NIGERIAN DEMOCRACY: PART OF THE PROBLEM OR PART OF THE SOLUTION?

The inspiration for this reflection is a long conversation I had recently with a Canadian at the lobby of a hotel in Abuja. The gentleman works for an international NGO and had come to the country for some development assistance work.
Because he came from the French-speaking part of Canada and I had lived briefly as a post-doctorate fellow at McGill University, Montreal, Canada, (another French part of Canada) in the 1990s, it was pretty easy to strike out a conversation.
Expectedly the discussion quickly gravitated to Nigerian politics – its character, possible trajectories and the way out. From experience you learn that when discussing with someone from the West, it is important not to signal that you merely want to soldier for your country or continent. You need to draw them out by your choice of words and body language so that such conversations could be frank and unhindered by too much political correctness. Most of such development experts from the West have what they call ‘Third worldism’ – the tendency of scholars from the developing countries to be overtly defensive of their countries or blame their woes on colonialism and imperialism when conversing with people from the West.
“So what do you think about 2015? Do you think Nigeria will survive its current challenges?” We had been standing and discussing on the lobby of the hotel for some 20 minutes or so.
“Nigeria is a master of hanging on the precipice. But unlike other countries, it is our comfort zone so there is no risk of falling over the precipice at all. We are masters of fooling every outsider by the way we seem to perch precariously on this precipice. But don’t be fooled, Monsieur. Probably ten years from now we will still be where we are while a few other countries laughing at us now will have imploded,” I answered.
He laughed hilariously and we decided to get ourselves some drinks at the bar section of the hotel while we deepened our interrogation of the Nigerian condition.
It turned out that my new friend – let’s call him John – was very enamoured by the book, Wars, Guns, and Votes: Democracy in Dangerous Places (2010) and used some of the constructs and precepts in the book in interrogating our democracy – or lack of it. The book was written by John Collier, a former director of research at World Bank and currently Professor of Economics and Public Policy at the Blavatnik School of Government, Oxford, and Director for the Centre for the Study of African Economies at the same university. When the book was published, it received rave reviews. I read sections of the book in 2011 or early 2012 so we had very interesting conversations about the book.
In the book, Collier argues that fragile states are unable to provide two vital public goods – security and accountability – due to a dire lack of leadership. He further argues that the “three illicit electoral tactics” in fragile states of which Nigeria is one – bribery, voter intimidation and ballot fraud – are extremely effective in handicapping the democratic process and its ability to provide public goods and that politicians who use these tactics hold power three times longer than those who do not. His recommended solution was a call on the “international community to boost troops and aid to fragile states, especially after elections, to eject them from the cycle of insecurity”.
My opinion of Collier’s book was that it was over-rated and very simplistic in its analysis and in the desiderata it offered. For instance, the book assumes, not quite correctly in my opinion, that an effective leader in a fragile, distrust-laden and polarized society will have the same unsentimental public space on which to exercise his wisdom and leadership as you do in the more mature democracies. This is another way of saying that the book neglects the influence of environmental variables – the same error committed by those who reduce the problems of the country to poverty of leadership. The truth, however, is that even if an angel comes down from heaven and is assigned to govern Nigeria, it will not take too look before Nigerians accuse the angel of ethnic, regional and religious biases in his policies or accuse him of marginalizing some sections of the country – or even carrying out ethnic cleansing against some. If the angel manages to escape such allegations there will sure be demonstrations and #Bringback campaigns that will accuse the angel of carrying out policies that are deliberately designed to favour beings from outer space or to ensure that Nigerians all do not make it to heaven.
When Collier argued that the “three illicit electoral tactics” – bribing, voter intimidation, and ballot fraud – are extremely effective in handicapping the democratic process and its ability to provide public goods – I was left wondering whether he was not, to use the words of my ‘oga at the top’, emeritus Professor of Political Science Isawa Elaigwu, not merely confusing the institutional manifestations of a phenomenon to its defining characteristic. Contrary to Collier’s position, my opinion is that the “three illicit electoral practices” (bribery, voter intimidation and ballot fraud) do not handicap the democratic processes. They are merely symptoms of a handicapped democratic process – meaning that we need to seek explanations of why our democratic processes are handicapped elsewhere.
I was also uncomfortable with Collier’s recommendation for the “international community to boost troops and aid to fragile states, especially after elections, to eject them from the cycle of insecurity”. Where has boosting troops to stem post electoral violence by the West ever led to the deepening of democracy in recent times? From Iraq, Libya, Syria to Afghanistan the outcome of such interventions do not point in the direction of democratic consolidation.
My opinion is that the anarchic nature of our elections and their predictable contentious character has to do more with the centrality of the state, its role as the major means of production, major instrument of wealth accumulation and the most critical instrument for the dispensation of lucre and privileges. In other words, while I reject theories that rule out democratic possibilities for Africa, we need to accept that the nature of our society predisposes us to a certain form of democracy, which is unique in its own right.
We began a discussion of democracy in general and the appropriateness of liberal democracy to Nigeria given the nature of the country.
Given the structure of our society and all that is happening in the country at the moment, do I think that liberal democracy is right for Nigeria at this time?
My opinion is that while it can be conceded that democracy could aggravate the structures of conflict in our type of society, such a conclusion still needs to be prefaced:
It is often fashionable to talk of democracy in fragile societies like ours as moving in three waves or phases – i) the liberalization phase, when the previous authoritarian regime opens up or crumbles; (ii) a transition phase, often culminating when the first competitive elections are held; and (iii) the consolidation phase, when democratic practices are expected to become more firmly established and accepted by most relevant actors.
It is generally believed that the consolidation phase is essential for establishing durable democratic regimes, practices and norms. For emerging democracies, however, it is also recognized as the most challenging. It is also often recognized that democratization processes are not usually lineal and that democratic transitions do not always result in consolidated democracies. Also some democratizing societies get stuck in seemingly perpetual ‘transition mode’ and its associated problems. For Nigeria, no one is sure if we are stuck in democratic transition or facing the challenges of democratic consolidation.
One of the features of democratizing (as opposed to democratic societies) is the retention of authoritarian impulses and even nostalgia for certain authoritarian manner of doing things. This is why there remains a nostalgia by some for the ‘strong leader’ (in the mode of Obasanjo) who has to find ways to circumvent the slow wheels of democracy and why leaders who are very restrained in their exercise of power such as President Shehu Shagari during the Second Republic and President Jonathan (until recently?) are thought to be weak. It is also probably why some cynics argue that we are not really practising ‘democracy’.
When people express disappointment that they are not getting the ‘dividends of democracy’ (used often to mean more social justice and improvement in their material circumstances), it is unfortunately not certain that this is one of the promises of democracy, especially ones that are facing the challenges of transition or consolidation.
Will Nigeria survive 2015? I already mentioned that we are masters of perching on the precipice so the chances of surviving are very high. But even if we don’t as a nation, it will not be the end of the world. So let no one use the breaking up of the country as a tool of blackmail. Being resource rich or resource poor does not say much about which part of the country will succeed if the undesirable becomes inevitable. Yes, many of us will feel diminished if Nigeria ceases to exist, but we will also adjust to regularizing our immigration papers to live wherever we want to.

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