THE ELITIST ROLE IN NATIONAL DEVELOPMENT OF NIGERIA
BY
COMRADE CHINEKWU ANTHONY UGBOR
Most countries in the world today are faced with
the challenge of National Development. E.g. Nigeria. National development
should rather be the elite group; and that the first step to National
development should be the human mind which is the main producer and sustainers
of the physical referents often equated with national development.
National development is a process of human civilization; hence the human person
must take the main focus. Nations in conflict are nations which members of the
elite group are also in conflict. Issues like this ignited Nietzsche
observation in his work Beyond Good and Evil. He states:
The essential thing in a good and
healthy
Aristocracy is, however, that it does not feel
itself to be function (of the monarchy or
of the commonwealth) but as their meaning
and supreme justification….
Thus, whatever a nation is, no matter the system of
government in place, it is what the elite group or the aristocratic group of
the nation says it should be that it becomes. The nation draws its
meaning from them and they justify its being. From the Promethean time
(the age when man first came into possession of his world through tools, fire
and speech), the burden of civilization has been borne by the elite
class. Even Nietzsche agreed with this vie by stating that “Every
elevation of the type ‘man’ has hitherto been the work of an aristocratic
society and so shall it always be….”2 As it is with
individuals so it is with nations, the burden of civilization of the world, of
the development of the world, lies squarely in the hands of the elite of such
nations in today’s globalized village – the world of unity of mankind which
consists in the fact that nothing essential can happen anywhere that does not
concern all. The elite or aristocratic societies of the world mould and
direct international wealth and world view. This explains the
internationalization of the democratic ideal, which has remained a burden
projected by the world ruling elite nations. All norms and rules are
legitimized by dominant world views and all dominant world views are views of
the elite of elite nations.
Every considered higher culture on earth emanates from the elite. The
continual overcoming of man from animal being (the beast) to human being, of
recreating man, which has remained a constant feature of human civilization,
has remained an elite project. Development in human society is not of
inanimate beings but of man who harnesses raw materials for his use and the
socialization of his kind to a harmonious social living.
We are daily admonished to be good followers if we want to be good
leaders. Those who sloganize this followership-leadership theory have
refused to consider other variables that beget good followership; the type of
leadership we are admonished to follow has ignored the consideration whether
the leadership is bad or good). Most people forget the fact that a good
and dedicated follower of a bad leader will definitely be a bad leader.
The elite group is basically not given the prominence that it deserves.
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