SHONEKAN, FASHOLA BEMOAN FADING SOCIAL VALUES

Chief Earnest Shonekan, served the shortest term as President of Nigeria

Former head of interim government, Chief Ernest Shonekan and Governor Babatunde Fashola of Lagos state on yesterday decried what they described as lack of socio-cultural values in the country.

They spoke at the annual lecture of the Lagos state University, LASU Alumni in Ojo, Lagos. Speaking on the theme ‘Good Governance: A tool for revitalization of the socio-cultural values for social development,’ Shonekan traced kidnapping and other criminal tendencies prevalent in the country to lack of socio-cultural values, stressing that the values that once defined the nation’s past have been eroded by inclinations to criminal tendencies.

Shonekan who was chairman of the occasion lamented that kidnapping and the various crisis confronting the country was caused by lack of socio-cultural values.

“All these issues of kidnapping and other crimes are the manifestation of the debasement of values in the country.”

The Lagos State Governor Mr. Babatunde Fashola in his lecture titled, ‘Re-ordering our socio-cultural values as a tool for good governance and development,’ said the only way the country can move forward and be regarded as a great country amongst comity of nation is to revive its moral values.

“It is the order way round. It is only the restoration of values that can enable good governance to thrive. As a nation, we must reclaim these values because they are strongly eroding away quickly. These values are some of the things that have made us essentially African. And we need to go back to some of them quickly,” he said.

The governor said decency, diligence, hard work, humility, integrity and honesty remains critical values that Nigerians must adhere to.

Dwelling on the solution to restoring the values, the governor advocated restoration of good family units as the foundation for having a larger societal harmony devoid of violence and evil.

“ For me the place to start is the family. That is the smallest unit of government and it is scattered everywhere and it is run daily. Our family is a true picture of government institution. This is the first government in any country. In the family, there is allocation of budget and time”, he said.