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Group holds lecture to eradicate superstitious beliefs

By Ijeoma Opara
18 September 2015   |   3:51 am
THE Humanist Assembly of Lagos (HAL), a new organization under the umbrella of humanity in Nigeria, has stressed the need for Nigeria to hold on to critical reasoning, evaluation and logic while dealing with issues to move the nation forward. Speaking at the inaugural public lecture held at the University of Lagos, the Chairman of…

businessTHE Humanist Assembly of Lagos (HAL), a new organization under the umbrella of humanity in Nigeria, has stressed the need for Nigeria to hold on to critical reasoning, evaluation and logic while dealing with issues to move the nation forward.

Speaking at the inaugural public lecture held at the University of Lagos, the Chairman of the organization Mr. Yinka Shorungbe noted that the group was established to promote humanistic ideas, freedom of thoughts, expression, conscience and belief in Nigeria and African society as a whole. “We encourage people to ask questions, query, think critically and for me, it starts when you begin to ask basic fundamental questions like where did we come from, how did we come about, how best can we make the environment better, how can we live our lives better and make the world a better place for all.

“Just like the Ebola Virus period, the Lagos state government had to put practical measures in place to ensure that the disease was contained and ensured that churches and other and religious activities were in tune to their measures while in other West African countries where they had it longer, people felt it was spiritual and so invaded authorities; going to their villages and churches to get spiritual healing instead they were spreading the virus from one member to the other and that ravaged the country.”

He noted that without going about addressing problems in a critical manner, there is a high risk of doing harm than good. “The Nigerian constitution is a circular one and so issues are supposed to be recognized based on facts and not any form of belief.

So, using a critical way of assembling and addressing problems is what the government has to do, but you know, we do have the human problem where leaders have beliefs which affect their decisions and some of these we have seen in government sponsoring pilgrimages.

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