I would like to thank Chatham House and Coventry University's African Studies Centre for inviting me to speak today. I'm honoured to have the chance at this critical time to share some of my thoughts about a country in whose existence and future I so strongly believe. I've been privileged to witness much of changing Nigeria at first hand, through more trips and stays than I can count, spanning four of her independent decades.
I've been fortunate to have travelled throughout the country, staying in towns, villages, and cities in 35 of Nigeria's, now 36 states, and to have seen Abuja from its infancy onward. And I found that, contrary to current received wisdom, Nigerians from all parts of the country identified themselves, proudly, as Nigerians, and it saddens me to have seen this sense and pride diminish for so many.
That sense of being Nigerian has ebbed and flowed. It was, I think, on an upward course through the 1970s and early 1980s, but it has declined since, as ethnicity, regions, and dangerously, religion, very often take precedence now over Nigerianness.
Nigerians have not seen for five decades the euphoria that independence brought. But there were times of optimism, notably in the run-up to the 1979 military handover of government to civilians1. The military described their rule as 'an aberration,' and Nigerians believed them, thinking democracy was here to stay. A second, more guardedly hopeful time, came in 1999, with the inauguration of Olusegun Obasanjo as an elected civilian president. No Nigerian leader has had greater support, at home and abroad. None has ever had such financial resources for constructive policies, thanks to extraordinarily high oil prices. But if Nigerians were disappointed in the 1980s and already made cynical by Ibrahim Babangida's 'transition without end,'2 they were far more discouraged - and far more cynical - by 2007. Nigerians all around the country would tell you their day-to-day existence had deteriorated, and that civilian rule had borne scant resemblance to democracy or started a path to prosperity.
Yet no one had expected 25 years ago that Nigeria would be where it is now. I won't repeat the catalogue of its obvious ills - corruption, mismanagement, violent crime and the rest - but not because repeating them is not apt. It is, and not least because they underlie what a deeply troubled Nigerian friend calls 'a litany of missed opportunities.' But as a historian, I regret that so much of what is said and written now rides roughshod over history, obliterating both nuanced understanding and the guidance to be found there. So, I've been reflecting on a few themes: first, good intentions and unforeseen consequences; second, not-so-good intentions and tragic consequences; and finally, how both kinds of consequences have affected a federal Nigeria.
There were genuine attempts to fix problems that arose during Nigeria's early years of independence, some so serious they had resulted in civil war. Other policies came with the happier conjunction of the end of war and the emergence of Nigeria as a major oil-producing country. It was often not recognized and is now forgotten, but the aftermath of that terrible conflict was the 'No Victors, No Vanquished' policy, more honoured than not, and rare in the wake of 'brothers' wars.' We have seen what the alternative could have been; think of the Balkans.
The sudden wealth from oil inspired a generous impulse to distribute the benefits: Infrastructure, especially roads, opened up places and possibilities all over the country. But large increases in government salaries, with lumpsum arrears,3 fuelled damaging inflation, and worse, expectations: Nigerians who, before oil, expected little from government now began to view it as the provider of first resort. That shift in psychology, incidentally, has been almost as important in derailing Nigeria's agriculture as the failure of successive governments to support it. 4 Major efforts to examine past ills and prevent them in the future, though, came in the late '70s. Creating (more) states; planning a new capital; and writing the new constitution (1979), with its executive presidency and federal character components were designed to correct problems of governance and to strengthen national cohesion.
But all have had unforeseen consequences. Creating states out of 1960 Nigeria's three regions began with dividing the Western Region in two, with a new Mid-West region, in 1963, under the same constitution that made the country a republic. The all-important commission to 'enquire into the fears of Minorities and the means of allaying them,' the Willink Commission for short, had reported in 1958 to the British government that no further states should be created, despite 'genuine fears' and the fact that 'minorities' in each region had argued for their own states. 5 Undoubtedly, the Mid-West Region came into existence for political reasons; the creation of 12 states in May 1967 was what someone in a position to know called 'the first bullet of the civil war.' With the secession of the Eastern Region (as Biafra) imminent, the federal military government announced the sudden change. The eastern minorities got the states they had wanted (Rivers, South-East), and the all-important Middle Belt - whose soldiers would do most of the fighting when war came - got theirs. Whether the central government, would have answered those 'minority' pleas anyway, I don't know; the immediate aim was to pry the people in and east of the Niger Delta away from supporting Biafra.
In 1976, Murtala Muhammed's government brought the number of states to 19, but his instructions to those charged with writing a new constitution were clear: Obstruct the creation of more new states by making creation a difficult process. No one then imagined that by 1983 the civilian government would face demands to have more than 50 states; no one imagined even the current 36.
The civil war loomed large in 1970s thinking; building a national identity was paramount. The Gowon government's National Youth Service Corps was one early step.6 Moving the capital to the center of the country, announced by the Murtala Muhammed government in October 1975, was another (with the unintended consequence of one day isolating legislators from their constituents).
But of overriding importance would be the new constitutional framework.7 It prescribed a new style of government, with an executive president at the center, to replace the parliamentary system inherited from the British. When General Muhammed addressed the opening session of the overnmentappointed
Constitution Drafting Committee in 1975, he made that clear, saying '..[W]e require...(ii) An Executive Presidential system of Government in which: --(a) the President and Vice-President are elected, with clearly defined powers, and are accountable to the people. We feel that there should be legal provisions to ensure that they are brought into office in such a manner so to reflect the Federal character of the country; and (b) the choice of members of the Cabinet should also be such as would reflect the Federal character....'8 The inspiration was the American system, not because of unqualified admiration for the United States, but because it seemed that Nigeria's size and complexity required thinking about what worked in another large, complex country. But the similarities, I must admit, misled me into thinking at first that it would work in the ways familiar to an American. I was wrong.
At the end of a process that graduated from the Constitution Drafting Committee to an indirectly-elected Constituent Assembly (with a few government appointees to represent unrepresented groups, like women and students) and from there to a final draft, Nigerians had compounded the complexities of the American constitution with complexities of their own. I will look here at only one: Institutionalizing 'federal character.'9 This was a key innovation, part of the goal of diminishing the fears people from one part of the country had for those from another. It sought to spread representation and participation in government and to protect the rights of 'minorities.'10 But 'federal character' requirements in the 1979 constitution created unforeseen problems. (To be fair, several members of the Constituent Assembly had raised concerns.) Take the federal executive council, for instance - that is, the president's cabinet. The requirement that each state had to have a cabinet minister worked - and still works - against submitting nominees to the Senate for specified positions. Why? Because, as then- President Shehu Shagari explained his dilemma to me, if the Senate rejected a qualified candidate he had nominated as, say, minister of education, he would be forced to find a replacement from the same state, regardless of whether it could produce the next most qualified person. Submitting lists of names without their intended positions meant that over time Senate confirmations became mere ritual, telling neither senators nor the public anything about a person's appropriateness for a job.
And if this was difficult with 19 states, how much more so with 36? It has led to the absurdity of 72-member cabinets, which makes sense neither in policymaking nor finance. Nor did the advocates of 'federal character' in the 1970s know that it would be carried to unimaginable extremes: If a cabinet minister were to come from one of a state's senatorial zones (at first five, then three), any ambassador appointed from that state had to come from a different zone.
And so on, including heads of parastatals and other appointed positions. States began to do the same, with local government areas playing the role of senatorial zones for state positions. Which gets us to two more related consequences, one anticipated, one not: Creating more and more states, and the resulting elevation of something called 'indigeneity.' (The ugliness of the word mirrors, to my mind, the consequences of the concept.)
First, creating states. Early in the Second Republic the financial drain of the new system was apparent. I remember the anguish of a long-serving Nigerian ambassador who had done the calculations and found that the recurrent costs of 20 administrations came to some 65 percent of the national budget. And each increase in the number of states, of course, has brought a parallel increase in costs.
Further, creating more states was intended to 'allay fears' and solidify national feeling. It has done neither. In the case of 'fears,' it has - much as the Willink Commission warned - stimulated the demand for more and yet more states, since in each new state there will be a new minority, making another demand.
In Nigerian terms, having one's 'own' state guarantees a 'fair' slice of the 'national cake.'
Even more serious than the financial absurdities in all this, the multiplicity of states has undermined one of the principal goals of creating them: to increase Nigerians' sense of being Nigerians. Remember now a single incontrovertible fact about Nigeria, and what, to my mind, may be its greatest challenge as well as its greatest glory: It is home to hundreds of ethnic groups - no one is really sure how many - speaking mutually unintelligible languages and most of them, if untouched by political manipulation, living in harmony with one another.11 But in combination with 'federal character' provisions, ever-smaller states may employ - and even educate - only their 'own,' so what was a sense of belonging to something larger, Nigeria, has frayed.
Whereas once upon a time, someone from, say, Keffi, could look for a government job throughout the Northern Region, or later Benue-Plateau State, or a still later Plateau State, he can now look only in his even smaller Nasarawa State. Further, there is the person who may have long lived and worked in Jos but must relocate to serve the government of a newly created state. Who could doubt that tensions and conflict result from this narrowing of opportunities? But it is happening all over Nigeria.
And along with this comes a pernicious distinction, now made even by prominent politicians: indigene (or 'native') vs. settler. The word 'indigene' appeared in the 1979 constitution in reference to 'federal character' provisions for federal appointments. It rapidly mutated, or in my view, metastasized, into abrogating the constitutional rights of residency and allowing states greater leeway in deciding who really belongs there. Meanwhile an indigene is now defined as someone whose ancestors were autochthonous to a particular place.
This vitiates the sense of being a Nigerian and a commitment to Nigeria as a whole. Indeed, many people called 'settlers' come from families that have lived for decades or even a century in places where they now face discrimination. Just as 'federal character' provisions have been taken to extremes, the 'indigene' label is being invoked by majority ethnic groups in even the smallest geographic areas.12 There is often the potential for violence - and, as weapons proliferate everywhere, that potential grows.
I've been reflecting on some other aspects of Nigeria's constitutions. One has to do with the power of state governors.13 Because of the way the federation's units have come together - not by separate entities agreeing to form a new whole or to join an existing polity, but rather by continually dividing the same area - the ever-smaller units are overwhelmingly dependent on revenue dispensed from the center. The cash cow in Abuja, as mandated by law, regularly provides resources to the states, that is to say, the governors, who, unchecked, 14 can misbehave with the money as they please.
I've often thought about the advantages of an 18th century constitution - or an unwritten one - over 20th century ones. Spare, easy to understand, laying down fundamental principles, neither provides much detail, but does allow for evolving circumstances. Why should Nigeria's constitution deal with the timing of elections and the workings of political parties, let alone enumerate and name states and local government areas - which also, not incidentally, have more than doubled to 774 since 1979? Why should the existence and composition of federal and state executive bodies, or the duties of local government councils, be constitutional rather than legislative matters?
That they, and many other provisions, are embedded in the constitution... has led to such absurdities as the urgent request by INEC to amend the 1999 constitution for a second time within a year to revert to a previous election timetable. And the so-called first amendment, following an appalling precedent set in the Obasanjo 'third term' attempt in 2006, bundled all manner of changes together earlier this year. There was no public announcement, no explanation, no discussion, let alone public ratification.
Indeed, it was all but impossible to get a complete list of the proposed amendments. Instead, once the National Assembly had passed them, governors rapidly rammed as much of the package as possible through state legislatures.15
Meanwhile, no thought is given to trimming the constitution. And while all Nigeria's constitutions specify how to create more states, none provides for mergers into larger units. It is hard to see how a fully functioning democratic Nigeria could effect such mergers - into the talked about six 'geo-political zones,' for example. But in today's dysfunctional democracy, it's even more difficult. Which governor or state legislator would sacrifice his position? Which outriders would opt to lose their jobs, for that matter?
Nigerians will have to face this if they want the country's resources to provide better health, better schools, and a more productive economy. Even theft apart (if possible), it should be obvious that Nigerians cannot afford the ever-escalating costs of so much government structure if they want to raise their standard of living; but who will explain it to them? Not, I think, members of the National Assembly, whose legislators voted for themselves upwards of one million US dollars apiece annually in salaries and perks - ten times what an American senator or congressman earns. And the recent constitutional amendment package made their pay a first charge on the federation account.
I've been talking about some of the consequences of well-intentioned attempts to remedy some of the ills that plagued Nigeria from early post-independence days.16 A road to hell may be paved with good intentions.
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Nigerians also point to less-good intentions that have done even more to create the Nigeria no one expected to see 50 years ago.
There is, though, one important case where intentions were arguably ambiguous: the drastic and sudden dismissal of hundreds of civil servants in 1975. Apparently done to curb alleged corruption and to undercut the enormous powers that the most senior civil servants - 'super perm secs - had acquired since 1966, the consequence was a wounded, demoralized civil service. It also introduced an element of unfairness - sudden actions based on presumed but not proven guilt - that later somehow became an acceptable precedent. The so-called 'reform' of 1988, which formally politicized the top of the civil service, was a further step towards politicizing everything in government. Morale in the civil service deteriorated and, along with more restrictive federal character requirements, further undermined chances to make policies based on experience, detached analysis and disinterested advice.
And then come consequences where intentions are irrelevant. The neglect of public education by both civilian and military governments has been a disaster. Every day that passes without elevating education to or near the top at federal and state levels is a day too late. The young of the wealthy and privileged go abroad, and often stay there and go on to professional success, some to international renown. How this short-changes the generality of Nigeria's young is obvious, unconscionable and, for the country, selfdestructive.
In a world where a work force at every level requires appropriate education, Nigeria's governments pay scant attention. A further consequence of creating states is that education at the secondary and university levels, such as it is, has become ever more localized, compounding the lack of understanding Nigerians have of one another.
Some Nigerians tried to sound alarms and seek remedies - the late Babatunde (Babs) Fafunwa was a stirring example. But they've seldom been heeded, and when they were, the necessary changes were not fully funded or implemented. Two more matters, devastating to Nigeria's present, come immediately to mind. One is the crisis in the Niger Delta; the other, the destruction of the middle class.
The tragedy in the Niger Delta has long been obvious. By 1980 the environmental and other physical damage was there for everyone to see.
Government after government saw it and did little or nothing. The blame and counter-blame between Nigerian authorities and the international oil companies have been largely irrelevant; the excuses of both have worn very, very thin.
What should have been done has been clear. Expensive, yes, but affordable, especially when Nigerians know the Niger Delta has provided the bulk of the country's foreign exchange earnings. First and foremost, build infrastructure and clean up the despoiled environment. And then - in the Delta as everywhere else - meet basic needs in education and health. And create conditions - security and a reliable, constant power supply foremost - to permit economic diversification and the jobs that would follow.
None of this has happened. An east-west road across the Delta? Still not built, decades after it was first proposed, although all of Abuja was built in less than 30 years. Meanwhile, the oil-producing states have budgets larger than many African countries, thanks to the revenue allocation formula and other adjustments from the federal treasury. But these resources seem irrelevant to the rising violence, starting in the late 1980s but escalating since 1999. That violence was sparked by a kind of Delta patriotism, entrenched through political thuggery, and co-opted by criminality. An attempt to stop the violence and restore oil production led the late president, Umaru Yar'Adua, to implement an amnesty, which few believed then or since will solve the problem. Meanwhile the violence makes new inroads. The message on October 1st was clear.
