NIGERIA AND STATE FAILURE SYNDROME
By Babatunde Jose
Since independence, our governments have been a matter of few holding the cow for the strongest and most cunning to milk, under those circumstances everybody runs over everybody to make good at the expense of others’.*(Awolowo, 1979).
It was Prof Adebayo Williams who said: *Nigeria is the ultimate nightmare of the political analyst. The chaotic and anarchic realities do not conform to any model anywhere in the world. Yet they keep getting in the way, making a fool of the most determined of analysts and political scientists.* – And I concur with his prognosis.
Contrary to the stand of many commentators, Nigeria is not yet a failed state, but is in the throes of state failure going by contemporary developments.
Commenting on the situation, Segun Adeniyi wrote: *“From the debt overhang to the national currency whose value diminishes by the minute, to the oil and gas sector where the bounty of nature abundantly available on our shores has been ceded to thieves, Nigeria is in deep crisis. The atrocious security situation compounds our woes. . . . . , death has become an unscheduled consequence of normal living since government—the only human invention meant to separate men from beasts—has lost the monopoly of violence to sundry criminal cartels. After taking over the roads, bandits have also grounded the railway that we built with jumbo loans we don’t know how to repay. And gradually, flying is being priced beyond the reach of many of us.”* Veritable attributes of a failing state.
Common characteristics of a failing state include a weak and increasingly ineffectual central government with little practical control over some of its territory. A situation we are currently experiencing especially in some parts of the North.
However, a failed state is a political entity that has disintegrated to a point where basic conditions and responsibilities of a sovereign government no longer function properly. We are not there yet but sleepwalking towards that state.
Failed states create an environment of flourishing corruption and negative growth rates, where honest economic activity cannot flourish.
State collapse may coincide with economic collapse, but not necessarily so, as the case of many very poor countries attest to. State collapse is also not synonymous with societal collapse, which often is a more prolonged process, as in the fall of the Western Roman Empire, the collapse of Byzantium, the Caliphates, and the Ottoman Empire.
It was R. Briffault, in his book, *The Making of Humanity*, who said: *“A society based on false principles inevitably disintegrates.”* The ‘wages of sin is death’ by the inevitable operation of natural selections”.
There are five routes to state failure: escalating ethnic conflicts, state predation, regional guerrilla rebellion, democratic collapse, and succession/reform crises, all of which are daily manifestations in our clime.
There is no doubt ours is a fragile or weak state characterized by low capacity or shaky legitimacy, leaving citizens vulnerable to a range of shocks and growing inability to maintain a monopoly on force in its declared territory.
Failing states or states in decline have the following characteristics: rise in political and criminal violence, rising ethnic, religious, and cultural hostilities and cleavages, weak institutions, food insecurity, rise in unemployment, inflation and fall in GDP with attendant rise in infant mortality, falling educational standards and a failed basic health delivery system. These aptly describe Nigeria today.
The Quran has repeatedly directed our attention to the phenomena of nations that flourished in the past, but which went into ruin because of their way of life, the goals they pursued, the values around which their culture was organized, their actions and the consequences of those actions. By looking back at them we can avoid pitfalls. *See Quran 24: 34; 40: 82-83; 21:11-14.*
The Quran says: *To every People is a term appointed: When their term is reached, not an hour can they cause delay, nor (an hour) can they advance (it in anticipation). (Quran 7:34)*
Natural resources, ethnic composition and religious differences do not in themselves drive fragility. Rather, it is the political weaponization of these factors that can impact on state stability. Violent conflict is the ultimate manifestation of state fragility.
The three top indicators used in constructing the scorecard of a failing state are uneven development, the loss of governmental legitimacy, and demographic pressure.
Uneven development typically means a lopsided authoritative allocation of values, such that a small segment of the population is accumulating wealth while much of the society may be suffering a decline in living conditions. This unevenness is often associated with political corruption. This is what we term marginalization of whole communities, ethnic groups or regions.
Governments that fail to effectively manage emerging issues and provide basic services are seen as ineffective. This often causes segments of the population to shift their allegiance to warlords, tribal chieftains, or religious leaders. A loss of political legitimacy is an early sign of state decline. This aptly describes the Nigerian situation where patently intelligent and intellectual minds shift their allegiance to non-state actors and budding warlords and other miscreants and nonentities, such as motor park chieftains.
We even reward the non-state actors with high traditional titles like Are Onakakanfo or turbaning a known terrorist by leaders of the community he has been terrorizing; what a paradox.
The third top indicator is demographic pressure when nations suffer from demographic fatigue, as a result of inability to cope with the provision of social services for the rapidly expanding population. This is simply the result of failure to plan.
Foreign investment drying up and a resultant rise in unemployment are also part of the decline syndrome. It is due partly to the state of insecurity. The fate of GB Food’s 20 billion Naira investment in Kebbi State is a case study.
Two years ago, GB Foods ( makers of Gino Curry, Gino Tomato Paste and Bama) invested 20 billion naira to build one of the biggest tomato processing plants in Africa. The factory has the largest single tomato farm in Nigeria. It is also billed to be the largest fresh tomato processing factory in Sub-Saharan Africa.
In March this year bandits invaded the factory with plans to kidnap the expatriate staff. But the gallant policemen attached to the factory ward off the attack. Four of the policemen lost their lives before the bandits were repelled.
The European expatriates booked the next flight out of Nigeria and the parent company GB Foods in Spain was forced to shut down the factory and the Nigerian workers were laid off. The factory is still closed. See https://www.thenews-chronicle.com/how-insecurity
Another characteristic of failing states is a deterioration of the physical infrastructure—roads and power, water, and sewage systems. The sorry state of the roads leading to the twin ports of Apapa and Tin-Can exemplifies this assertion. Equally so is the ever-deteriorating electricity supply in the country with frequent breakdown of the National Grid.
Among the most conspicuous indicators of state failure is a breakdown in law and order and a related loss of personal security. Regrettably, no one is safe anymore. We are all threatened creatures under God with nowhere to run.
Another indicator is long-standing civil conflicts. The Boko Haram insurrection in the Northern parts of Nigeria comes under this purview and the sporadic actions in the Niger Delta and the IPOD menace in the Southeast; le st we forget the herdsmen lurking in southern forests.
The State is failing when security is so bad that insurrectionists, bandits, and terrorists use our soldiers and in some cases Generals for target practice.
Today the proverbial chicken has come home to roost. The terrorists have arrived at the gate of our Presidential Villa, attacking roadblocks and palace guards’ barracks, threatening to kidnap our president. What more remains in the characterization of a failed state syndrome? Haaa! Lobatan, it is finished!
Barka Juma’at and a happy weekend
Babatunde Jose
