The 4^th Inaugural Lecture of  Samuel Adegboyega University,  Ogwa Edo State, Nigeria delivered by Prof. Cyrille Ngamen Kouassi and held on Thursday, 7^th July, 2022 has come and gone. However, the issues and assertions of the day are still in the air.

Samuel Adegboyega University is one of the fastest growing Private Universities in Nigeria located in Edo State with an astute Administrator, Prof. Adewumi Idowu as the Vice-Chancellor. The Vice- Chancellor during the Inaugural Lecture intimated the University community and the general public with the giant strides achieved so far and the developmental strategies being put in place towards making Samuel Adegboyega University a topmost University.

Prof. Adewunmi Idowu, Vice-Chancellor Samuel Adegboyega University.

The topic of the 4^th Inaugural Lecture “Western Fallacies and the “Monkeyism” Theory:  A Philosophical Enquiry into why some Men are not Humans” created so much expectations in the public space. Surprisingly, it continues to be a subject of intellectual discourse even after the Inaugural Lecture.

ValidViewNetwork opines that the conceptualization and delivery of the topic has to a large extent obliterated and uprooted a wrong narrative leaving the audience and the public with an outcome of the genuine interrogation of the African man as that of a distinct entity, tradition and culture.

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According to the Inaugural Lecturer, “This lecture, therefore, is an attempt to debunk the “time yellowed” impression of some people especially the Western world that Africans are lazy, primitive, uncultured and good for nothing whence the “monkeyism” theory.”

Prof. Ngamen lamented the unwarranted categorization of Africans as being inferior to those in the western world and discrimination based on race and colour. Advancing the following rhetorical questions “Who is a human being and how does he / she look like? If all men are equal before God then why and how is it that some men are not humans? Is there any relationship between culture and race? Does the qualification for being a human being dependent on the whims and caprices of other fellowmen? Should a culture be “superior?” or “inferior” to the other? If yes, why and how? Is culture hereditary? If no, then what is the way forward for present day Africa?” , the Don debunked the fallacy placing the western world above the Africans. He therefore convincingly asserted that all men are “humans” and equal irrespective of their skin colour, origin and location.

ValidViewNetwork reports that the Inaugural Lecturer expressly condemned the attitude of the white man towards the black man which alienated the Black man from his tradition, culture and way of life. .

He condemned the assumptions of the white man about the black man which has left the black man as an inferior entity capable of doing little or nothing. According to him, White men alleged that the black man intelligence quotient was low, his vocabulary had no abstract nouns, he was incapable of abstract thinking, he had no philosophy, he did not understand natural phenomena, he has no idea of causality. His mind was full of magical notions which have been debunked by scientific findings.

According to the Inaugural Lecturer, white men dismissed all African indigenous belief as heathen. “In their attempt to impose their culture on Africans, white men succeeded in dividing parents from children, villages from villages, tribes from tribes and to a large extent, countries from countries. White men wanted to make sure that all evidence of African culture was gradually suppressed or eradicated from living memory” He emphasized that part of the tragedy of the infusion of the white man was the unwarranted change of names and obliteration of the identity of the black man to suit the European lifestyle.

Identifying the effects of the negative mentality on the African man, the Inaugural Lecturer lamented that the effect is multidimensional. In his words,  “it is obvious that psychologically, politically and socio- culturally, the colonizer/white man has succeeded in convincing the colonized that is, the black man, that he/she is lazy, good for nothing, unintelligent, wicked, inferior, backward or underdeveloped. That he/she lacks personality and he/she is not checked by any inhibition of civilization. So, constantly and forcefully confronted with this image of him, set forth and imposed on all institutions and in every human contact, the black man ends up recognizing it as one would a detested nick name which has become a familiar description”.

ValidViewNetwork reports that the recommendation of the Don is one that should birth a new aspiration in all Africans and provide impetus for development and growth as he advocated for a paradigm shift towards migrating from the present status to the rightful position.

Prof. Ngamen enthused “So in the search for the way forward, the twenty first century Africa needs a paradigm shift, a kind of “Copernican revolution” in the ways and manners she presently perceives and expresses her cultures and traditions. In other words, as far as development is concerned, each culture has its own peculiarity and conditioning therefore, it is high time for present day Africans to understand that they do not need “others” especially the West to name, define and even classify them”.

The Don stated emphatically , “Since it is now a fact that all the technical and scientific theories, all the analyses of culture and race, all the attempts to establish the innate inferiority of the black man are vain efforts, what is urgently needed is for present day Africans to primarily decolonize their current mentality and look for a way forward in achieving it. This should be done through the self-actualization of Africans and the promotion of African personality as a viable vehicle for development.

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