Nigerian politics, leadership and nation-building (1)

NIGERIA is a nation born in optimism in 1960 at independence but has in its 55 years lived in a state of doubt and uncertainty. Within those years too, all kinds of analysis and conclusions have been assembled on critical issues responsible for what has become a Nigerian dilemma over nation-building and national development. This is because all the countries compared to Nigeria in 1960 have made astronomical progress, developed relatively stable political and economic systems. David Kemp compared Nigeria to Brazil in the 1960s; others spoke of Malaysia, Indonesia, India, etc.

One of Nigeria’s fault lines was for a long time attributed to leadership failures, others suggested defective political and economic structures, and yet others spoke of the Nigerian national character or the “Nigerian factor”. The reality is that in comparison to her other contemporaries, Nigeria was an abysmal disappointment in both expectations and achievements. This is obvious when one realises the position of India, Brazil, Indonesia, etc. within the present international political and economic system, in comparison to Nigeria.

Leadership
Nigerian history is both fascinating and an object lesson in “politics of precarious balancing” in a society of irrepressible pluralism and hostile sub-cultures. It is actually a country of outrageous paradox in the sense that it is a nation constantly threatened not by those who have nothing to lose, but ironically, by the incoherent national political elites who have everything to lose. Consequently, although Nigeria is assessed as uniquely powerful in its African and global scope, at the domestic level, the country is assessed as equally uniquely insecure and unstable. It is therefore imperative for us to recognise and accept, no matter how uncomfortable that the tensions and crises constantly present in Nigeria arise not from imaginary but real issues, which the national leadership must address urgently.

It is a historic fact that leadership is everything in governance and management of human affairs. Here also, history has furnished us with examples of specific qualities and attributes that contribute to effective leadership. These include clear sense of purpose or mission and vision, charisma and the ability to motivate others in a way that favours compliance, dedication and devotion to the fulfillment of the vision and the mission. The late sage – Chinua Achebe – summarised Nigeria’s leadership problems in his book – The Trouble with Nigeria.

Accordingly, he said: “Nigerian problem is the unwillingness or inability of its leaders to rise to the responsibility, to the challenge of personal examples which are the hallmarks of true leadership”. He further concluded that “in spite of all conventional opinion, Nigeria has been less fortunate in its leadership”, and placed the blame on the “seminal absence of intellectual rigour in the political thought of our founding fathers”.

Leadership and nation-building have consistently been Nigeria’s most constant priority agenda before and since independence 55 years ago. Unfortunately, in spite of all good intentions and spirited efforts of the nation’s leaders since 1960, these twin problems have remained a national dilemma. Throughout Nigeria’s history, sub-national or ethnic nationalism has dominated and sabotaged all meaningful discussions and debates about national integration and nation-building.

In fact, no generation of leaders, military or civilian, has been able to create an atmosphere of credibility to ensure Nigeria’s claim to a political future as a nation. None was able to evolve a unifying national ideology that was embraced either by fellow political elites or by the entire Nigerian populace.

Recently, some Nigerian political leaders have said that “Nigerian unity is not negotiable”. This is an irony because these leaders have forgotten, or have failed to learn, the lessons of history. Nigerian unity is definitely negotiable and must be re-negotiated for it to stand or survive the test of time. The reality over the years remains that in spite of the best efforts of all our leaders past or present, Nigerian unity is not guaranteed. It is simply, at best, an aspiration and not yet an achievement. Hence, the statement that Nigerian unity is “not negotiable” is simply a historical fallacy. In fact, just recently too, in a brainstorming exercise at the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs (NIIA), one outstanding Nigerian scholar referred to our country as one of the “most and fastest declining states in the world” and supported the assertion with startling and incontrovertible statistics.

If we are to salvage our country, we must begin to face reality, stop the syndrome of self-deception and self-delusion about Nigerian historical exceptionality. Today, if the truth must be told, our diversity has turned into disorder, and our democracy into an invitation to incremental anarchy.

For Nigerian unity and nation-building to succeed, the leaders need to borrow a leaf from or emulate the experiences of countries that did not ignore the element of pluralism in their respective countries and societies. Nationalism, including ethnic nationalism, is not about to disappear in the world generally, and certainly not in Nigeria, no matter how much we want to wish it away. It is still a potent force and all its advocates feel they have a strong case and believe that history is on their side.

Without mincing words, the disparity between claims to nationhood and the political realities in Nigeria are responsible for the political instability, military coups, sporadic guerilla war fares, crises and violence that have characterised Nigeria’s history. It is equally the same realities that compel the Nigerian political elites – military and civilian – once in power to quickly split along many lines, particularly, the lines of ethnic origin, religion and region. The result has been inter-elite rivalries, reciprocal suspicion, hostility of position and status conflict among Nigerian elites.

Consequently, throughout our history, the national elites have been engaged in deadly competitions and conflicts of hostile sub-cultures, resulting in various danger signals that often threaten the survival of the country. There is hardly any national issue over which our incoherent national political elites would accept consensus. Every issue is subject to political maneuvers and intrigues, conspiracies and sabotage of one another or of one group against another. Hence there exists in Nigeria, almost on a permanent basis, a heightened level of elite insecurity, with its inevitable national psychosis.