President Muhammadu Buhari has fortuitously reopened the debate about the fate of Nigeria as a corporate entity. At a meeting with the Emir of Katsina, Abdulmummuni Usman, the President declared that “the corporate existence of Nigeria is non-negotiable.” He vowed that he would defend the unity of the country with his life, stating that, having fought the Civil War, he would not hesitate to crush any agitation for a break-up. Buhari’s position is understandable, but he has touched a raw nerve.
Like all pluralistic societies, Nigeria’s corporate existence will always be a subject of intense agitation. This is more so as the country is an artificial creation standing on a false tripod. Although we are not advocating a violent secession, seeing that the 1967-1970 Civil War led to an unbearable human misery in which “almost two million Nigerians lost their lives,” as Buhari pointed out, it is precipitate of him to foreclose frank discussions about the country. You don’t force national unity by fiat.
For a long time, the country had pretended about its unity, when indeed its existence is fragile. It is a country where ethnic champions, religious bigots and political overlords hold sway. The 1999 Constitution, which is meant to accommodate the over 400 ethnic nationalities, is only federal on paper. In practice, the federating states are pawns in a deadly chessboard of injustice.
The centre receives 52.6 per cent of all revenues, putting the 36 states, which own the resources, in a serious economic disadvantage. In a federal system, this is unfair. The Niger Delta communities are aggrieved because of this: their land has been despoiled by years of oil exploitation, but they have nothing to show for it. When resources from one part of the country are allocated by law to other parts on the basis of land mass, and number of local government areas, there is a deep feeling of injustice and oppression. It is only appropriate for Buhari to appreciate this, and kick-start the process that will allow states to control their resources as it is done in other federal climes. Honestly, without fiscal federalism, the injustice will not abate.
So, why would Buhari foreclose the issue of internal security in a country where governors are chief security officers of their states only in name as the commissioners of police are not answerable to them? In a proper federal system, where the states control the police, the atrocities of Fulani herdsmen, which the Global Terrorism Index rates as the fourth most deadly terrorist organisation in the world, would have been curbed. There is no way the country can move forward by suppressing the other ethnic nationalities feeling the brunt of the Fulani hegemony.
Therefore, Buhari should hold a broad view of Nigeria. No action has been taken against the 12 northern states that declared Sharia in their domains in obvious violation of Nigeria’s secularity. Section 10 of the 1999 Constitution states, “The Government of the Federation or of a State shall not adopt any religion as State Religion,” but the President is threatening to crush those who are agitating for resource control. Why would states that promote Islamic Sharia share in the Value Added Tax revenue, which is generated partly from selling alcohol, when they are opposed to people drinking? These are enough grounds for the country to restructure.
Nigeria is now at a point where all the cards have to be on the table. Great leaders see the big picture, far-sighted in the knowledge that no force can permanently suppress ethnic nationalism. A time has come for Buhari to allow our nationalities to choose their preferences peacefully. Slobodan Milosevic failed to adhere to this wisdom in the defunct Yugoslavia; the outcome was a war that claimed 140,000 lives, according to the US-based International Centre for Transitional Justice. His obdurate refusal to negotiate caused violent seizures and the country splintered into six different nations. The old Union of Soviet Socialist Republics is now history. Sudan went the same raucous path, before South Sudan was carved out in 2011.
But Buhari should not be like that because not all divorces turn out to be nasty. In September 2014, Scotland held a landmark referendum on whether to remain in the United Kingdom or not. The “Yes” side won with 55.3 per cent. The UK is holding another referendum in June to determine its membership of the European Union. The British Prime Minister David Cameron is only campaigning for the country to remain, not threatening his people. In 1993, the old Czechoslovakia arranged a peaceful separation, an exemplary model in how to organise an amicable political divorce between incompatible political entities.
The President needs to re-examine the salient proposals contained in the two national conferences held under former presidents Olusegun Obasanjo and Goodluck Jonathan. For starters, he should fast-track some of the recommendations that do not need the imprimatur of the National Assembly. One of such is the promotion of religion or sponsorship of religious pilgrimage.
Nigeria cannot pretend about this artificiality any longer. The centrifugal forces need to be addressed. It is vain optimism that another 1967 cannot happen again. Therefore, the life-threatening issues of state police, resource control and fiscal federalism should be determined on the negotiation table, if we are to end our perennial political convulsions.
Buhari should seize the moment. Nigeria is skating on a thin ice, and something will give in the end. The Niger Delta militants, the Biafra separatists, the hisbah police and other non-state actors are just a sign that there are deep fissures in the polity.
No threat can crush these cleavages, as shown in Catalonia, which has been campaigning for independence since the 16th century. Instead of the agitation to wane in the face of the Spanish government’s repression, it is growing stronger. On May 20, it went a notch higher when a court in Madrid overruled the central government, which had ordered that the estelada (Catalonia) flag should not be displayed during the Copa del Rey final between Barcelona and Sevilla. Hence, it is only an honest, non-conspiratorial openness about the points at issue that will liberate Nigeria.
Couldn’t continue reading your editorial because it’s rooted on simplictic and banal reasons for a negotiable of Nigeria’s current existence.
We need sounder reasons as planks to establish and renegotiate the current Nigetia as it exists.
My arguments is that money being creamed off the oil wells from South East Nigeria doesn’t benefit any part of Nigeria more than SE of the country. The only class of Nigerians that benefit from the largeness from oil are the few elites in the society who come from all geopolitical sections of Nigeria. Granted, the oil pollution in these areas is egregious and a serious problem that should be given the highest priority as it’s also a shame to all Nigerians.
However, breaking up Nigeria now will not solve any problem at all. The oil resource problem Nigeria is facing today will replicate itself if and when Biafra and Niger Delta communities become autonomous countries. Greed and unending personal wealth accumulation remains the bane of Nigeria as perpetrated especially and mostly by the Nigerian elites.
Most political writers and thinkers in Nigeria lack original thinking on how to solve and manage the proceeds from our common oil wealth as it’s today. Where these original thinking exist, if all, the political class lacks the steel spine to resolutely implement the fruit of such thinking as the needed panacea for our oil resource conundrum. Enough of shoddy thinking for serious problem facing all Nigerians.
Apology for some typos and fluffs in the posting below. Didn’t edit it.