). The paper however suggests that authentic education, real
independence and rediscovering of Africa’s lost identity will be a necessary alternative to restore
Africa’s bartered historical journey. The work concludes that the present internal ethnic and
religious crisis that have destabilized the peace and development of the African continent since
after the independence of most African states, will eventually lead to their final collapse if nothing
is done.
Introduction
The threat posed by failed and failing states in Africa has been a thing of concern because
its consequences have not escaped other nations. The world is quick becoming a global village so
a crisis in one country affects the others. If they are not affected through the influx of refugees,
terrorists and miscreants, they will be affected by a change in their economic, political and
religious status. The implication of this is that no country is completely safe until every country is
safe. The paper argues that the foundation of state failure in Africa begins from the failure of the
family values because the family is the base of the society. It also pointed out colonialism as a
major factor that destabilized African values and left the African man in a serious identity crisis
which is the major cause of Africa’s Underdevelopment.
This work is therefore worried about the position of Africa states in the Fragile State
Index (FSI) 2017 released by the Fund For Peace (FFP), an independent nonpartisan, nonprofit,
research and educational organization. From the index, the worst or the most fragile state in the
world judging from 178 countries they used in the research is South Sudan. One may be forced to
ask why South Sudan since they recently broke away from Sudan. On 9th July, 2011, South Sudan
got their independence from Sudan. However, internal conflict have led to the formation of a
parallel government with the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement the major opposition to the
government taking control of some part of the state. Other countries immediately after South Sudan
in the rankings are Somalia, Central African Republic, Yemen, Syria, Sudan, Congo D.R, Chad
and so no. As a matter of fact the first 30 positions in the rank are occupied by African Countries.
Our own dear country Nigeria is at the 15th position.
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These facts have been compiled by the FFP since 2004 using different social, economic
and cohesion indicators. According to the 2017 FFP report, the Fault lines can emerge between
identity groups, defined by language, religion, race, ethnicity, nationality, class, castle, clan or area
of origin. Tension can deteriorate into conflict through a variety of circumstances, such as
competition over resources, predatory or fractured leadership, corruption, or unresolved group
grievances1
. These factors that they pointed out are things that can likely lead to state failure.
Looking at the top of the index the most stable and least fragile country in the world is
Finland, followed by Norway, Switzerland, Denmark and Sweden, in that order. This work also
tries to find out the things that those countries have in common which African countries don’t
have. The work then finally concludes by making some suggestions on things that will help to
savage the already critical situation and fragile nature of African states.
What is State Failure?
The concept of state failure is a nebulous concept because it is always difficult to find out
the point you can conclude that a state have failed. While some may argue that a state has failed
when it can no longer control any part of its territory. This work views state failure from the point
of view of its function which also includes: security, economic development, political control,
social development etc. Thus, a state has failed when it is found wanting or can no longer fulfill
any of its functions to the citizens.
The understanding of the meaning of a state will go a long way in understanding when it
fails. A narrow definition of a state sees it as a political entity that possesses a permanent
population, a defined territory a government and a capacity to enter into agreement with other
states. However, a broader definition of the state involves the idea of social contract which focuses
on the relationship between the state and citizens. When the citizen enters into a contract with the
state they give their freedom to the state in exchange of peace and security. So, when the state
cannot provide this they have failed in the contract.
According to Helman and Ratner the term failed state is a “disturbing phenomenon”
whereby a state was becoming “utterly incapable of sustaining itself as a member of the
international community”2
. They argued that a failed state would endanger its own citizens and
threaten their neighbours through the influx of refugees, political instability and random warfare.
Zartman develops the idea of state failure along the lines of Hobbesian social contract theory. For
him, state failure occurs when the basic functions of the state are no longer performed. It refers to
a situation where the structure, authority, law and political order have fallen apart3
.
According to Rotberg, nation-state failed because they can no longer deliver positive
political goods to their people4
. Their governments lose legitimacy and in the eyes and hearts of a
growing plurality of its citizens, the nation-state itself becomes illegitimate. From the definitions
of failed state, one will not be wrong to describe Nigeria as a failed state because it has all the
indices of a failed state.
Causes of Failed States
When we look at the worst fragile states in the world, we will discover that most of them
are African states. The African continent was the worst victim of colonialism and most African
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states were products of colonialism. Thus it will not be out of point to argue that the problem of
state formation is the major reason of state failure. The foundation must be strong for the building
to stand. And for the foundation to be strong there must be unity of purpose. However, African
states were weak and there is nothing uniting them because the white man just came and lumped
up people from different ethnic and religious background together. This has resulted to antagonism
and struggle of domination by these different groups making it difficult for peace and development
to thrive.
Colonial Legacy: The Nigeria Example
The colonialists sat in a Berlin Conference in Germany put the map of Africa on a table
and shared it among themselves. They arbitrarily created borders with little or no regard for the
differences which exists among different ethnic groups.
Wole Soyinka writes that:
One hundred years ago at the Berlin Conference, the colonial powers met to divide
the African continent into states, lumping various peoples and tribes together in
some places, or slicing them apart in others like some demented tailor who paid no
attention to the fabrics, colour or pattern of the cloth he was patching together.
5
Because of this disjointed and haphazard creation of boundaries, Nigeria and many other
African nations, consists of different ethnic groups with different languages and cultures. This
made peace and unity which is necessary for solving national problems to be absent. If it is not
external conflicts like boundary disputes it will be internal dispute like ethnic religious or cultural
crisis. Nigeria for example began independence under a constitution that divided the country into
three regions: North, West and East, that were made up of Hausa-Fulani, Yoruba and Igbo as the
predominant ethnic groups, respectively. Each region had a different culture and language, and
each region was governed as if its region was a separate country.
6 There is a struggle of who will
control more power in commerce and industry, this led to ethnic rivalries. The amalgamation of
the country by the colonial masters in 1914 was merely for administrative convenience. However,
this did not help in uniting the country as it was like a square peg in a round hole.
The survival of states must be based on certain conditions that are intricate in the nature of
the state. Just like a house, if it must be solid, it must be built on very strong foundations. Although
many materials come together to build a house, they must agree to work together and ensure that
the house stands. The cement will not tell the sand or stone “please I don’t need you”.
It is one thing to have a country and it is another thing to sustain it. The recent agitations
all over the world by different groups fighting for self determination and self-governance are fueled
by the fact that the existing structures do not accommodate their interest. The major function of
the state is protection of life and property of its citizens and provision of social goods to make life
worth living. In a situation where the state fails in fulfilling these responsibilities either to its entire
population, the state is adjudged as a failed state.
In Nigeria, the Biafran agitation, the declaration of Oduduwa republic and the fight for
liberation of the Niger Delta in recent times have been propelled by the non-inclusive government
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practiced in the Nigeria. The question of revenue sharing formular and power sharing formular has
further divided the country along ethnic lines.
The emergence of states has been a common issue in Africa because most African states were
arbitrarily created to satisfy the interest of the colonialists. In what some have identified as colonial
legacy;
Across much of the continent, state boundaries drawn up by the colonial
powers cut across existing tribal, ethnic, and regional allegiance. Many of
these new states were landlocked (15 of Africa’s 54 countries fall into this
category) or faced other geographical barriers to effective economic
development.7
The issues that arise from this colonial haphazard creation of states are enormous. The first
problem is that they lumped up ethnic nationalities together. In Nigeria for instance, there are over
250 ethnic groups with Hausa Fulani, Yoruba, Igbo, and Ijaw the major ones. The possibility of
agreeing to a common national goal becomes difficult since most ethnic nationalities will always
seek the interest of their ethnic group. Furthermore, after the independence of most African states,
some of the states with many ethnic groups like Nigeria started playing ethnic politics. Although
political party formation from the pre-independence era tried to be national in outlook with the
formation of the National Council of Nigerian Citizens (NCNC), it later changed to a regional
party because some saw it as a party principally for the eastern region. This led to the formation
of the Action Group party (AG) for the western region and the Northern People’s Congress (NPC)
for the northern region respectively. This became the bane of national integration and the
foundation of state failure because ethnic rivalries will not give way for any sustainable
development. Even the new parties formed presently in Nigeria, APC, and PDP which its members
cuts across all the ethnic groups are not left out from the infection of this ethnic virus. Simbine
observes that “The People’s Democratic Party (PDP) the erstwhile governing party formed in 1998
with a membership that cut across all the ethnic groups in the country eventually became bogged
down by vicious factional wrangling that often assume ethno-religious and regional dimension”8
.
This is why they now try to introduce zoning within the party to forestall ethnic and religious
disputes within the party. But even at that, there are still problems and disagreements as some
ethnic groups try to dominate the other. Every election in Nigeria now is always seen from an
ethno-religious angle and this continuous fanning of the embers of ethnicity will eventually lead
to the collapse of the state. All these were as a result of how the country emerged. Looking at the
most stable countries of the world like; Finland, Norway, Denmark, Switzerland, etc, one can
discover that there is none of them with the level of ethnic complications as we have in Nigeria.
Furthermore, their emergence was not as a result of forceful amalgamation. Thus as one people,
they can work together in achieving a common goal.
Resource Curse: This might sound strange because most people will argue that the abundance of
resources should be a blessing rather than a curse. However, research has shown that in recent
times the abundance of natural resources especially, oil has been attributed to poverty, violence,
and conflicts. Some countries that have oil or people that have oil in their lands will have preferred
if it was not there because of the situation it has placed them. Wars have been fought, lands
rendered useless, waters and water bodies polluted because of oil. In some countries where this oil
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is extracted from, the people live in a very deplorable condition and their means of livelihood are
destroyed.
In a research carried out by Collier and Hoeffler (1998, 2001, 2002, 2004) they discovered that
commodity exports increase the possibility of civil war. In their most recent work which covers
161 countries of the world and 78 civil wars between 1960 and 1999, the claims that the state’s
commodity for export has a major impact on the likelihood that a civil war will begin in the next
five years.9 They suggest that oil abundant less developed countries generate valuable rents and
the existence of these rents often leads to violent forms of rent-seeking that take the form of ‘greedbased’ insurgencies10. This will increase the risk of civil war. For them, most of the states with oil
as their resources are prone to fighting secessionist wars as the people that have the largest deposit
of oil will seek to break away and control the resources themselves. This is the problem we are
facing in Nigeria with the militancy in the Niger Delta and the call for a Niger Delta Republic.
Collier and Hoeffler argue that natural resources offer rebel groups a funding opportunity because
they produce rents that are location-specific and can be looted on a sustained basis. The possibility
of looting money from manufacturing firms is less because these firms are more mobile.11 When
rebels are not settled oil companies may be attacked to stop them from mining, the kidnapping of
oil workers and full-blown militancy may set in.
The Niger Delta part of Nigeria is a practical example. Their lands are polluted to the extent
that cropping or farming on them is needless. Their major occupation and means of livelihood is
fishing because they live amongst rivers, however, this dream cannot be achieved because due to
oil spillage, their rivers have been polluted. The government has been promising them a cleanup,
but up till now, nothing significant has been done. On the other hand, most stable countries in
Europe and Asia like Denmark, Finland, Switzerland, Norway, Sweden, China even America have
little no oil deposits. And yet they are technologically advanced more than Africans that are sitting
on the oil.
Although we can attribute the resource curse as a major cause of state failure, we may not
conclusively say that it is in all situations. Some other states that still have oil, gold, diamond, and
other natural resources have managed it well to provide important political goods to its citizens
and make life better. Saudi Arabia for example has a large deposit of oil and they are stable. Thus,
the management of resources should be a major concern, not the resources itself.
Population: This might sound strange but you cannot rule out population explosion as one of the
factors that contribute to state failure. This is because none of the highly populated countries in
the world falls in the top ten of the most sustainable countries in the Fragile State Index. However,
Nigeria is far below the table because of multiple internal contradictions caused by ethnic and
religious differences. Due to the diverse historical and ideological experiences, in countries like
Nigeria with over two hundred million people, there are bound to be clashes of interest resulting
from individual differences especially when the differences are irreconcilable.
With the vast population, there will be shortages in resources to sustain the teeming
population and this will result in conflicts and clashes which will lead to the failure of the state.
With this huge population, the government will struggle to share the social goods and because it
may not go round they may be tempted to attend to their own people first. This may be seen as
favoritism by the other people who may also revolt. Countries with a very high population like
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Nigeria, India, China, etc end up migrating to other countries around the world in search of greener
pastures. Nigeria for instance is a country that has its citizens all over the world. Population experts
have argued that apart from the indigenous people, Africans, especially Nigerians are the next in
terms of population in every country of the world.
Religion Economy: Religion has also been linked as one of the causes of Africa’s
underdevelopment. Simon Oladipo and editor with New African Broadcasting Network T.V the
role of religion in the progress and failure of nations cannot be overemphasized. For him, every
nation in the world falls under two types of economy: The knowledge economy and the religious
economy. The most prosperous nations of the world belong to the knowledge economy while the
poorest nations of the world belong to the religion economy. The knowledge economy engages
the brain and asks questions and seeks solutions to problems, while the religion economy is the
economy that dumps every responsibility to God. Japan for instance is a knowledge economy, it
has no natural resources, but it is a prosperous nation six out of ten cars we see are made in Japan,
it is also a corrupt-free nation. The same goes with China, it is not a religion economy and yet it is
successful and almost every phone we use is made in China. On the other hand, African countries
despite been blessed with a lot of natural resources like; oil, diamond, tin, Gold, Nickel, copper,
uranium, phosphates, coal, natural gas etc yet are still the poverty capital of the world with endless
corruption. It is also one of the most religious continents in the world.
Ironically, two of the greatest religion of the world which is Christianity and Islam
emanated from Isreal and Saudi Arabia but surprisingly, none of them falls under religious
economy. One of the evidence of their subscription to the knowledge economy is the yearly
pilgrimages that generate to them billions in dollars. In fact, the Hajj and the Umrah add $12 billion
to Sandi Arabia’s GDP per year which accounts for 20 percent of the country’s non-oil GDP and
seven percent of total GDP. The Saudi government also plans to increase revenues from pilgrimage
to $150 billion by 202212
.
Consequences of Failed States
The consequences of failed state are devastating ranging from loss of control over its
territory, to total collapse and break down of law and order. Failed state have very weak control of
its territory this is because, when the necessary political goods have not been supplied to the
citizenry, violent groups rise up and attempt to take over the government. Under a failed state,
physical infrastructures are in decay, economic and social institutions are in comatose, abuse of
human rights and corruption is high, the life and property of the citizens are in jeopardy.
Rotberg summarizes the consequences of a failed state thus:
Weak states include a broad continuum of states that are: Inherently weak
because of geographical, physical, or fundamental economic constraints;
basically strong, but temporarily or situationally weak because of internal
antagonism, management flaws, greed, despotism, or external attacks; and
a mixture of the two. Weak states typically habor ethnic, religious linguistic,
or other inter-communal tensions, that have not yet or not yet thoroughly,
become overtly violent.13
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For him, in a failed state, urban crime rates tend to be higher and increasing. In weak states, the
ability to provide adequate measures of other political goods are diminished or diminishing14
.
Furthermore, the physical infrastructural networks in failed states are in shambles, this is
very glaring in the poor state of schools and hospitals in such state. The GDP per capita and other
critical economic indicators are very low in failed states and the level of corruption is
embarrassingly high and escalating. In most failed states, there is no rule of law as civil societies,
journalists and human rights activists work under very stringent conditions. Weak states are often
ruled by dictators either elected or not. Some leaders turn to dictators, after been elected in a
democratic election, some of them turn to pursue personal or ethnic agenda rather than a national
course. This type of leadership further divides the state and makes the state insecure.
The high level of insecurity in failed states is enormous. This makes the citizens live in
fear and anxiety. Robert states that:
Citizens depend on states and central governments to secure their people
and free them from fear. Unable to establish an atmosphere of security
nationwide, and often struggling to project power and official authority, the
faltering state’s failure becomes obvious even before, or as, rebel groups and
other contenders threaten the residents of central cities and overwhelm
demoralized government contingents, as in Liberia and Sierra Leone.15
Nigeria is a typical example of a state where insecurity thrives. Armed robbery, kidnapping,
banditry, militancy, and worst of all Bokoharam insurgency are the order of the day. The
government has done little or nothing to arrest the situation, instead, they are been used to score
cheap political points.
In most failed states, regimes prey on their own constituents. Driven by ethnic or other
inter-communal hostility or by the governing cities insecurities, they victimize their own citizens
or some subject of the whole that is regarded as hostile.16 This was visible in most African states
especially, Zaire under Mobutu Seko, Sierra Leone under Siaka Steven, Liberia under Charles
Taylor, Zimbabwe under Robert Mugabe and, Lybia under Muammar Gaddafi.
Failed states are characterized by the presence of violent crimes. As the state authority
weakens and fails, and the state becomes criminal in its oppression of its citizens, so lawlessness
becomes more apparent. Criminal gangs take over the street of the cities. Arms and drug trafficking
become more common, insurgency, terrorism, banditry, kidnapping becomes the order of the day.
The police can no longer protect the people and the citizens will resort to self-help. This is the
picture that the government of Nigeria is currently painting. That is why different ethnic
nationalities that make up the Nigerian state are resorting to regional security outfit to protect their
people. The establishment of Amotekun security network in the South West, the Ogbunigwe
security services in the south East, and the Shege,-Kafasa (I dare you to attack or surrender) in the
north are all evidence to show that the Nigerian state is quick nose-diving into a failed state. The
fact remains that the unity and security of the country have never been threatened since after the
Nigeria-Biafra war more than now. The country has been drifting into a failed state because its
leaders have abandoned a national course to pursue an ethnic agenda.
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In a failed state, there is no proper separation of power, and the checks and balances which
should exist between the three arms of government in a democracy are lacking. In most countries
like Nigeria, the executive hijack the other institutions (the judiciary and legislatures), and they
will be used like puppets by the executives. Rotberg paints the picture thus:
Failed states exhibit flawed institutions. That is, only the institution of the
executive functions. If legislatures exist at all, they are rubber-stamping
machines. Democratic debate is noticeably absent. The judiciary is
derivative of the executive rather than being independent, and citizens know
that they cannot rely on the court system for significant redress or remedy,
especially against the state.17
This makes the other arms of government lose their sense of professional responsibility because
they exist only to carry out the orders of the executive and oppress the citizens using the police
and the army. The right and freedom of the citizens are not respected, thereby giving rise to protests
and crises. One of the features of a failed state is that there is no freedom of worship, freedom of
speech, freedom of association, freedom to own property, etc.
Failed states are typified by decayed infrastructures. In a failed state, we have bad road
networks filled with potholes, dilapidated and ill-equipped hospitals, poor communication
networks, epileptic power supply, poorly structured and unequipped schools, etc. There is a high
rate of corruption in public and private places and leaders and those in positions of authority siphon
funds from the state coffers into their personal accounts. All these make life unbearable for people
living within the state and most of them who could not survive the hardship will seek to go out of
the country for greener pastures. Rotberg explains that:
When the state has failed or is in the process of failing, the effective
education and health systems are privatized (with a resulting hodgepodge
of shady schools and questionable medical clinics in the cities), or the public
facilities because increasingly decrepit and neglected. Teachers, physicians,
nurses, and orderlies are paid late or not at all, and absenteeism increases.
Textbooks and medicines have become scarce. X-ray machines break down
and are not repaired. Reports to the relevant ministries are ignored. Citizens,
especially rural parents, students, and patients, slowly realize that the state
has abandoned them to their own devices and to the forces of nature.18
When states fail, the unity of purpose is lost, because the whole institution collapses and the state
will be prone or open to different attacks both from outside and from within. In cases of a global
health emergency or epidemics like AIDS, Lassar fever, and Corona Virus, such states often
experience a very high casualty rate because the existing health infrastructure is often
overwhelmed. The life expectancy rate in failed states is very low because the situation of the
country places the citizens at a very high risk of passing at any time. Poverty and illiteracy rates
also fall, corruption flourishes, this manifests itself in “Kickbacks on anything that can be put out
to fake tender (medical supplies, textbooks, bridges, roads, and tourism concessions);
unnecessarily wasteful construction projects arranged so as to maximize the rents that they
generate; licenses for existing and non-existent activities; and persistent and generalized
extortion”.19 The gradual decline of real national and per capita income levels of annual GDP
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marks the total collapse and failure of a state. This economic crisis lead to inflation, deflation, and
food shortages.
Finally, state failure has many indicators, but in other to rank the severity of state failure,
Rotberg suggests that there is a hierarchy of positive state functions. These include; 1. Security; 2.
Institutions to regulate and adjudicate conflicts, rule of law, secure property rights and contract
enforcement;

  1. Political participation; and
  2. Social service delivery, infrastructure, and regulation of the economy.
    From his analysis, strong states scores very high marks, and all these indicators while
    failing or failed states perform abysmally poor.
    Prospects against State failure in Africa
    The solution to state failure in Africa is not going to take a straight perspective. There is need to
    approach it from a foundational angle, this is because if the healing do not start from the root, other
    efforts will just be like window dressing the major issue.
    Authentic Education: The failure of states in modern Africa can also be attributed to the type of
    education that the Africans received from their colonial masters. This type of education is what we
    refer to as “inauthentic education”. Walter Rodney called it “Education for underdevelopment”20
    .
    Education is very crucial in any society because it is through education that the values and beliefs
    of the people are transferred from one generation to another. It can either be formal or informal.
    However, in Africa, informal education is the first and most important part of education because
    young people start learning from home how to respect their elders, honesty, hard work, etc.
    Education is what grows out of the environment. The process of learning cannot be separated from
    what the people do in society. This is what is obtainable in the indigenous pre-colonial education
    where education was not separated from the productive activities of the individual. This helped in
    producing children with sound mental, emotional, and physical personalities. Rodney asserts that
    “Altogether, though mainly informal means, pre-colonial African education matched the realities
    of pre-colonial African society and produced well-rounded personalities to fit into that society”21
    .
    There was also formal education in Africa during the pre-colonial era. This form of education then
    was also connected to the purpose of the society. There were regimented programs taught at
    different periods and stages of the individual’s life. Rodney writes that:
    There was, for instance, more formal specialization, because the proportion
    of formal to informal education increases with technological advance. Apart
    from hunting and religion, the division of labour made it necessary to create
    guilds for passing down techniques of ironworking, leather making, cloth
    manufacturing, pottery moulding, professional trading and so on22
    .
    This system is called the apprenticeship system of education. In Igbo land, it is expected that the
    young student stays under the guidance and tutelage of the master for some period after which he
    is settled and starts up his own. The type of education that the colonizers introduced to replace
    traditional African education ignored the African values, beliefs, and environment. Their education
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    was focused on training Africans to help them in local administration and to staff the private
    capitalist firms to be junior clerks and messengers owned by Europeans. Rodney insists that
    “colonial schooling was an education for subordination, exploitation, the creation of mental
    confusion and the development of underdevelopment”23. Their main aim of educating Africans
    was just for their interest; this can be seen from the poor enrollment of students throughout Africa.
    Thus we must go back to our apprenticeship method of education because the colonial
    education alienates the child from his environment and only trains him to know book instead of
    skills. In the African condition, the education that is supposed to be a tool to solve the problem of
    society is the problem itself. Given this, there is an urgent need to change the Euro-based
    curriculum which the colonialists left us with, from the primary, secondary to the university level.
    African cultures, values, and history must be thought to students from the elementary stage. Njoku
    rightfully states that: “every university in Africa must be involved in Africa in a deep and
    fundamental sense. Like universities everywhere, universities in Africa must represent the focal
    point of the culture of the society of which they are a part24
    .
    The urgency for this change is because the African child who is a product of the colonial
    school is a marginal child who belongs to neither Europe nor Africa. Ezeani submits that:
    It is baffling that African art, African literature and African history are still
    strange to many Africans. Ironically, the people seem to be more familiar
    with the European music, arts, culture and history. Since schools are today
    the principal agents which transmit culture, it is time that schools in Africa
    began to spend more time on African culture25
    .
    When this change is made and Africans taught in the context of their own culture and values, only
    then will the African child bridge the gap between school and African society. And that is when
    he can provide solutions to the problems bedeviling the continent, especially the problem of
    underdevelopment. Little wonder why, despite billions of dollars that flowed to the poorest part of
    Africa, yet they are getting poorer and their economy is not getting any better? William Easterly
    proved in his work The White Man’s Burden that over 1950-2001 among the poor countries,
    countries with below-average foreign aid had the same growth rate as countries with belowaverage foreign aid26
    . This means that poor countries without foreign aid had no problem having
    positive economic growth. This goes a long way to show that aids do not affect investment and
    economic growth. When the foreign aids come and disappear, everyone will be wondering, where
    did the money go? In countries like Nigeria, there have been many cases where stories of Animals
    like snakes, monkeys, and even rats swallow billions of Naira. These stories are made up to cover
    the stealing and diversion of the commonwealth into the private purse. Foreign aid usually finds
    its ways into the pockets of corrupt leaders and their allies. This goes to show that foreign aid is
    not the solution to the underdevelopment of African countries because it is often mismanaged.
    Thus, before African countries ask for aids, they must be ready to curb the insatiable greed of their
    leaders and to use the available resources to transform the lives of their poor citizens.
    Real Independence
    No meaningful development can take place in any society where freedom and justice are
    not entrenched. The way and manner that African countries got their independent exposed them to
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    31
    another level of external manipulation or what many called neo-colonialism. This situation
    manifested after the physical independence granted to African states. The young “independent”
    Africa adopted democratic norms for governance, but this did not take care of the immediate
    problems facing African states then, African states were bedeviled by civil wars, diseases,
    corruption, and boundary disputes. These were caused by the artificial multi-ethnic states with
    haphazard and no clearly defined borders created by the white man. This situation was an ideal
    ground for all sorts of foreign interventions. African leaders thought that these aids and
    interventions from the white man were to show concern about their plight, but they didn’t know
    that they had ulterior motives to continue their subjugation, exploitation, and domination.
    The colonialists left Africa in a precarious state so that they (Africans) will always run back
    to them asking for help and aids. These aids are like the Trojan horse, which comes with many
    stringent conditions. These conditions have contributed to the underdevelopment of the continent
    today. Economically, western influence has been felt all over Africa especially through Aid and
    Foreign Direct Investment. Caplan quoted in Ezeani states that: “The collective complexity of
    western governments and banks, multinational corporations and African business and political
    leaders in this massive fraud is a perfect example of the great conspiracy against the people of the
    continent”27
    . When they come with their loan and aids like bait, Africans swallowed it hook line,
    and sinker, without knowing that that they are killing themselves. The external manipulation comes
    through IMF, World Bank, and international organizations in form of adjustment programs,
    austerity measures, currency devaluations, and Foreign Direct Investments (FDI). A typical
    example in Nigeria is the astronomical increase of the exchange of Naira to the dollar in the last
    thirty years.
    Politically, the case is not different, African countries have been manipulated politically.
    Because even after independence, Europe still has an interest in controlling, thus they planted
    puppets that are ready to follow their dictates and protect the interest of the colonial masters. It
    will surprise you to hear that even now, almost all African presidents emerge with the blessings of
    the colonial master, it is no longer the duty of the people to elect their leaders but that of America,
    Britain, France, Portugal, Spain, etc. The manipulation and rigging of elections in Africa were
    enacted by the colonial government. In countries like Nigeria and Kenya, they tried to manipulate
    elections to ensure that their allies would emerge victoriously. These manipulations have instituted
    corruption, and authoritarianism in African politics thus development becomes very difficult.
    Moreover, the political system that African leaders inherited was structured to benefit the
    evolving ruling classes with little regard for the needs of the people. The inability of African
    leaders to dismantle the internal political structures imposed by the European colonial regimes
    allowed ethnic and regional- based political competition to remain the core of Africa’s local and
    national political competition to remain the core of Africa’s local and national political structures28
    .
    The lack of national identities and political movements ensured the continued intervention of the
    former political powers in Africa’s internal affairs.
    Africa Must Regain its Lost Identity
    Identity is the particular traits that something is known with. In Igbo, it is called “Ejiri mara
    ihe”. Identity is those qualities that are inherent and it can also be acquired from our immediate
    environment. It is like a signature that is attached to individuals and people. These traits can be
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    lost and a new one acquired. In situations where the newly acquired traits conflict with the original
    one, identity crisis sets in and this has devastating consequences on both the individual and the
    society.
    The crisis of identity amongst Africans was caused by its bizarre historical experiences
    (slave trade and colonialism). Africans encountered the church and Western education in this
    process. These two institutions helped in brainwashing and indoctrinating Africans. They devalued
    African culture and almost obliterated Africa’s identity. The identity of the Africans, are those
    things they are known for which are imbibed in their culture: language, value, religion, social
    structure, and world views. The sudden transformation which characterized African’s newfound
    identity is enormous.
    The impact of western culture on African identity is visible in every facet of African life.
    For Okere:
    This present culture is an amalgam of the total of all its parts: the precolonial, ancient past; the experience of the slave trade/ colonization and
    independence; the present multi-lingual, a multi-ethnic form of political coexistence; the massive urbanization, industrialization, and neo-colonial
    exploitation; the religious pluralism, exposure to modern education and
    growing capitalism; the growing mass poverty, consumerism, and
    corruption; the mass urban unemployment and the deserted villages
    syndrome29
    .
    The truth is that African culture never remained the same after contact with other cultures. Thus,
    language, belief, system, worldview, which were the main constituents of the African identity were
    distorted. This brought about the crisis of identity that the Africans suffer today because they are
    now what Frantz Fanon called “black skin, white mask”. Although, they are Africans by the virtue
    of their birth, heritage, and history, but they wear the mask of the white man. The effect of this is
    enormous. The crisis of identity leaves someone confused and lifeless. To live, one must know
    who he or she is. The knowledge of self is a fundamental condition for being alive. One may be
    breathing but yet he is not alive. This means that to have no identity is to be an object instead of a
    subject. Ezeani called it Ihe-ndu (subject) and ihe-nkiti (object)30
    . He described ihe-nkiti as a thing
    that can be animate or inanimate. Ihe-nkiti does not reflect or ask fundamental questions about
    why he is alive, reasons for his actions, and the limitation and practices of his actions. But ihe-ndu
    reflects and asks fundamental questions. Having an identity crisis turns the Africans into ihe-nkiti,
    they accept whatever names the white man calls them, speak the white man’s language, adopt his
    religion, and forgets where he comes from and what he is. Ezeani however explains that a person
    can move from being ihe-nkiti to ihe-ndu when he wakes up from his slumber and becomes awake.
    He begins to ask fundamental questions and he removes the cloak of the white man to reveal his
    true identity. For example concerning European names which many Africans took or were given,
    those who gained the necessary awareness reacted by shading them off. Such people are; Kwame
    Nkrumah, Chinua Achebe, Wole Soyinka, Obafemi Awolowo, Mbonu Ojike, and Nnamdi
    Azikiwe31
    . They discarded their European names because they realized that by bearing these noncontextual and alienating names they were tagged instead of named. For instance names before the
    coming of the white man are means of identity. People are known for what they answer. In Africa,
    most names have a lot to say or do about where people come from. This is because people are
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    named after their ancestors, natural things within the environment, gods that they worship, and
    situations surrounding their birth. Igbo names like; Chioma, Ada, Igbonekwu, Akachukwu, Ani,
    etc has deep meaning and connection to the people and their beliefs. However, with the coming of
    Christianity, names like; James, Michael, Peter, Wendy, William, Henry, etc were used as
    baptismal names. These names were imported from overseas and have no correspondence to our
    culture. Africans were made to believe that these names are holy names and names of saints. Ezeani
    writes that: “we have to answer these names of holy saints so they can intercede for us; they say,
    but why should Africans not answer their original names and become saints of tomorrow who
    interceded for others”32
    .
    Now people have even started changing their surnames and not allowing their children to
    answer their surname because some of them believe that the name is the cause of their misfortune.
    Thus we now see names like; Jane Francis, Hilary John, Mary Kenneth, etc. This is creating an
    individual who has no identity, who has no root, who is completely an alien. Before now, you can
    comfortably predict where someone comes from, the tribe, the state, the local government, even
    the village, because their names take you to their root but today, it is very hard to do that.
    Our contention is not that Africa should not copy anything from the Europeans. However,
    in copying, we should copy it wisely. We must not lose our identity in an attempt to copy the white
    man. Africa must know how to copy the right things for instance; copying European technology
    will help us to improve technologically, but changing our names, our skin color, or language can
    never enhance our standard of living. Imitating their lifestyle by involving in homosexuality and
    lesbianism which are a moral aberration in Africa is completely unacceptable. Ezeani agrees with
    this point when he states that: “The point is not that Africans should not learn new things from
    Europeans or copy Europe or America: the contention is that they should show circumspection in
    their progress of copying others”33
    .
    There are also good things in Africa and African culture which the Europeans can copy,
    for example, the beautiful African dance, the architectural skills that go into women plaiting, the
    natural way of beautifying the bride, etc. Africa cannot discover these good sides of them when
    they have not liberated themselves from ignorance, prejudice, and hatred. They cannot discover
    this when they don’t know who they are: and why they are here. They must discover their identity
    through reflective education.
    Conclusion
    The problems associated with state failure such as poverty, drug trafficking, terrorism, and
    failure of democracies are major global issues, and in other to prevent states from failing, adequate
    attention must be paid to the process of state emergence and state formation. Fukuyama in his
    article; The Imperative of State Building argues that while we know much about state-building,
    there is much that we do not know, particularly about transferring strong institutions to developing
    countries. For him, we can transfer resources, people, and technology, but well-functioning public
    institutions require habits of mind and they operate in complex ways that resist being moved.34
    These institutions which are the bedrock of development in every state will have to grow
    out from the culture and the worldview of the people, for it to be generally acceptable by the
    people. Institutions cannot be imported and imposed on the people without any regard to their
    cultural values. Institutions are not like products that you export to any part of the world. It is
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    34
    something that spurts forth from the people. This is because man is the agent of both development
    and underdevelopment, thus, his views believe, actions, values must be respected. The work
    concludes therefore that the failure of African states is due to the fact that the institutions on which
    most African states are built on are faulty and alien. Development and underdevelopment is a
    product of man’s action and inaction, so anything that influences his thinking, affects his action
    and this is why colonialism and slave trade is the most devastating thing that happened to Africans.
    Protagoras supports this view when he declares that: “Man is the measure of all things of
    all things that are, they are; and of all things that are not, they are not”35
    . This statement does not
    just stop at the consideration of objective truth, but also to everything that can be measured and
    development is one of them. This means that development and underdevelopment is a function of
    man. Man in this context is the thinking man (Ihe-ndu) who reflects on his condition, why he is
    here, his roles, and how he can better his situations and find solutions to his challenges. Man here
    is the subject and the creator who asks important questions in other to act. In what Agbo called
    Refl-action, man does not only think but takes action on his thought. For him, refl-action is a
    commitment to think out a practical solution, to think of what to do, how, and when to do it. Reflaction is not to think before acting, neither is it unguided action. It is an admission that thoughts
    without action or thinking without acting is docility while acting without (simultaneously) thinking
    is foolhardiness and arbitrariness36
    .
    Finally, we must not continue to use the Whiteman as scapegoats to the African
    Predicaments, we must take our destiny in our hands and take proactive steps to change the present
    African predicament. This will be done through the redefinition and reconstruction of African
    values. The need for action is what brings about development, there may be different theories of
    development but there will be no development if they are not put into action. This is why Karl
    Marx in the 11th of his Theses On Feuerbach had written that “the philosophers have only
    interpreted the world, in various ways; the point, however, is to change it”37 There is a need for
    this change in Africa now. For Agbo, “if there is anywhere this “change” should transit from
    “madepoint” to ‘carried out action’, it is in Africa, where political, religious, economic, scholarly,
    in fact, cultural processes and institutions have been deliberately created to encourage (and sustain)
    a culture of docility, indifference, ignorance, surrender and fear.38 The foundation of Africa’s
    underdevelopment is in the mindset of Africans, which needs to be worked on. This task is for
    philosophers who have liberated themselves from ‘colonial mentality’ and regained their identity.
    End Notes
  3. Messner, J.J. (ed) 2017 Fragile State Index, Fund for Peace: Washington Dc. Available on:
    www.fundforpeace.org, February 10th, 2016
  4. Heldman, Gerald B. And Steven R. Ratner, 1993, “Saving Failed States,” Foreign Policy, 89
    (Winter 1992-1993) 3-20.
  5. Zartman, I.W. (ed.) Collapsed States: The Disintegration and Restoration of Legitimate
    Authority, Boulder, C.O: Lynne Rienner, 1995. Available on: http://www.foreignpolicy.com.
  6. Rotberg, Robert, I.. Failed States, Collapsed States, Weak States: Causes and Indicators.
    Chapter One: Available on: www.brooking.edu>wp-content>uploads>
  7. Wole Soyinka Convene Sovereign Conference, Weekend Concord (Lagos) 17-10-98
  8. Ibid.
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    35
  9. Simbine, A. T. Quoted in Nathaniel Danjibo and Kelvin Ashindorbe. The Evolution and
    Pattern of Political Party Formation And the Search for National Integration in Nigeria
    Brazilian Journal of African Studies, Porto Alegre v.3, n.5, Jan./Jun. 2018, p. 85-100
  10. Ibid.
  11. Collier P. and Hoeffler, A. C Greed and Grievance in Civil War, (Oxford University Press
  12. Oxford Economic Papers 56) P. 563-595.
  13. Ibid.
  14. Ibid.
  15. How important is the Umrah pilgrimage for the Sandi economy www.trtworld.com/niddleeart/how-important-is-the-umrah-pilgrimage-for-the-sandi-economy-34163/amp. January
    25, 2021
  16. Robert Rotberg. (2016) Failed States, Collapsed States, Weak States: Causes and Indicators.
    P. 4
  17. Ibid.
  18. Ibid., 6.
  19. Ibid.
  20. Ibid.
  21. Ibid., 7
  22. Ibid., 8.
  23. Walter Rodney, How Europe Underdeveloped Africa. (Panaf Press: Abuja, 1972 ), p. 290.
  24. Ibid., 291.
  25. Ibid., 292.
  26. Ibid., 293.
  27. Njoku quoted in Fufunwa, p. 120
  28. Emefiena Ezeani, A Philosophy of Education for African Nations: Recovering from the
    Negative Effects of Colonial Education, (Veritas Lumen publishers, London 2nd Edition,
  29. P. 107
  30. William Easterly, The White Man’s Burden (The Penguin Press: New York, 2006), p. 36
  31. Caplan Quoted in Ezeani
  32. Benjamine Talton, The Challenge of Decolonization in Africa Available on:
    http://exhibitions.nypl.org/africanage/essay-challenge-of-decolonization. September 10, 2019.
  33. Theophilus Okere, (ed) African Culture: The past and present as an indivisible whole in
    cultural Heritage and Contemporary Change Series II Africa vol. 3. 1996. The Council for
    Research in Values and Philosophy. P. 18
  34. Emefiena Ezeani, Iquism: Intelligent questioning as African Liberation Philosophy: (Veritas
    Lumen Publishers: London 2014), p. 21.
  35. Ibid. p. 22.
  36. Emefiena Ezeani, Iquism, p. 35.
  37. Ibid., p. 39
  38. Francis Fukuyama The Imperative of State Building Journal of Democracy Johns Hopkins
    University Press Volume 15, Number 2, April 2004 pp. 17-31
  39. Plato & Jowett, B. Plato’s Protagoras. Clarendon Press, 1992. P. 161b
  40. Agbo, Joseph The Principle of “Refl-action” as the Basis for a Culture of Philosophy in
    Africa Filosofia Theoretica: Journal of African Philosophy, Culture and Religion Vol. 2 No.
    2, 2013 pp 423-460
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    36
  41. Marx, Karl “Theses on Feuerbach”, in Engels, Frederick, Ludwig Feuerbach and The End of
    Classical Philosophy, (Peking: Foreign Language Press, 1976), p. 65
  42. Agbo, Joseph The Principle of “Refl-action”.

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