IMSU DON DECRIES UNDERDEVELOPMENT IN NIGERIA
A university Don. Professor Rev. Fr Izu Marcel Onyeocha has identified nonchalant attitude to time and need for punctuality by Nigerians as the major reason for the country’s continued underdevelopment.
Professor Onyeocha in his inaugural lecture yesterday April 26, 2012 on “The problematic of African Time” at the auditorium of Imo state University, Owerri – Imo state posited that the problem of punctuality has become so endemic that lateness to any function is accepted and explained off as “African time”.
He described tardiness as an abuse of time and an aberration that should not be taken for African time.
Onyeocha maintained, “Those responsible for, or promote, or are engaged in the travesty of tardiness should retrace their steps, and reconsider their attitudes so that tardiness disappears permanently from the lexicon, from memory, and from the African profile”.
While counselling against linking African time to negativism, Professor Onyeocha was of the opinion that, “In its true sense, “African time” is a positive concept of dedicating quality time to the full accomplishment of a set activity or task”
“It is about keeping activities in perspective and taking the required time to accomplish the task in hand. It is making time work for one, and not let oneself float rudderless within the confines of passing time.”
Professor Onyeocha regretted that when people come late to a prescheduled event, rather than being shamefaced and apologetic will tend to shrug it off by saying “African time”
Pointing out that, “The expression African Time when invoked by a defaulter is nothing but a crude rationalization, a strained excuse, and an unwarranted extrapolation and a weak pretext for tardiness in arriving or commencing, or prosecuting a prescheduled activity or event. The proper thing would have been to avert tardiness in the first place, or otherwise apologise when it happens.”
