Language death is a natural phenomenon, according to linguists. However, some languages die faster than others, and various factors are responsible for this. But given the nativisation of the English language in Nigeria due to colonialism to reflect the sociocultural realities of the Nigerian peoples as well as its development in terms of codification, the language may remain a relief in the face of the clamour for a national language.
Meanwhile, Nigeria’s national language policy is a complex issue with no single, universally accepted solution. While English is the official language, there is a growing push for a more integrated approach that recognises and promotes indigenous languages. The current situation sees a mix of official and practical use, with English dominant in many areas, while some efforts are underway to include indigenous languages in education and other sectors.
Despite the push for one, as of today Nigeria does not have a national language.
A national language may be termed as one or more languages that are indigenous to a people and are assigned the duty of official language(s). This means a language has to fulfil the conditions of being indigenous and serving official purposes before it can be described as a national language.
In 2022, the Federal Ministry of Education through the Nigerian Education Research and Development Council (NERDC) approved the National Language Policy, which states that the language of instruction will be in Mother Tongue (MT) or Language of the Immediate Community (LIC).
The policy, however, reveals the unhealthy attitude of many Nigerian elites towards the sustainability of indigenous languages, the inability of successive governments to select a single viable national language from the indigenous languages, the non-codification of many minority languages, and the inadequate definition of roles in the various languages.
Although the three major languages, Igbo, Yoruba and Hausa, co-exist with English and are allowed as languages of legislation in the National Assembly, they still cannot be described as national languages given that none of them is acceptably used in all regions of the federation. Notably, these major languages are among the over 500 distinct languages that exist in Nigeria, with some of them having over 10 diverse dialects within them.
With the different sides to each option or language that may be proposed by any group, it appears that in today’s Nigeria any question of a national language might even require a referendum for an acceptable decision to be reached.
Experts have suggested that there are four major steps involved in the process of choosing a national language. The first stage is the selection of the language or languages, which should reflect the desire of the people. This is because an imposed national language could result in a national crisis, such as the resistance that greeted the choice of Tagalog and Filipino in the Philippines.
Next to this is codification, which involves standardising the language. It essentially has to do with the development of grammar rules and dictionaries for the chosen language. The third step is elaboration, and this has to do with the adoption of the language in new domains such as academics, medicine, governance, and so on. The language to be adopted as the national language must have the potential to explain the abstract terms used in different fields.
Above all, a national language should have the people’s acceptance. The government of a country must take the necessary steps to convince the citizens of the appropriateness of the choice made.
Sincerely, we all will agree that none of the current Nigerian languages meet the above requirements. It can be said then that, given the nativisation of the English language in Nigeria to reflect the sociocultural realities of the Nigerian peoples as well as its development in terms of codification, the language may remain a succour in the face of the controversies that surround the choice of a national language in Nigeria. It must, however, be mentioned that, pending the time that the country will be ready for the national language debate, all ethnic groups in the country must ensure that their languages do not go into extinction by encouraging their offspring to speak them.
The Nigerian government can also, intentionally, help protect the languages from going into extinction. This can be done by implementing the policy of teaching pupils in the early primary school classes in the languages of their respective environment and by ensuring the policy of all students learning one or more indigenous languages in secondary schools.
