"The fact remains that every single Nigerian is a tribalist; accept it or not, we all owe 100 times more allegiance to our ethnic groups than to the nation. We see everything and everybody first as Yoruba or these days 'Christian Yorubas' or 'Biafran Ibos' or 'Hausa-Fulanis'; it reflects in everything we say or do."
Nigeria has its own Sept. 11. Its day of explosion and death was Jan. 27, the day an army munitions dump in Lagos exploded, leaving perhaps 1,000 people dead.
The quotation above is part of the fierce debate that can be found on a Web site dedicated to Nigerian news and commentary: www.gamji.com. The debate trades accusations over which group was responsible for what. While Sept. 11 united, Jan. 27 has divided. And the Jan. 27 explosion, or the ethnic violence that left hundreds dead or wounded in Lagos days later, are just one among many grievances.
Take another: the murder in his home last year of the justice minister, Bola Ibe; no culprit has yet been found. The debate goes on. "When Yoruba leaders like the late Chief Bola Ige who was born and bred in the North argues that the 'Hausa-Fulanis' are the Tutsis of Nigeria for no worse crime ..." begins a different writer on the Nigerian Web site.
According to David Cowan, senior Africa economist at The Economist Intelligence Unit in London, Nigeria is "a seething mix of ethnic, religious and geographical rivalries." There are three major tribal groups, the Hausa-Falani, the Ibo, and the Yoruba, but Antony Goldman, formerly The Financial Times' correspondent in Lagos and now writing a book on the country, points out that these three tribes make up only about 60 percent of the population.
There are many other tribes, 350 language groups, different geographies, different climates: forces that pull Nigeria apart. In the north some states have declared Islamic Sharia law. It suited the British colonists to create one country, Goldman comments, but one prominent Nigerian chief asked if the country was no more than a geographical expression, a space on the map.
The grievances of the seething mix have worsened. What was once an agricultural country has been changed by oil. Nigeria extracts over 2 million barrels per day, more than Kuwait. But oil has brought trouble as well as wealth. The country fights over the oil money, and the fight embitters. The military has often stepped in, taking the money for itself.
Economic growth has been low. Cowan puts Nigeria's gross domestic product at about $35 billion: far less than that of Peru. It provides a GDP per capita of only about $300 per year for the population of 115 million. Probably these figures paint a picture worse than reality. There is a large informal economy which, as Gavin Williams of St. Peter's College, Oxford, points out, "the government, fortunately, does not touch." Nevertheless Nigerians are poor, and they are unhappy. Relentlessly the oil money comes in. Where does it go? What is there to show for it?
Since 1999 the civilian government of President Olusegun Obasanjo has had to field the grievances. Obasanjo is himself a former military leader, in 1976-79, but is now a born-again Christian and is not thought to be personally corrupt. If he lasts out his term till 2003 -- and it seems he will --that in itself might be called a success. For the first time, the military will not have stepped in. But what is his agenda? For Williams, Obasanjo's goal is no more than to "try to keep the show on the road."
There is little direction to economic policy. Inflation has climbed to 18 percent as the government borrows and spends. The fiscal deficit is now about 5-6 percent of GDP, Cowan estimates. Rising inflation is one of the problems that led a stand-by agreement signed with the International Monetary Fund in August 2000 to fall apart. The flagship privaitization, that of Nitel, the telecoms company, looks like it will fall through.
Obasanjo has also made many political mistakes. He should have done more to stop the declaration of Sharia law in the Muslim north, Goldman believes. Radical Islam is a threat to Nigeria's unity. The parliament revised a rule over parliamentary elections; Obasanjo unilaterally over-ruled it. He went to the scene of the tragedy of Jan. 27 and angrily told people who heckled him to shut up, Goldman says. Later he said he did not know there has been fatalities. If he did not know, he ought to have done.
Nigeria does not really have democracy, in Goldman's view. He sees the political elite as being complacent. They expect to speak and be obeyed. It is a tradition that probably goes back to the village or tribal chief. Nigeria is a hierarchical country. And beneath the elite, the tensions are growing: the ethnic violence, the vigilante groups, the lawlessness.
The danger is that it could all get worse. Rwanda has shown how ethnic tension can become genocide. Sierra Leone has shown how the frustrations of the majority can erupt into nihilistic slaughter and brutality. If Nigeria, Africa's largest country, were to break apart, millions might be killed. That is the nightmare vision: the abyss into which Nigeria could fall and has not fallen.
The economic picture is changing. The oil wealth is going to become still greater. Offshore drilling in the Gulf of Guinea has the potential to double Nigeria's crude production. The United States will be among many Western countries to welcome that. The more Nigeria produces, the less the West is dependent on the Middle East for oil.
But within Nigeria there is a risk: that the rising earnings from oil promote still greater greed, rivalry and division.
For decades Nigeria has teetered on the edge of the abyss and has pulled back from it. Goldman thinks of the country differently, as a bumblebee. Its design suggests that it could never fly. And yet it does. The country muddles along, unhappily, chaotically, violently, but disintegration and disaster are avoided. Things are bad but could be much worse.
Yet Nigeria's leaders must wake up. They have failed the population and the dangers are great. If the country were to explode and separate many would die and the future of the new entities would be just as uncertain.
Jan. 27: Perhaps the country ought to see it as a symbol. Explosion and death must be avoided. It is time to pull together.
Global View is a weekly column in which our economics correspondent reflects on issues of importance for the global economy. Comments to [email protected].
