By
Toyin Falola
The Nigerian condition is not a happenstance; it is a condition with history and extensive roots. Nigeria is what it is today because some things were never right from the outset and are still not right. Therefore, it is tantamount to moving in circles if we seek to get out of the Nigerian condition without taking thoughtful reminiscing and examining where the problem started. If we do not visit our past, we will continually make the mistakes of our predecessors, thereby meeting the waterloo they met. I have often said that the problems of Nigeria are made in Nigeria, patented by Nigerians, and manufactured in our cities.
Corruption in the Nigerian government did not start three or five years ago. Kidnapping and banditry are not matters of a few years ago; only that they have grown beyond the capacity of the state to stop them. Agitations for disengagement from the Nigerian entity did not start twenty years ago—all ethnic groups had threatened to secede. Neither is it true that agitators are only just recently meeting their waterloo—Isaac Boro and Odumegwu Ojukwu were visited by state violence. All these things have been playing out from the onset, and they keep doing so in an endless loop, in a seemingly wash, rinse, and repeat manner. If we wish to make any tangible progress in solving Nigeria’s problems, it is essential that we first study the Nigerian situation. Thus, it is pertinent to ask ourselves: What is Nigeria?
Nigeria is the “afterthought” of a British commissioner, Lord Frederick Lugard. At the allocation of entities on the African continent following the 1884-1885 Berlin conference, the different entities that currently make up Nigeria fell into the possession of Great Britain. These entities consisted of distinct kingdoms which shared geographical boundaries—Hausa, Jukun, Ebira, Tiv, Nupe, to mention a few of them, in what is now called northern Nigeria. These kingdoms had their distinct languages, cultures, and people. The kingdoms in the Sokoto Caliphate had their relationships cemented by Islam. They traded, exchanged ideas, and fought wars. Some groups interacted outside the framework of how the colonial government defined “states” and “power.” For the benefit of the colonizers, the entities which make up present-day Nigeria were grouped along geographical lines. The first was the grouping into Northern and Southern protectorates, laying the foundation for solid divisions.
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The earliest seeds of the fully grown and malignant Nigerian condition can be traced to this epoque, when peoples of different orientations, cultures, value systems, and beliefs were broadly zoned into two protectorates. However, the seeds were not fully germinated at this time because most of the kingdoms still operated on some degree of autonomy as they still had their fundamental monarchy-based system of governments. All the kings had to do was report back to the commissioners and district officers. This meant that before 1914, there was nothing known as Nigeria as a country, and the differing cultures had not been fused in the cauldron of a faux unifying culture and identity. At that time, there was no need for the peoples of those different cultures and kingdoms to present themselves as one, and there were no conflicts of interest, all of which make up the Nigerian condition today.
In 1914, the distinctly governed protectorates were amalgamated into one. At the whimsical thought of Ms. Flora Shaw, the new entity was named Nigeria. One thing that many people have failed to think deeply about is that the amalgamation of Nigeria goes beyond merging two protectorates. The British, through Lord Lugard, merged these two entities for easier administration and more efficient economic management. Did they consider some underlying nuances that would have served as pointers to the seeming impossibility of merging over 250 ethnic groups, with little to no interaction, into one country? The entities which make up present-day Nigeria were distinct, unrelated entities before the colonial administration. Therefore, the amalgamation can be seen as the earliest sign of the existence of a half-blown Nigerian condition. Recall that the lauded indirect rule, as applied by Lord Lugard, failed woefully in the East but was a massive success in the North and a partial success in the West. This, if not anything, should have given the colonial administration some insights into the fundamental discrepancies between the peoples and cultures they chose to merge into one.
During the earliest years of the new country, the Nigerian condition still manifested at half capacity because the administration was structured along a regional basis. The people were allowed a degree of self-identification. The West, consisting mainly of the Yoruba people, had the government of the western region. The Hausa-Fulani and other minority groups were in the northern region, the Igbo were in the eastern region, while the Niger Delta and mid-western region belonged to the ethnic groups that now make up the bulk of the South-South geopolitical zone. Nonetheless, the Nigerian condition started and was further aggravated, as the politicians in the South insisted, by the wrong allocation of rights by the British colonial government. In a country with four regions at the time of independence, the Southerners argued that it was crooked of the British to have allocated 52% (over half) of the legislative seats of the soon-to-be country to the Northern region in an attempt to make the North agree to the country’s independence. Till today, what the British might have seen as a clever move is a driving force in the psychological makeup of northern Nigerian politics.
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In allocating over half of the legislative seats to the North and leaving the other three regions to scramble for 48%, many have argued that the British inadvertently passed a message to the North that all regions of the soon-to-be independent Nigeria are equal, but the North is more equal than others. Could they have carved out the Middle Belt as a separate region? To the South, the mentality of being the No. 1 manifests in the North’s approach to politics and national concerns to date. Why should the biggest region not control power? Nigeria operates a federal system of government, yet the federal charter does not take effect in the bulk of federal appointments or university admission, to mention a few. By advocating for a unitary government, Majo General Johnson Aguiyi-Ironsi, who came to power in the first military coup of 15 January 1966, was blamed for unleashing the process that produced the centralization of power and wrong-headed federalism. A civil war followed, with the military in control for years. Power became highly centralized in the federal government.
The Nigerian condition is about the blame game and finger-pointing. The narrative from the South has permeated the thinking of millions of people. It is expressed simply: The “North-is-more-equal” mentality continued into the first few administrations of the new country, coupled with deeply corrupt practices, till the military, deeming itself as the people’s messiah, arose to take power from the civilian government. Is this view correct? If so, did it make matters better? It did not. Since its inception, Nigeria has faced corruption, a warped sense of national and uniform identity, and nationalism deeply punctured by ethnicity and ethnic loyalty. These are endemic problems caused by the fact that Nigerians have never entirely accepted the sense of being one nation—we are too apart in our notions, beliefs, social formation, and cultures. The narrative about Nigeria is tied to the region where it is created. People think first of their ethnicity before they think about Nigeria. During elections, parties permutate along religious and ethnic lines rather than ideological ones: “We have a Muslim Hausa as the presidential candidate, let a Christian Yoruba man be his vice, and an Edo woman his campaign chairperson. The Igbo did not vote for me!” There is nothing for the Igede, and nobody remembers the Esan. “The Edo can wait to produce the chairman of the party!” It has never been about ideologies; it is always about the best ethnic conjunctions producing concoctions that produce constipation.
When agitators like Nnamdi Kanu, Omoyele Sowore, and Sunday Igboho take up the challenge to call for a revolution or seek the disengagement of their ethnic groups from the Nigerian entity, millions applaud them for the courage to challenge a sitting government. Yes, it is well to applaud them for their one minute of fame. However, they also remind us of Chukwuemeka Ojukwu’s Biafra, the Mid-Western region’s Republic of Benin, and other secessionist or separatist moves that have been made in the history of Nigeria. In the early 2000s, Afenifere and Ohaneze called for a national conference to examine the legitimacy and plausibility of a federal and united Nigerian state. The years that led up to the country’s independence prove that the citizens have never for once seen Nigeria as a successful “United States of Nigeria.” The agitators for an independent Nigeria saw a failed state even before Nigeria got its independence. Since then, many Nigerians have always advocated for the country’s breakup, which has formed the basis for the Nigerian condition.
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Taking a tour through Nigeria’s history will reveal that the Nigerian condition is a phenomenon that has been with us since the first attempt to lump different peoples together to form two protectorates in 1900. The amalgamation of the two protectorates gave rise to the malignancy of the phenomenon, and it has seemingly become worse ever since then. The failure of the Nigerian state is rooted in the deep sense of commitment to ethnic and regional beliefs. And because the components have never been wholeheartedly invested in making the clumsy centre succeed, the centre does not hold. The citizens consider themselves first as Yoruba, Hausa, Igbo, Efik before considering themselves as Nigerians. This is why the quest out of the Nigerian condition cannot be fully quenched. It will rise, like the phoenix, in another form because the old and the young go through the baptism into ethnic-centric loyalty.
There is no problem related to the Nigerian condition whose cause cannot be traced to the fundamental problem of the country’s formation, an artificial contraption. Also, there is no failed secessionist or separatist agenda or movement whose failure is distinct from the failure of others. Perhaps, Kanu and Igboho did not know this. Sowore is probably aware, which may be why he opted for revolution instead of the breakup agenda being pushed by ethnic leaders and warlords. Nigeria is what it is today because things were not set right from the beginning. The moves to divide Nigeria have failed because all agitations have shied away from the same thing and followed a similar path.
What have the agitations and agitators shied away from? Can the quest out of the Nigerian condition be rightly brought to the light of fruition? In the next instalment in this four-part series, I will examine the fundamental problems of the attempted paths out of the Nigerian condition.
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. Part 2 of 4 of the series on the “Nigerian Condition,” commissioned by the New Times. In Part 3, the failures of the exit options will be examined.
. Falola is a Nigerian historian and professor of African Studies. He is currently the Jacob and Frances Sanger Mossiker Chair in the Humanities at the University of Texas at Austin.
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