Ethno-Religious Pluralism and Sustainable National Development: The Nigeria Experience

Abstract

Ethno-religious pluralism and sustainable national development in Nigeria seem a paradox as well as an unattainable goal. Lives and properties have been recklessly destroyed with unabated zeal without giving consideration to our national diversities. This study was carried out in sixteen Nigerian Universities with a sample was made up of 800 lecturers divided into north and south. The sampling technique adopted was the multi-staged random sampling technique; data was generated through the use of a structured questionnaire administered directly by the researchers and ten research assistants over a period of 3 months. The researchers formulated two research questions and two hypotheses to guide the study. Data generated from the field using the instrument was coded and analyzed using the independent t-test analysis. Results obtained showed that Muslim staff religious tolerance (15.9>8.2); this produced tvalue of 33.9 with a p-value higher than the .05 significance level with 798 degrees of freedom, this implies that religious tolerance does significantly influence sustainable national development. The result of the second hypothesis also shows that mean score for the North is slightly greater than the mean score for the South (11.86>10.73); this produced t-value of 2.41with a p-value higher than the .05 significance level with 798 degrees of freedom. This implies ethnocentrism (religious pluralism and ethnicity) has significant influence on sustainable national development in Nigeria. The authors concluded that despite the religious pluralism as is observed in Nigeria, Nigerians can still live peacefully among the different ethnic nationalities and carry out sustainable national development. It was however recommended that leaders should make their followers understand that Nigeria is a country for all of us and as such every citizen has equal rights and privileged to govern or lead and every leader should give equal opportunities to every sector of the country.