Democracy in Nigeria at the dawn of the 21st century

Résumé du document

“« Democracy is good, » says Godwin Eweye, a video-store owner, « but Nigeria is not yet fully democratic. »” A few days only after Nigeria's 2003 parliamentary elections, this local comment illustrates the enduring difficulties that the country faces in its attempt to consolidate its young democracy. After more than thirty years of nearly uninterrupted military rule, Nigeria experienced in 2003 its first successful civilian-to-civilian transition, when former general Olusegun Obasanjo was elected president for the second time after his 1999 victory. Mr Obasanjo was already known for being the only Nigerian military ruler ever to have stepped down in favour a civilian government in 1979, and he is considered “a decent man” by most observers and foreign powers.
Still, his efforts to transform the most populous country in Africa into a consolidated democracy stumble upon huge obstacles, stemming mostly from the army's awful record in ruling the country. In his first term President Obasanjo has taken courageous steps toward bringing the military under civilian control, but two very delicate issues remain to be addressed. First, the long-lasting ethnic conflicts that have plagued the country since independence show no sign of fading, especially in the highly sensitive region of the Niger Delta, where most of the countries oil reserves are concentrated. Second, the economic situation is disastrous, living standards are among the lowest in the developing world, and the debt burden is crippling. Hidden behind both concerns is endemic corruption and state pillage at all levels of government, a situation that President Obasanjo has not yet attempted to tackle correctly.

Extraits

[...] In the Nigerian case, only an insignificant part of the state's resources come from its citizens, and oil trade is the only really crucial activity for state finance. This means that any attempt at democratisation, that is making the state more reliant on its citizens, can only be the result of benevolent elite activity. So long as this remains the case, there will always be the possibility for the Nigerian political elite to cut itself from its grass- root basis, since there is no form of dependency between them. This theoretical approach is confirmed by Jane Guyer's findings during her study of democracy in rural Nigeria[25]. [...]

[...] And there have been “significant gains in civil liberties since the end of military rule”[3]. In 1999, just after his election, president Obasanjo was prompt to take action against the military establishment. In his first days in office, he dismissed more than one hundred and fifty senior officials, amongst whom many had hold political posts in the past fifteen years. In addition, most of the generals had already achieved comfortable positions for themselves and their family through thirty years of pillaging the state, and few of them were therefore inclined to take action against the new government. [...]

[...] President Obasanjo should try and use his last two years in office to alienate the military wing of his supporting party. Unfortunately, confidence in the state is not far from its lowest ever point, and ethnic unrest still claim hundreds of lives each year. Nigerians' hopes for democratic accountability, as manifest through the thriving civil society, have yet to be answered from the upper levels of the state. This is probably the country's ultimate challenge: a rethink of its oil-export dependency in order to fully surrender the government to the will of its citizens. [...]

[...] Despite some quite serious problems in the process[21], the 1999 and 2003 elections have restored some measure of electoral legitimacy into the regime. Still, ethnic conflicts have only been exacerbated by the subsequent relaxation of the military grip on the country. Today, such problems prevent national politicians from concentrating on more pressing issues for the future of the country, and force them to concentrate their efforts on regional dissatisfaction that is only a consequence of thirty years of bad military governance. But there is a more profound implication in the persistence of ethnic issues on a global scale. [...]

[...] Democracy is still far from consolidated in Nigeria. The Abacha era has made the military highly unpopular and has helped the development a new, thriving civil society in the country, but army officers retain a strong influence over national politics in the need of avoiding threats to their own interests. It is in many ways an unavoidable evil, but with the 2007 elections looming ahead Nigeria is still in desperate need of decisive governmental action to get rid of its authoritarian legacy. [...]