As Africans, and ultimately Nigerian, one of the cultural attributes we have been known to pride ourselves in is Loyalty to communal family and values. By calling ourselves Family we refer to the long extension of the family most people call Compound, local community going beyond a set of people that share the same name but long reached to an association of a group of people who have in the year intermarried inhabiting a common location with common set of values.
Folk communal family image from: http://babathestoryteller.com/
common attributes and most especially that special thing that keeps them locked onto each other called “Loyalty”. I can go on and on defining loyalty which I believe a lot of “us” in my generation know about but have hardly experienced in different circumstances from those before us. The strength of our societies in the past depended on loyalty and communal family values. We have also come to learn the importance of communal family and lineage. Certain phrases such as “what family are you from” “which of the communities do you hail from” will sound familiar while interacting at certain levels.
In this modern day and age, as strong as we say we try to hold family values, can we boast of loyalty to the traditional definition of communal family as we know it to be as Africans? A lot of times the younger generation (millennials) are blamed for being disloyal to “the family”. On the other side of the table, does the old saying “the family will always stand to protect its own even in the storm still exist”? Is the family loyal to its members? Often times, millennial focus on the value of giving back to that very sect which has given to them no matter how small. The question again is, has “the family” given to earn a return? Or has the family taken from whom they owe their loyalty? There is more attachment to the nuclear family the communal family isn’t close to enjoying possibly because of the answers you have given to the questions I raised.
However, in recent times, for the very few of the new generation that care for the communal family association have mostly found newer families far away from where they typically will call home. A newer family confident enough to prove their loyalty over and over they share their values with. So, can we say it is right for the communal family to make demands from those whom they have robbed off their loyalty when success knocks at the door?
Finally, should our current society characterise our vision through the originating communal family if the essence has truly been lost? Should our society hold us by our family values or by our individual standards? These are some of the questions I will leave you to think about......
Deji Layade October 2015
