IGWEBUIKE PHILOSOPHY AND HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATION IN AFRICA

Résumé

Human rights are moral principles which describe certain standards of human behaviour, and are regularly protected as legal rights in municipal and international law. They are commonly understood as inalienable fundamental rights to which a person is inherently entitled simply because she or he is a human being, and which are inherent in all human beings regardless of their nation, location, language, religion, ethnic origin or any other status. They are applicable everywhere and at every time in the sense of being universal, and they are egalitarian in the sense of being the same for everyone. This piece studies the anthropological consequences of the violation of human rights from an African perspective. This study is based on the Igbo-African philosophy of identity and alterity captured by Igwebuike philosophy, which sees the other, not in terms of the ‘I and the Not I’ but in terms of the ‘I and Thou’. This philosophy understands the other as a complement of the self, and to violate the human rights of the other who is a complement to you is to violate your own fundamental human rights. For the purpose of this research, the hermeneutic method of inquiry and Indigenous Wholistic Theory would be employed. This research anticipates to re-awaken the need for a more sympathetic approach towards the human rights of the other.