Beyond the Polls

One cannot escape the feeling that Nigeria’s 2023 presidential election was a seminal moment in the country’s history. With the media focused squarely on the electoral fortunes of former Anambra State governor, Peter Obi, who emerged as a viable third force—the first since Nigeria’s return to democracy in 1999—both Nigerians and the observing international community were seemingly waiting to see if Obi could pull off the sort of people-led electoral victories Zambia’s Hakainde Hichilema and Kenya’s William Ruto did in 2021 and 2022 respectively.

Arguably, the election came as the nation faced heightened division amongst its people. In the South East, an insurgency rages intending to actualize the long-held dream of Biafra. In the north central, Christian minorities cry of an ongoing pogrom at the hands of Fulani ethnic militias. In the South West, Yoruba nationalists call for an independent Yoruba nation. At the presidential elections, these forces came to a head as each of Nigeria’s major ethnic groups, the Hausa (and Fulani), Yoruba, and Igbo were represented by a viable candidate, with predictably reflective voting patterns.

For keen students of history, the elections may be reminiscent of the pre- and post-independence period, when the nation’s politics was little more than a tussle between the three major regions. The tussle was largely personified in power struggles between Sir Tafawa Balewa, the nation’s first and only prime minister, and the premiers of the Northern, Western and Eastern regions respectively: Sir Ahmadu Bello, Obafemi Awolowo, and Nnamdi Azikiwe, who became the first president. Nigeria appears to have come full circle in terms of ethno-religious politics. This ought to sound alarm bells to those who still believe in the concept of one Nigeria.

Although the Independent National Electoral Commission of Nigeria (INEC) has now declared Bola Tinubu, the winner of the 2023 Presidential elections; the question of the nation’s future seems far from settled. Firstly, the president-elect must face off with his main rivals, Atiku Abubakar and Peter Obi, who are currently in court challenging the process that put him there.

No presidential election has ever been overturned by Nigeria’s courts, but many who believe that 2023 may be the exception. Most prominent among these would be Obi himself, who, as governor of Anambra State was impeached but reclaimed the gubernatorial office through the court. In his tweets, Obi can be seen assuring his supporters that he will reclaim his mandate, once more, through the framework of Nigeria’s legal system.

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Beyond the winner-takes-all royal rumble that may now ensue before an electoral tribunal, there is the larger existential question that hangs over the fate of the nation. Ahead of the polls, Pa Ayo Adebanjo, the national leader of the Pan Yoruba cultural and political group, Afenifere, and an ardent supporter of Peter Obi, repeatedly warned that any outcome other than an Obi victory would sound the death knell for the nation Nigeria.

In his words, ‘It is either bend or break. If Obi does not win, forget a country called Nigeria. If we lose this election, there will be no opportunity for a non-Christian, a non-northerner to be president again’.

Was this mere alarmism on the part of a man with an interest in an Obi win? Or is this a prophecy destined for inevitability?

Talk of the disintegration of Nigeria has never been absent in Nigeria’s socio-politics. For example, Sir Tafawa Balewa, the leader of the Northern Peoples’ Congress (NPC) and the eventual prime minister, is credited with having made the following statement, in 1948, several years before the nation’s independence:

Since 1914, the British Government has been trying to make Nigeria into one country, but the Nigerian people themselves are historically different in their backgrounds, in their religious beliefs and customs and do not show themselves any sign of willingness to unite… Nigerian unity is only a British intention.

Such views are arguably as valid now as they were then. Nigeria, being an ethnically diverse country, has over 250 distinct languages spoken by its people and has three major ethnicities, along with several relatively large minority groups. The smallest of these three major tribes, the Igbo, who represent 18 per cent of the country’s population—approximately 36 million people—are more numerous than the next most populous country in West Africa, Ghana.

Each of these groups has distinct sets of cultural values, with several sub-cultures, dialects, and sometimes historical in-group rivalries. This only serves to further complicate matters. These ethnicities are also divided by geography: the rivers Niger and Benue between the South East and other regions, and a rich belt of rainforest between the South West and the North. This means that if not for British colonial intervention, the country currently known as Nigeria realistically had very little prospect of being formed organically.

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Beyond the Polls

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