Funmi Ogundare
The African Universities Seminar Series–Nigeria (AUSS-NG) has referred to as for the reconstruction of Nigerian citizenship round inclusion, equality, participation and social justice, warning that structural inequalities and exclusion proceed to deepen battle and insecurity throughout the nation.
The students additionally urged the federal government to maneuver past standard commemorative remembrance of previous conflicts to what they described as reparative reminiscence that acknowledges historic injustices, restores the dignity of victims and helps forestall the recurrence of violence.
These had been among the many main suggestions contained in the communiqué issued on the finish of the second AUSS-NG convention and signed by Victor Ogbonnaya Okorie, Professor of Development, Obafemi Awolowo University (OAU).
The three-day convention, hosted by the University of Lagos Institute for African and Diaspora Studies (IADS), introduced collectively students, researchers, practitioners and different stakeholders to look at the theme, ‘Citizenship, Belonging and Geographies of Conflict in Contemporary Nigeria’. It featured 25 papers, comprising a keynote paper, a lead paper and 23 plenary papers.
According to Okorie, the discussions recognized various geographies of battle and types of belonging, together with conditional citizenship, noting that every geography of battle incorporates a triangle of violence involving perpetrators, victims and witnesses, whose reminiscences and experiences might range. The students noticed that violence is fungible, explaining that a person who’s a sufferer in one scenario may turn out to be a perpetrator in one other, whereas a witness may additionally turn out to be concerned in violence.
The convention distinguished between subjective violence, skilled by neighborhood and interpersonal conflicts corresponding to land disputes and farmer-herder conflicts, and goal or structural violence embedded in institutional and governmental preparations.
Okorie famous that unequal entry to sources, land, training, employment, alternatives and public establishments may foster exclusion and deepen social divisions.
The students due to this fact referred to as for peacebuilding interventions to deal with not solely quick violence but additionally the institutional, financial, social, and political buildings that reproduce inequality, deprivation, and battle.
“There is a need for greater recognition of locally generated peacebuilding initiatives and community knowledge, rather than relying exclusively on elite-driven or top-down approaches,” they said.
The convention additionally really useful integrating indigenous African information programs, native conflict-management mechanisms, and community-based practices into nationwide, regional, and world peacebuilding frameworks.
They additional referred to as for stronger recognition of girls’s casual peacebuilding roles in houses, markets, spiritual areas and communities as authentic elements of battle prevention, mediation and reconciliation.
The students urged nearer hyperlinks between casual community-based peacebuilding initiatives and formal governmental, institutional and worldwide mechanisms.
On training, the convention really useful treating studying as a elementary element of peacebuilding and reintegration, significantly for kids and ladies residing in displaced communities.
It additionally referred to as for participatory approaches to displacement, deradicalisation and reintegration programmes, stressing the necessity to recognise the company, identities, narratives and social realities of displaced individuals.
“Scholars and practitioners must also strengthen research-policy linkages through innovative, interdisciplinary and field-based studies capable of informing policy and institutional practice,” they said.
The convention additionally referred to as for African experiences, information programs and regionally generated proof to play a higher position in regional and world debates on battle, safety, citizenship and peacebuilding.
The students advocated a broader conception that strikes past a slender state-centric strategy to recognise on a regular basis financial, social, environmental and human insecurities skilled by residents. Regarding the therapeutic of warfare trauma and painful reminiscences, the convention referred to as on the state to maneuver from historic and commemorative remembrance to reparative reminiscence.
It mentioned reparative reminiscence ought to overtly acknowledge previous injustices, together with colonial violence, warfare crimes and systemic oppression, whereas guaranteeing that victims and marginalised teams are remembered in ways in which restore their dignity and affirm their humanity and company. According to the convention, such an strategy also needs to encourage society to simply accept duty for historic wrongs, with the last word goal of stopping a repetition of violence and selling therapeutic.
The convention additional restated the significance of strengthening the capability of universities, analysis establishments, civil society organisations, authorities businesses and neighborhood organisations for advocacy, coverage engagement, battle administration and institutionalised peacebuilding.
In its conclusion, AUSS-NG mentioned questions of citizenship and belonging couldn’t be separated from inequality, exclusion, displacement, identification, faith, gender, governance and structural violence, reiterating that sustainable peace would require not solely the administration of quick violence but additionally the transformation of the buildings and narratives that produce exclusion and insecurity.
The convention consequently referred to as for “stronger collaboration among universities, communities, government institutions, civil society organisations, religious institutions and international partners in designing and implementing peacebuilding interventions”.
It reaffirmed the AUSS-NG neighborhood’s dedication to producing rigorous, interdisciplinary, and policy-relevant scholarship that contributes to extra inclusive citizenship, stronger social cohesion, and sustainable peace in Nigeria and past.
