Da Jonathan Sunday Akuns, traditional ruler of Daffo in Bokkos Local Government Area of Plateau State and co-convener of the Movement for National Reformation (MNR), speaks with LEO SOBECHI on the link between insecurity and the struggle for political power. He argues that restructuring Nigeria is key to resolving the crisis.

You have been a frontline advocate for Nigeria’s return to the 1963 Republican Constitution as the basis for review of the grundnorm. What will you say are the essentials of your advocacy?
National security and stability. Well, the basic issues about security in Nigeria are two-sided. One side of it, when we treat it as insecurity, we’ll be looking at issues that generally refer to underlying communal frictions, wherever those flashpoints are.

And the question of underlying communal issues has to do with the problem of bad governance. When I speak about bad governance, it’s not in the context of politics. It’s in the context of the fact that when a public officer or civil servant leverages their position to advance personal or ethnic interests rather than national interests, that is bad governance.

Or the same position is utilised to advance a religious interest rather than national interests. That is bad governance to me. So, this is uniquely different from what you hear in other discussions relating to politics.

Now, if we take bad governance, for instance, you see it in all aspects of our life, particularly in comments of high-profile government officers who occupy positions of public trust and then turn around to advance ethnic interests rather than national interests.

The second issue relates to the idea of shunning due process. When people shun due process, they are technically pushing a scenario where you engage with the proverbial statement, “survival of the fittest” or “survival of the fattest.”

The third argument has to do with what we see as doctrinal bias among defence and security personnel deployed to flashpoints. And doctrinal bias also leads to dereliction of duty.

A classical example that we have, by way of testimonies from survivors of attacks in flashpoints, is that sometimes they say, “The military officers came around, but they could not defend us. We alerted them beforehand, but they did not come early.”

And what we understand is that they don’t have the order to shoot on sight. We’ve seen social media comments where people who speak in defence of those indulging in criminal violence say, “Ah, shooting on sight—whose order is it?”

So, if you mobilise defence and security officers to the field and they are unable to act unless the threat is directly against them, that is an issue of doctrine or rule of engagement.

And so, when they fail to do the needful in line with the requirements or stipulations of the Constitution—Section 14(2)(b): the security and welfare of citizens is the purpose of government—when they fail to protect citizens, it turns out to be a dereliction of duty. That is what you hear from survivors: “They were there, but they didn’t do anything.”

The fourth point, as an underlying communal issue, has to do with the lawless handling of grievances. We take the classical example that is much talked about—herder-farmer clashes. It is a misnomer to call it a clash.

But let’s take it from its pristine view. Livestock breeders want open grazing. They need land, and they feel that is their occupational trait—that is the source of their livelihood—to breed livestock through open grazing.

Crop farmers also need the same field to farm their crops, till the ground, and earn a harvest as a means of livelihood. So, we go back to the traditional factors of production: land, labour, and capital. In this case, there is competition over the utilisation of land between crop farmers and livestock breeders.

Thus, whenever there are grievances from either side, the law says: Don’t take the law into your own hands. Pursue your grievances through legitimate channels. Report to the police, go to court. But eventually, what we live with daily, now and then, is livestock breeders attacking crop farmers right inside the comfort of their sleep at night.

Then, the question to ask is: do you graze your livestock in somebody’s bedroom? Do you even graze them at night, let alone in somebody’s bedroom? What is the issue?

And assuming the crop farmer has technically tilled the pathway through which you carry your livestock, that is a grievance you hold against the farmer. Rather than follow them into the comfort of their sleep to kill and attack them so they won’t be alive to till that ground, why don’t you report to the police? Why don’t you even go to court?

So, given this background, lawless handling of grievances has also become a major stressor of insecurity in Nigeria.The last point has to do with the ethnic struggle for political power. It’s also a major source of insecurity, and that’s the other side of insecurity that I talk about. It is insecurity per se, yet it is not insecurity.

When it is about a power struggle, it’s no longer insecurity; it’s a strategy of those struggling for political power and position. Some are deploying organised violence or gangster violence to deter others and cause them to submit.

Do you mean that there is a nexus between the struggle for political power and insecurity?
If you take a cursory look at political leadership in Nigeria—government leadership positions at the chief executive level, which is the president or the head of government—during civil rule, only three ethnic groups in Nigeria have had that privilege out of 250 ethnic groups; some say 400 ethnic groups, depending on which study you are looking at.

But we can work with the study that says there are 250 ethnic groups in Nigeria. So, only three ethnic groups, so far, have become chief executive officers of Nigeria during civil governance.

If you look at their population ratio compared to the overall population of the country, it is so small. And so, they make up for it by deploying gangster violence to achieve power, to survive in it, or—when they are out of power—to become relevant to those in power.

And so, that boils down to what we call the ethnic balance of power. The features of ethnic balance of power are three: number one, lack of strong consensus about governance; number two, legitimacy questions about every government that comes up; and number three, recursive policy measures or cyclical policy reversals.

Elites become the focus of attention here in a situation of ethnic balance of power. The elites that are out of power—elites generally in a multi-ethnic polity like Nigeria—tend to owe allegiance to and act on behalf of their ethnic interests rather than national interests.

So, those in power and those out of power will only see those in power as acting in the interests of their ethnic groups. Hence, they look for ways to stigmatise them to delegitimise their authority in power. And those out of power withhold their consent. Every government policy must be criticised. They see only the bad side of it. So that needed strong consensus is missing. The legitimacy of the government in power is also weakened.

A recursive policy measure comes in when every step pursued by the administration to remedy the perception of illegitimacy in office—every step taken by way of policy—becomes the problem itself or even bigger than the problem. That is the case of recursive policy measures.

Therefore, the best effort of every administration to solve a problem becomes a problem. So, when these features play out, they create a structural trap; a structural trap that now becomes the bane of governance in Nigeria. Technically, we call it structural stasis.

Hence, once governance is trapped in that structural stasis, the only way that becomes obvious to the common man is survival of the fittest by deploying ethnic strategies in the struggle.

And that struggle is what we see as insecurity. While we label it as insecurity, it remains a wrong diagnosis of the problem. This brings up the argument—let me just overstretch the question by saying: what is the remedy? The remedy is simply restructuring.

We are practising federalism, and true federalism is based on the will of the people. And the will of the people is defined by global principles that say freedom and liberty of the local identity of indigenous people over their land and people.

So, when you take the concept of freedom and liberty of the local identity of residents or indigenous people over their land and their people, Nigeria’s federalism becomes obtuse. Nigeria’s federalism is based on territorial composite administrative units, and so it now encourages the need for ethnic struggle.

Having said that, do you think Nigeria is capable of raising a constitution that addresses these problems, especially restructuring?
Well, if we take the three ethnic groups that have ruled Nigeria for reference, the Fulani have ruled Nigeria cumulatively for 21 years, from 1960 to date. Tafawa Balewa was Prime Minister for six years, (Shehu) Shagari was President for four years, (Umaru Musa) Yar’Adua was President for three years, and (Muhammadu) Buhari was President for eight years—cumulatively 21 years.

Now, what is the population of the Fulani? Relative to the population of the other 249 ethnic groups—if we are working with 250—what is their population? At best, six per cent of 230 million Nigerians. That’s a small population.

Next to the Fulani is the Yoruba. (Olusegun) Obasanjo ruled for eight years, and (President Bola) Tinubu has now ruled for two years and is still counting. That’s just ten years.

The third ethnic group is the Ijaw. (Dr Goodluck) Jonathan ruled for five years—one year remaining from Yar’Adua’s tenure and four years of his own full tenure—without the chance of a second tenure, simply because of the ethnic power struggle.

So, when you take these three ethnic groups and you see the struggle between them, and you see their population relative to the larger population and to the other ethnic groups, the only way they will keep themselves in power, or be relevant to power when they are out, is to deploy gangster violence.

And that’s what we are seeing. The most outspoken gangster violence comes from the Fulani group. It’s not hidden. It’s everywhere, all over the country. If you check the commentaries of their elites, they reflect the concept of bad governance. When somebody like Dr Aliyu Tilde, as Commissioner of Education in Bauchi State, tells you that the Fulani in the forest are continuing what (Usman) Dan Fodio began—that they have to finish it by any means, by rape, by killings, by whatever—it’s documented. This was an article he wrote. It’s published in the newspapers. You can reference it.

When you take the current Sultan (of Sokoto, Sa’ad Abubakar), who was attending a course in the U.S., and said that he doesn’t subscribe to any constitution except the Qur’an—yet he is here as a monarch, a spiritual leader, and a former military officer, making that kind of grotesque statement—what do you expect?

How many times have you heard him chide his ethnic people for doing what they are doing? I recall only one occasion when he said, out of every ten criminals arrested in the police station, seven or eight are Fulani. How can he be happy?
It’s not just enough to express unhappiness. There should be concrete steps pursued and advocacy aimed at curbing the tendencies of his kinsmen. So, those are the issues.

Then, take the Hausa ethnic group, which is the largest ethnic group in Nigeria. They’ve never had a shot at the presidency. They are currently struggling for liberation from the Fulani hold.

Over the years, the Fulani have deployed the resources of the Hausa ethnic group to achieve ascendancy to power: resources of language, marriage, religion, population, history, culture, and art of dressing.

Before now, an average Nigerian would tell you Hausa and Fulani are the same. We used to hear the concept of Hausa-Fulani—until the Hausa began their liberation advocacy. We have come to realise that they are not the same.

Initially, we interrogated the argument that no tribe is a hybrid. Since we are patrilineal, you follow your father’s lineage. If he’s Hausa, you’re Hausa, whether your mother is from any other tribe. If he’s Fulani, you’re Fulani, depending on the tribe of your father.

These are the dynamics that are playing out in Nigeria and are creating insecurity, either in the form of a power struggle or in the form of a struggle for livelihood.

For livelihood, we’ve seen the features: lawless handling of grievances, shunting due process. And those who are sent out to the field to keep the peace have suffered issues of doctrine that have led to dereliction of duty.

So, when you take it from a political power point of view, we’ve seen the ethnic balance of power reflected in bad governance, using governmental positions to advance ethnic interests.

And the elites are the key drivers of these issues, who owe allegiance and act on behalf of their ethnic interests rather than national interests. The key element that we tend to forget is that no one can change their ethnicity, from womb to tomb. No matter what, no one can change their ethnicity.

We can change anything in life. Any proprietary item of value can be changed at will, but not ethnicity. So, the deep-rooted nature or influence of ethnicity on the elites can only be resolved when true federalism comes into play.

If we belong to the same ethnic cohort, I want to be in the parliament on our behalf. I will only campaign among you and get to the parliament. I don’t have to make a decision about somebody in Sokoto or Bayelsa whose environment I don’t know. That is true federalism.

An example of true federalism is at the family level. I’ll give you an example of myself. There are six males from my dad. Each one of us has their unique gift, unique calling in terms of career, to earn a living. But all of us will take care of our parents; we will contribute to taking care of our parents. So, our parents have now become the central government.

While we are individuals—if I am a plumber, that’s the way I earn my living—but I have to take care of my parents. If the other one is a welder, that’s his way. So, that’s the example of federalism.

At the governance level, let every ethnic group be on its own. Some will be homogeneous; some will be heterogeneous. But to be heterogeneous, they have to agree to be together.

And empirical evidence suggests that in multi-ethnic politics, heterogeneous units must have a determinant factor that is influenced by demography and electoral value.

The issue of political structure, how much does it impinge on this federalism?
Take the current structure of Nigeria. We have three-tier federalism: the central government, the state government, and the local government. This does not reflect the principles of true federalism anywhere in the world; it’s only in Nigeria.

Now, these structures are based on boundary delineation by some authorities. All of the structures in Nigeria, beyond the four regional structures that existed in the First Republic, were created by the military.

Take the case of Benue State. The majority of the Tiv ethnic group is in Benue State. Some are in Nasarawa State, some in Taraba State, and a small number are also in Plateau State. So, you have scattered one ethnic group into four states.

Those in Benue are in the majority—they can carry on. Those in Nasarawa are few; they are a minority. So, they will struggle for their rights and will be suppressed.

And that struggle, which we discussed as ethnic struggle—they want to have a voice, they want to have a say—but they are being held down. So, the only way to vent their displeasure or whatever is through some criminal tendencies. It’s the same with nearly all the ethnic groups around the nation.

Take the case of Kwara and Kogi, where there are ethnic elements of Yoruba. Those cohorts, since the First Republic, have pushed for the need to be with their kinsmen in the former Western Region, to no avail.

It was the reason why the Northern Regional Government set up a minority commission in 1954, headed by Mr R.S. Hudson. Soon after that, the federal government set up its minority commission under Henry Willink in 1957, both of them turning in their reports.

But the one of the Northern Region was about two issues: the Middle Belt needed its separate region from the Northern Region, and the Yoruba who were in the Northern Region needed boundary adjustment to move to the Western Region.

Those issues failed because the colonialists said they were about to hand over power by Independence in 1960. Now, it was 1958, and the first federal elections were coming up in 1959, in order to form the federal parliament to take power at independence.

The question then was, which one do you prefer? If we have to do the boundary adjustment and create new regions, we would delay independence. If we have to give independence in 1960, then we will allow you to do these things on your own. That was how it got lost, and it was never done.

And when the military took over, the First Republic lasted technically only two years. Self-rule that began on October 1, 1963, was preceded by a period of transition.

Between October 1, 1960 and September 30, 1963, was a transitional, colonial period, because we were still answerable to the Queen in England. It was only from October 1, 1963, that we became a republic and were answerable to ourselves. Those are the issues.

So, that period of the First Republic lasted from October 1, 1963, to January 14, 1966—two years, three months, and two weeks; it had not lasted long enough to make adjustments in the desire to address the issues.

The current structure that was created by military fiat based on administrative boundary delineation has encouraged the struggle for power among the ethnicities.

Unfortunately, it became embedded in the rotation of power between North and South. The rotation of power between North and South itself has not helped matters, because it has been an intense struggle between ethnicities.

When it is in the South, we say that technically, the Yoruba have dominated it. The Ijaw, via Jonathan, got in there by default. When it is in the North, the Fulani have dominated it. So, the power struggle is between those two major ethnic groups—the Yoruba and the Fulani. And so, anything that needs to be done to get that power is being done.

For the Fulani, who are a small population—if you take the entire Northern bloc—the population of the Middle Belt minorities, the Kanuri, and the Hausa relative to that of the Fulani is too minuscule. Yet, they have ascended to power using the resources of the Hausa population, as explained earlier.

And so, to maintain themselves, to survive in power, they have to deploy gangster violence beyond just civic and secular attributes; the same goes for the desire of a Kanuri man to also ascend to power.

If you observe political parties, especially during the Second Republic, the Kanuri stood with their GNPP (Greater Nigeria Peoples Party), while the Hausa and the Fulani, technically, by way of a smokescreen, were with the NPN (National Party of Nigeria). And the minorities in the Middle Belt went for the NPP to align with the Igbo.

So, these are the dynamics that fuel insecurity or crises in different ways—killings every now and then. It has never bothered anybody, because it is understood to be a struggle for power.