Inheritance in the African Context: Is it a blessing or a way to promote Laziness?

Compliments of the season @everyone and welcome to my blog as I share ideas about the context of inheritance. Growing up as a child, I had the mentality that my parents had to work hard and accumulate wealth for us that we would inherit and live a comfortable life.

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To me, the amount of wealth inherited will determine the kind of lifestyle to live. While in secondary school, my thoughts changed because of lessons learned from my parents and my elder sisters.

My parents constantly reminded us that in life you need to work hard to earn what you so desire and not sit down waiting for someone else to work and you just eat. They taught us to be independent beings and not depend on anyone because depending on someone might lead to disappointments.

That said, inheritance within the African perspective is somehow complex and it all depends on the culture and community in which you find yourself.

Inheritance varies and can be categorized into different forms. That is, inherit cultural values, customs, or properties. In most African countries and Cameroon in particular, with over 250 ethnic groups, I think inheritance has been somehow a blessing, but when we go down to different communities, we see that inheritance has promoted laziness amongst youths.

It is common to take a girl or boy to your parents to bless you guys as husband and wife but the first question is which family are you coming from? You might think it is a way to check family background to be sure of the family they are involved with but no. Some ask this question to know if the family is financially stable enough that they can profit from it.

In my community, I have seen many youths grow up and become a nuisance to the society because they believed so much in inherited properties from their parents. They never bothered about gaining education to be able to manage the family properties. In excitement, they squandered everything within a twinkle of an eye, and of a sudden became street kids.

Some parents will work hard and cannot feed well just to save for their kids to inherit. I know a family that the man was sick and refused to go to the hospital because he did not have money. When he died, the amount of money discovered in his bank account was what I termed a curse to himself because he was bent on accumulating more for his kids to inherit to the extent that he died.

My advice to parents is that empower your kids to be independent beings and not depend on inherited properties. When they learn to be independent, they will be able to manage resources well and build a vibrant community.

Of course Education is the key to success, educate your kids because knowledge is profitable to mankind. Empty brains will only help to empty the inherited property because they lack the know-how.