ACCORDING to Mahatma Ghandi, “there is always enough for everybody’s needs but never enough for everybody’s greed.” It therefore means collective ownership and equitable distribution of resources are the commonsense and liberation for all human beings.
For example, the sunshine we bask in and the air we breathe are available to us without any struggle or competition simply because nobody acquires more than his immediate needs. This is how it should be in the interest of peace and justice. Availability of fuel, food, education housing, transportation, communication, shelter should be in the realm of sunshine and air.
However, the ideology of communism, hated so much by the West, has been replaced by capitalism which is reflected in the mentality of survival of the fittest, every man for himself, privatisation, liberalisation, ‘government has no business in business’, deregulation, market forces and so on. All these are diametrically opposed to the cosmology of creation as a just and equitable handiwork of God.
No wonder the world is grappling with intractable problems such as wars, hunger, poverty, deprivation, lack, backwardness and underdevelopment.
In a world where the extremely greedy minority, either as individuals or countries, commandeer and hijack far more than their needs to dominate, oppress or prove superiority over the majority, there can’t be peace. Highly evolved cultures understand all this deeply and they do not charge exorbitant prices on goods and services.
Market forces in capitalism claim that when more people chase fewer goods, prices skyrocket but spiritually, because all beings are one inseparable entity, more people do not even have to chase fewer goods because in whatever situation or whatever is available, they share equally.
- Nathaniel Adewole, Ibadan.
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