Global-Nigeria-Report.Pdf
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
N30 Billion Debt Issuance N30 Billion Debt Issuance N30 Billion Debt Issuance N30 Billion Debt Issuance Global_Ad.indd 44 22/04/2013 22:27 AN41 Spotlight Nigeria Hurrying to an uncertain destiny Beset by security problems and governance issues, Nigeria continues to confound its critics, with an economy that posts handsome growth – and a football team that can deliver satisfying results Antony Goldman in Abuja When a constitutional furore threatened population is now estimated at 160 mil- marginalised regions. In the Niger Delta, to rip Nigeria apart in 1964, the country’s lion, infrastructure is at breaking point which produces for export more than 2 leading newspaper observed that, just four or beyond in at least a dozen teeming cit- million barrels a day and generates more years after independence from Britain, “we than 90 percent of foreign exchange earn- have perfected the art of staring into the ings, violence remains ever present, despite abyss without toppling in”. This talent for A sustainable peace will the adoption of amnesty in 2009 by many escapology has been sharpened through 50 militia groups fighting for a greater share years of emergency and crisis management, come not simply from of the region’s oil wealth. International oil marked by a civil war, several coups and a military victory over companies estimate that up to 20 percent of today a pattern of violence that begs ques- Nigeria’s production from fields on shore, tions as old as Nigeria itself: who is the extremists, but with or in shallow water, is regularly stolen by country for – and what will it take for it to organised criminal networks, often with remain as one? substantial investment to the complicity of officials in those same oil The challenges Nigeria faces today are rebuild the battered legacy companies and partners in the military and more severe than at any time since its government. It is a trade worth billions of disparate regions in the old Islamic em- of government dollars, supplemented by sidelines in pi- pires of the North, the oil-rich swamps racy from Cameroon to Ivory Coast – and of the Niger Delta, Yoruba kingdoms in the abduction of expatriates or prominent the west and feisty republicans in the ies and the ranks of the unemployed and locals, including in 2012 the octogenar- east were fenced together for colonial underemployed continue to swell. ian mother of the finance minister, Ngozi convenience by the British in 1914. The Tensions have been greatest in the most Okonjo-Iweala. Curt Carnemark/World Bank Curt Carnemark/World global second quarter 2013 www.global-briefing.org l 47 Global14_Spotlight_Nigeria pp46-57.indd 47 22/04/2013 23:23 AN41 Spotlight Nigeria The Ministry of Petroleum Resources ia itself. They also claim that while Ansaru notes that Nigerian output has climbed sig- has no real constituency in Nigeria, Boko nificantly since the 2009 amnesty and is Haram has been able to tap into a sense of presently at record levels. But delays over alienation from the secular state in one of the adoption of reforms first presented to Nigeria’s impoverished regions – and that parliament nearly four years ago have put a sustainable peace will come not simply a brake on new investment in oil explora- from a military victory over extremists but tion, while technological advances in the needs substantial investment to create jobs exploitation of shale gas mean that interest and new initiatives to rebuild the battered in Nigeria’s prodigious reserves of natu- legitimacy of government. ral gas has dwindled. While thousands of Opponents of President Goodluck former militants have undergone training in Jonathan maintain that security issues are a diverse range of skills, signs of opportu- symptoms of a deeper malaise, and that nity and jobs generated by a confident and his administration has shown little will or expanding private sector are few and far capacity to deal with longstanding govern- between. ance and infrastructure issues. Opposition In the North, the situation is potentially parties in February pledged to work togeth- more explosive still: an Islamist insurgency er to overcome personal rivalries between Shiraz Chakera CC by SA-2.0 threatens to place Nigeria on a new front- Kwa Falls and the Cross River State rainforest their leaders to create a political merger that line in a War on Terror that the USA and its could challenge the hegemony of the Peo- allies in Europe had hoped was fizzling out. ple’s Democratic Party (PDP), which has Boko Haram (Western education is a sin) curity police station in Abuja in November, lasted since the restoration of civilian rule began life as a fringe religious cult in Borno kidnapped a French national in Katsina in in 1999. State in the early 2000s. The administration December and ambushed an army convoy Within the PDP, powerful forces are lob- of Olusegun Obasanjo (1999-2007) stood in January. Pledging retaliation against bying quietly to ditch Jonathan in favour by as it morphed into a more militant force international interests, in protest at the of a northern candidate who might prove with links to the political establishment – French-led military coalition deployed more electable in 2015. Jonathan’s sup- and a military strike ordered in 2009 by against Islamists in Mali, it kidnapped and porters maintain he is in a stronger posi- his successor Umaru Yar’Adua provided killed foreigners in Bauchi State and in tion now than when he defeated a northern only a brief respite as Boko Haram went neighbouring Cameroon during February, rival for the PDP nomination before the underground and forged links with jihadist transforming the security environment in last elections, and are confident that the groups in other parts of Africa. northern Nigeria into an international issue. opposition will again splinter over per- Boko Haram has engaged in assassina- Security sources inside Nigeria say there sonal ambition. tions and suicide bomb attacks against a has been a huge improvement in the capac- The government is proud of the record of range of targets including police headquar- ity to combat terror, but that it is a regional strong economic growth, averaging more ters in Abuja, army barracks, police sta- rather than a national issue. While efforts than six percent a year since Jonathan came tions, banks and churches. But in 2012 a to defeat Islamists in Mali are critical for to office in 2010, and there is new interest separate faction, known as Ansaru, emerged the long term security in the region, in the by international funds in Nigeria. A tangi- with closer links to Al Qaeda in the Mah- short-term the fall-out from the interven- ble increase in services such as power sup- greb (AQIM). It attacked a maximum se- tion in Mali could further destabilise Niger- ply would be a further boost but, with pre- 2015 campaigning already gathering pace, the window for effecting change is begin- ning to narrow. It was for this reason that Jonathan so warmly embraced Nigeria’s victory in the African Cup of Nations football tour- nament in February, a triumph for one of the country’s few truly national institu- tions that was celebrated in all parts of the country. “Our enemies blame us even for natural disasters like floods,” one close ad- viser to the President said, “so the least we can do is take the credit when something goes right.” l Antony Goldman, a regular commentator on Nigerian affairs for international media outlets, is director of Promedia Consulting, which specialises in business risk analysis UN Photo / Devra Berkowitz and due diligence in Africa Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala 48 l www.global-briefing.org second quarter 2013 global Global14_Spotlight_Nigeria pp46-57.indd 48 22/04/2013 23:24 AN45 Spotlight Nigeria Understanding the democratic de cit The way in which the return to civilian rule was organised in 1999 means that the democratic process is still falling short of delivering the expected benefi ts for Nigerian citizens Sylvester Odion Akhaine After many years of authoritarian rule, Ni- political parties, which should be the en- In spite of their disenfranchisement, citi- gerians expected a better deal from the re- gine of the process. But Nigeria’s ‘political zens have continued to clamour for a share turn of democratic rule in May 1999. The parties’ do not operate as elsewhere. They of the ‘dividends of democracy’. But how nation’s oil wealth would have seemed to lack ideological content and are highly much of a democracy dividend is possible in make that practicable. However, after 14 idiosyncratic. A discerning commentator, a rentier economy where the informal sector years of civil rule, its democracy is still Dr Edwin Madunagu, captured this point preponderates and corruption holds rational grossly inhibited. when he said: “In Nigeria, most of the peo- planning to ransom? The country’s neigh- The ‘pacted’ nature of the country’s tran- ple who aspire to high-profi le elective po- bours, like Ghana and Niger, have smaller sition to democracy has turned out to be its sitions fi rst announce their ambitions, and reserves of crude oil but at least they have Achilles’ heel. Authoritarian rule had left Ni- then seek political platforms on which to functioning refi neries, while Nigeria’s four geria badly divided and also splintered the realise them.” refi neries are comatose and subjected to per- solidarity of the powerful military, which, The shortcomings have brought a new petual maintenance, which is often a conduit in the words of one of its former chiefs, had phenomenon – the emergence of state gov- for siphoning public funds. The venality of become an “army of anything is possible”.