Public Lecture and Occasional Papers

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History and Society
(University of Lagos Press, 2004-12-07) Ade Ajayi, J.F.
My aim in this lecture, is to urge that we take a moment to analyse what is really wrong with our society and to suggest what we can and should be doing about it. The degree of violence and instability in our society is intolerable. It is no longer strange to hear that a number of students have used matchets to kill fellow students of the same institution on campus. There are always rumours that some people sacrifice their children in the search for wealth. And the number of corpses that turn up at shrines may be proof of this. Armed robbery and political assassinations are rampant. Business enterprises collapse because no one trusts any other, not even his brother or sister, to play fair. There is such instability and unpredictability that it becomes very difficult to initiate policies that could be sustained for a year or two before "unforeseen circumstances" necessitate a revision, if not reversion. The IMF prescribed Structural Adjustment. We tried it and the present regime goes from one reform agenda to another, but we remain ill at ease