Abstract
The traditional African society had at its heart the community-based value. The individual was looked at as part and parcel of the community. His welfare was everyone’s concern. That is to say, the individual existed because the community existed as John Mbiti would say “I am because we are, since we are therefore I am” (Mbiti, 1969). The traditional African societies lived a communal life in that every individual cared for his neighbor’s needs regardless of the family, clan, ethnic group or tribe the neighbor belonged to. If any problem befell anyone in the community, it was up to the whole community to deal with it. The situation however changed with the colonial era, as Westerners invaded Africa. The harmony, love, care, respect and every virtue which characterized the traditional African societies was tempered with, giving away such unethical practices as individualism, corruption, nepotism, tribalism and the like. By allowing the individualistic spirit to creep in their societies, the contemporary African nations have thus taken up a face, as it were, that is not African, an identity far different from what Africa ought to be. This article sets out to argue that it is with this neocolonialistic individualism in mind that some African thinkers came up with Ubuntu philosophy to remind their fellow Africans of their lost traditional values which made Africa what it really is: a communalistic society.