Nigeria: Unmasking The Thunderstorm

Nigeria reluctantly faces a thunderstorm: Boko Haram extremism and atrocities, pervasive national corruption, poverty, widespread insecurity, the 2015 Presidential election, and Sharia Law.  Hence, all Nigerians and perhaps West Africans, have a stake in ensuring that Nigeria remains a stable and strong nation, or elect to remove their eye on the ball and risk seeing the country turn into a deeply divided sectarian nation Iraqi-style. Going forward though, the pillar to maintaining Nigeria’s national unity, credibility, and international standing rests in the choice Nigerians will make in their scheduled 2015 presidential election. To determine the mindset and aspirations of Nigerians on the future of their country, the African Policy and Opinion Research conducted an analytical and observational survey as well as a media content analysis regarding issues and events ongoing in the country. 

Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau, center, sitting flanked by militants in a still from video released on YouTube on April 12, 2012.

Real Concern
Citing insecurity, religious extremism, corruption, and mismanagement, an estimated eighty-five percent of Nigerians surveyed in-country and abroad think that Nigeria, in a number of ways, is in a bad shape.  The most pressing fear for most Nigerians surveyed are the spread and atrocities of the Boko Haram terrorist group, and the ‘all-powerful’ Nigerian military’s unpreparedness or inability to counter the threat posed by the extremist group. According to our recent January 2015 sampling survey of Nigerians in-country and in the Diaspora, the two main presidential candidates in the race, incumbent head of state President Goodluck Jonathan, a Christian, and former military ruler and untiring opposition challenger, retired General Muhammadu Buhari, a Muslim, are both  unimpressive.   Each of the candidates has a drawback.  However, the question remains as to whose drawback threatens Nigeria’s future more.

The Jonathan Factor
Although successive Nigerian regimes have a history of corruption and abuse, survey results indicate that about seventy percent of Nigerians are fed up with the continuation of the status quo, and the fact that incumbent President Goodluck Jonathan has been unable to address the country’s crucial problems, particularly insecurity and corruption, frustrates them.  In August 2011, Boko Haram bombed a United Nations’ building in the Nigerian capital, Abuja, and has adducted hundreds of school girls, many of whom are still under the extremist group’s forced detention. Under intense pressure marred by widespread consistent demonstrations and globally charged advocacy to bring back the over 200 schoolgirls abducted by Boko Haram, President Jonathan instead of being responsive, has asked that the demonstrators to focus on blaming Boko Haram for the abductions. An utterance which many people surveyed say reflects the lack of leadership and competence on his part as commander of chief.



Incumbent President Jonathan

 
Boko Haram is a largely Sunni Islamist extremist movement that seeks to abolish the secular system of governance in Nigeria while seeking to establish Sharia law throughout the country.  As a result, the group’s attacks have killed more than 20,000 people, left several thousand wounded and more homeless nationwide.  The Nigerian leader, President Goodluck Jonathan, confirmed that, as of May 2014, the extremist group’s attacks caused the death of 12,000 people and left 8,000 more people cripple, not accounting for the missing and unreported. 

The failure of the Nigerian government, especially the Jonathan administration, in eliminating the extremist group and finding the schoolgirls in the aftermath of a world media highlighted kidnapping of 276 schoolgirls, exposes the lack of adequate responsiveness and effectiveness of the government in addressing the problem.  Subsequently, Boko Haram’s activities spread in most parts of the country and beyond, prompting neighboring nations like Benin, Chad, Cameroon and Niger to join Nigeria in a united effort to combat the extremist group.  

In addition, historical financial analysis estimate indicates that between 1960 and 1999, Nigeria has not just been pervaded by political corruption; an estimated 400 billion dollars plus was embezzled from the country’s treasury by its political leaders and bureaucrats around this period and more afterward. The pace of corruption in the country has ranked it to 143 out of 182 countries in the 2011 Corruption Perceptions Index  published by the Germany-based watchdog group Transparency International.

In spite of the crushing economic hardship in the country, and the inefficiencies of the present administration in addressing key issues and problems, sixty-one percent of Nigerians surveyed blamed the Islamic extremist group’s attacks and mayhem as circumstances that impede the current government’s capacity to impact real change and prosperity.  Twenty-two percent of those surveyed disagreed and insists that the government’s failure to be firm and effective compounds the treat while seventeen percent put the blame on both. The question then became:  Could these issues and events hinder the chances of the incumbent President Jonathan in the upcoming presidential election, forty-one percent of those surveyed think most likely, thirty-five percent say not all, and the rest unsure.

The Buhari Factor
On the other hand, the main opposition Presidential contender, retired Major General Muhammadu Buhari comes across as a very capable and strong leader who an estimated forty-seven percent of those surveyed think would be great at minimizing graft and excess corruption in Nigeria based on his past record as no none-sense military head of state in the early 1980s.  However, seventy-one percent of those surveyed also think he will be unwillingly to stop Boko Haram from imposing its radical religious ideology given the fact that he Buhari, like the rest of the Boko Haram’s leadership, shares the view of imposing Sharia Law in Nigeria, it does matter which part.  He has also unequivocally given his support for the strict enforcement of Sharia law in Nigeria's northern states, of which more than eleven states have implemented Sharia Law in force.  This had not only caused him political difficulties among Christian voters in the country's south; his supporters attacked Christian settlements in Nigeria’s central region with a violence that led to the death of more than 750 people during a three day uprising. Forty three percent of people surveyed voiced that Buhari has had inconsistencies in his messaging.      

Presidential Candidate, Retired General Buhari



While running for president in 2011, Buhari not only ran as an anti-corruption campaigner, he pledged to remove immunity protection from government officials engaged in corruption. As a candidate for the All Progressives Congress party in the 2015 Presidential election, he continues to build his platform around his image as a staunch anti-corruption fighter and an incorruptible and honest politician. However, he recently remarked during an interview that he will not probe past corrupt leaders and that he would give officials who stole in the past amnesty, insofar as they repent.  Seventy-two percent of those surveyed view this latest stance as a contradiction to his ‘populace’ image as an honest man who says what he means and stands for it. Added to this is the series of contentious statements Buhari made concerning insecurity in Nigeria.  In 2013, he requested the Nigerian government to halt the killing of Boko Haram members, justifying the extremist group’s atrocities and attacks on civilians on the prevalence of militant tribal groups, majority of whom are Christians, in the South of Nigeria who are fighting for economic control or share of the country’s oil wealth gained from the mining of their land.  In 2012, Buhari’s name was listed in a Boko Haram’s publication as one of the personalities that the extremist group would trust to mediate between them and the Nigerian government, especially after he Buhari questioned the special treatment the Christian dominated tribal militants received from the Nigerian government while they fight for “economic justice”. He further deplored the fact that Boko Haram members were killed and their houses destroyed.  This statement ruined his standing with most people.

Sixty-three percent of the people surveyed think Buhari will restore strict discipline in the country’s federal workforce and institutions; thirty-seven percent think he will disregard respect for human rights and civil liberties, especially of civilians.

As leader of a military junta and head of state of Nigeria in the early 1980s, Buhari passed several harsh decrees that human rights groups decried.  Decree Number two passed in 1984 granted the country’s chief of staff and security agencies, particularly Nigeria’s secret police, the unprecedented power to detain, without charges, individuals deemed to be at security risk to the country for up to three months. During his regime, the country’s secret police the National Security Organization (NSO) cracked down on public dissent by intimidating, harassing and jailing individuals. In addition, critics of Buhari’s military junta were also thrown in jail, as was the case of one time presidential candidate, afro-beat singer Fela Kuti who was arrested on September 4, 1984 at the airport as he departing for an U.S tour.  According to Amnesty International, the charges levied against the popular singer including illegally exporting foreign currency were “spurious”.

 Asked whether Buhari’s leadership could unite Nigeria, seventy-nine percent of people surveyed say they did not think so because of his inflammatory rhetoric, fifteen percent unsure and about six percent think he would.  Could these issues and events hinder the chances of the former military ruler General Buhari’s chances in the upcoming presidential election, fifty-nine percent of those surveyed think most likely, thirty percent say not at all and the rest unsure.

Core Issue
This brings our survey to the core out-layer: Can Nigeria circles around its current thunderstorm?  Seventy percent of people surveyed think it all depends what the next president can do. Twenty-five percent think they hope it would, and the rest unsure. The true is, as a nation, Nigeria has seen everything: good and bad. Often denoted as the “Giant of Africa” because of its economy and population, an estimated 174 million people, with one of the largest youth population; it is also the most populous nation in Africa, and considered the seventh most populous country in the world.



Map of Nigeria Per Population Density



Nigeria is partitioned almost evenly between Christians, who occupied the central and southern regions and Muslims, who are largely concentrated in the northern and southwestern regions. The 2015 Presidential election will test the capacity of Nigerians to chart the course they want for their country by carefully unmasking the thunderstorm in ways that ensure their national unity, address the issue of corruption, end sectarianism, resist the abuse of human rights and civil liberties as well as extremism.
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The Federal Republic of Nigeria is located in western Africa on the Gulf of Guinea and has a total area of 923,768 km² (356,669 sq mi), making it the world's 32nd-largest country (after Tanzania). It is comparable in size to Venezuela, and is about twice the size of the U.S. state of California. It shares a 4,047-kilometre (2,515 mi) border with Benin (773 km), Niger (1497 km), Chad (87 km), Cameroon (1690 km), and has a coastline of at least 853 km. Nigeria lies between latitudes 4° and 14°N, and longitudes 2° and 15°E.

One in four Africans is a Nigerian. Presently, Nigeria is the seventh most populous country in the world. 2006 estimates claim 42.3% of the population is between 0–14 years of age, while 54.6% is between15-65; the birth rate is significantly higher than the death rate, at 40.4 and 16.9 per 1000 people respectively.