APQ - APPON PHILOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY

Nigeria, in more than a century of existence, is still grappling with the process of nation building. The process from the onset was thorny, resulting in an attempted secession and civil war. The old challenges of ethnicity and religious intolerance, which played key roles in the war persist even as the boundaries of poverty, unemployment, corruption, insecurity continue to expand. As such, Nigeria is nowhere near achieving the one nation, which the 1914 amalgamation was set to accomplish. How best, then, can this task be approached? This study adopts philosophical reflection as the best method that can offer the level of social analysis required for both understanding the issues frustrating Nigeria's nationhood and measures to correct them. This study locates the threats to nation building in the structural flaws inherent in Nigeria's democracy, which makes its application contextually removed from the needs of the people. A democracy that is unreflective of the plural composition of the country and incapable of making leaders accountable. These result in instilling in Nigerians a sense of not belonging to the nation, thereby undermining the unity of the country. This study concludes that a rehabilitation of Nigeria's democracy, especially by instituting a constitution that reflects the peoples' will and a peaceful restructuring of the country where each region can develop at its pace are prerequisites for re-making the Nigerian nation.

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