The Mind Opener Magazine (MOM): Previously My Lord in our magazine, The Mind Opener magazine, we tried to articulate problems or the situations facing Nigeria's development and some other crisis and insurgency, but this year 2017 we want to focus on the individual, on how the individual can develop. According to Miguel Ruiz, an individual cannot change the world but he can begin by changing himself. In this respect, we want to focus on or articulate the possible ways in which this individual can develop his potentials. That is why we gave the caption of this year's magazine EMANCIPATION FROM MEDIOCRITY: A LEAP TO SELF ACTUALIZATION.
Before we proceed, Your Lordship can you please oblige us with an overview of your profile?
 
Bishop: Well, my biography is out there in the public. I was ordained priest at Ogbunike on 28 September 1985. After my ordination I taught in my alma mater All Hallows Seminary Onitsha for three and a half years. In 1989 I was sent to Rome by my bishop, Most Rev. Stephen Ezeanya, to study and also to work with Cardinal Arinze. I studied in the Pontifical Biblical Institute Rome and Pontifical Gregorian University Rome. From the time I finished my studies in 1996 till March 2015, I worked as a staff of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue. I covered the sections for Christian dialogue with Muslims, followers of African Traditional Religion in Africa, adherents of Tribal religions of Asia and Indigenous peoples of the Americas. I was the vice-President of Nostra Aetate Foundation. In February 2015 the Holy Father Pope Francis appointed me Bishop and sent me to Onitsha Archdiocese as Auxiliary. Here I am. I live in Aguleri.
 
 
MOM: The high rate of dependence on external factors especially in Nigeria, that borders on lack of self-esteem had made us on occasions to ask whether there are really hidden potentials in man?
 
Bishop: The world, thanks to technological connectivity, is now a very small village where one thing connects to another. World’s economies are interdependent. The political and social activities of our governments have meeting points. This means that different communities should take note of what their neighbours are doing.
If those in government in Nigeria go to other countries to promote this exchange, it is positive. But it would be a pity if some of our people, as you have described, have low self-esteem and do have a need to seek approval of their worth and achievements from outside.
          That said, we know that human beings have certainly hidden potentials. It is necessary, however, to distinguish two types of potentials: potentials to do good and to do bad. If we just look around ourselves and we begin to appreciate the human ingenuity, the human creativity, the human ability to improve his or her environment. Advances in science are just little manifestations of the hidden potentials in a human person. But if we turn the coin and we immediately see how some other people have perfected evil in our world. We hear about smart bombs, nuclear weapons, and all sorts of perfection of “evil genius” in a human being. Even thieves have graduated from pickpocketing to armed robbery and to kidnapping. There are potentials for doing good and for doing evil.
 
MOM: Given that we are unique creatures that are insatiable; can we actually be content with these potentials of ours?
 
Bishop: Human beings are auto-transcendent. We don’t remain where we are. If we reach one point in our life’s journey, we begin to aspire to go to the next point. We tend to transcend ourselves…to go beyond ourselves. We are not satisfied where we are. We are moving forward. We desire to go beyond ourselves…beyond our present limits.
          In the bible, beyond the task to increase and multiply, human beings are commanded to till and dominate the earth. We are to conquer the earth. We just have to look around. Human being are really striving to conquer the earth. The wonders of scientific exploits are clear results of human beings’ effort to go beyond the present stage. The things we don’t see physically, we discover using sophisticated instruments invented by human beings. Just think of the Wi-Fi: we don’t see it, but today it is widely used to send message to somebody through it and it works. We are exploring nature; exploring its potentials and the things we have around us, and we are going beyond it. We are not satisfied where we are. We strive go beyond ourselves. We want to transcend.
 
 
MOM: Which facet of the country do you think needs more attention or is necessary for exploring these potentials in man?
 
Bishop: I think of education: educating the people, exposing them to be better informed about life, making them discover alternatives to their way of life, letting them know how things can be done differently and better, providing choices on how to improve relationships and how to organise our environment and so on. When people are educated, they begin to discover the things they have, they begin to work on how to acquire the things they discover that they do not have. Ignorance is thus to be eliminated. Some of the things we do are done out of ignorance. Twins were killed in the past. In some places, the albinos are killed. In their great desire to become rich, some people kill their loved ones. Wars are fought; there have been community clashes, sometimes because of prejudices coming from ignorance. Education gives us the tools to handle and to fix challenges we encounter in life.
 
MOM: My Lord, it seems that in the advent of this western education our culture appears to be losing their meaning?
 
Bishop: Our culture losing their meaning? No! You have now specified the kind of education you are talking about. We received western education through the schools. The Europeans that came to our land several years ago did their best to give us the type of education they thought best for all human beings. They did not know our culture. They had their own culture. No person exists without a culture. They were also learning from us as we were learning from them.  They did not promote our culture because they knew nothing about it when they first arrived. It took some time before our own early teachers learnt the method of teaching and of introducing our own way of life to their pupils and students in school. But it is not as if we had no education before the Europeans. We had and still have the traditional way of bringing up the members our society. We now know how to integrate what our traditional society taught us about life (how to live) and what we have learnt from other parts of the world, especially what we got from the western form of education.
 
MOM:  In the light of present economic cum socio-political instability in our country, how can the supposed hidden potentials in man be realized?
 
Bishop: You used the word ‘instability.’ Nigeria is not politically unstable. Truly, Nigeria is politically stable. We have changed presidents, governors and legislators through the ballot box. Our elections were not perfect, but they produced change of political leaders. We don’t have military government intervening. We are indeed politically stable. But we are economically challenged and it is not unique to Nigeria. We have economic challenges. We ought to and we are learning how to manage our economy. 
What worries me is what the “prosperity Gospel preachers” are doing to the psyche of our people. They tell us that you do not have to do anything: just fold arms and shout Amen the whole day. The person who pays tithes and sows seed of offering to the preacher gets everything done: passes exams without preparing for it; gets plenty while sleeping without working for it; and so on. Gradually we are building up a society of mediocres! The potentials are hidden, not explored. Laziness takes over.
          We need to tell our people that hard work pays. They must explore and develop the hidden treasures on earth. They must apply themselves to self improvement. As human beings, we must strive to transcend, to go beyond our present limits. We must become inventors, explorers, dreamers wanting always to be greater than we are presently.
 
MOM: Since the position you have taken as regards the facet of the country that needs more attention is education, then as regard the decline in quality as well as in the facilities for educational in our country, how then can the individual realize his potentials in the vicissitudes of Nigeria’s 6-3-3-4 structure of our educational system?
 
Bishop: I think that 6-3-3-4 is a good system. The contents of each level when fully considered, used as prescribed, should produce the desired effect in the pupils/students. The problem is found in the application. Sometimes the teachers do not follow the syllabus. Some are too slow at the beginning, then they rush at the end without giving enough time to the students to assimilate what they are taught. It is now the duty of those who operate the system to make it functional. That is what I suspect that is not always there. When the system is operated as it should, we find improvement in the level of education. I am just thinking: how dedicated are the teachers who are involved directly in the system? What of the school environment? Go to some places, you don’t find decent school buildings. What about the proprietors? Are they just there to make money? How are they disposed to make the system work by providing conducive environment for learning in schools? What of the tools needed in the system? Like I said, the system is good, but what about other factors that will make the system functional? That’s where we have problems. For example, do we have books? Do we have good library? Do we have sitting desks? What about the teaching aids? Today computers are provided in schools. We can’t be relying on black board to teach “Obi is a boy and Ada is a girl” as we did during our own time. Now there are more facilities available for learning What of light at night for reading? We used kerosene and bush lamp. We have abundance of sun light. Has time not yet come for solar energy in all schools?
          If you look around today in Nigeria, where we have all these improved facilities available there is improvement in the level of performance by the students. I don’t want to name States or institutions but when you have these facilities available, they help to make the students study better and perform better in their examinations. If such things are put in place, the 6-3-3-4 system should work.
          We need teachers who are interested in the education of their students, not those who are interested only in their salaries. In the past, we used to have teachers who volunteer to give extra hours to brush up their students for external exams at no additional fee. They gave their lessons free and were proud when the students passed very well. Do we still have such teachers today?
 
MOM: Thank you My Lord. My Lord, if you check now, some ss3 students age are within the range of 12,13 and 14. But before now, when people want to enter school, they will be asked to put their hands over their head to touch their ear. You’ll see that what adults are supposed to learn in ss3 are taught children. I don’t know whether this can lead to deformation in juvenile education?
 
Bishop: Yes, the capacity to absorb sets of concepts depends much on the age. A well-prepared syllabus takes into account the age of the pupil/students. This is particularly important for parents who push their bright children to higher classes. A child of ten, for example, should not be in any Senior Secondary class. He or she may pass the exams but is not mature enough to assimilate what is taught. Some of them develop problems later in life.
          Let me mention a group that does not belong to the 6-3-3-4 system. This group is the kindergarten class. In places where children are prepared well in kindergarten facilities, when they enter the next level they do very well. I want to recommend that this level of education should be taken seriously. The programme at this level provides true foundation for child development. Kindergarten schools should not be just baby-sitting facilities for working parents.
 
MOM: the individual approaches the activities of life as a unique being but often this unique nature lacks self-trust. My lord could you oblige us with the tenets of this self-trust or determination that is pertinent for the actualisation of one’s potentials?
 
Bishop:  Self-trust is built up, it is developed. There is a saying in Igbo but that is one aspect of it “aku na esi obi ike”. Something or somebody helps us to develop self-trust. Let me give example from my experience. I remember that before I entered the seminary, I used to take first position in class. But in the seminary, I met close competition because there were many bright students were selected and placed together in the seminary. After the first term examination, I took twenty fourth position. I was surprised with my result and when I took it home, my mother called me and sat me down and asked me whether the person who took first position had two heads. I said no, only one head.  After listening to her I was ashamed of myself. When next I returned to the seminary, I was challenged and I worked very hard. When I came back with my highly improved result my father and my mother said “yes, this is what we expect from our offspring”. From that moment on, I started considering myself as a first-class brain. You understand? We all need encouragement to boost our self-esteem, to develop self-trust. On our own, most of us are timid. Somebody else has to tell you ‘hey, you can make it, you are doing well, you have done well, keep it up, I know you can do it.’ Such encouragement could come from parents, teachers, governments, some highly placed and influential people in the society, from peer groups, etc.
 
MOM: His Lordship, what would be your fatherly advice to those at the helm of affairs in this country, as regards to how to aid the citizens towards actualizing their potentials?
 
Bishop: As I said at the beginning of our discussion, God created each and every one of us with potentials. There is no person born “empty handed” without divine gift. No person is “accompanying” others in this journey on earth. Philosophers talk about tabula rasa or whatever. Also Immanuel Kant writes about antimonies. The point is that no person is in this world “not loaded”. Now, we have potentials to do good, we have also potentials to do evil. As we grow up, the society shows us more and more those potentials for doing good.  We begin to imbibe and develop the good ones and drop the bad ones.
          Now, those at the helm of affairs in Nigeria should create enabling environment to help citizens actualize their good potentials. For workers, the people in government should create good working environment, and develop working ethics. Legislators should make good laws — laws that would discourage mediocrity, that would reward devotion to duty, hardwork, and would extol excellence.
 
MOM: My lord, we commend the dynamic approach you applied in attempting the questions, we wish to appreciate you immensely for granting us audience irrespective of your crowded schedules. Thank you very much.
 
Bishop:  Thank you. Thank you for coming. May God bless you and the readers of your magazine.
 
MOM: Thank you.