2 6 FÉV. 2004. o~.~6- 04 THE NATION AS GRAND NARRATIVE: THE NIGERIAN Ab E PRESS AND THE POL~TICS OF MEANI G ~ ;)_, j~Q: By Adewale 'Niyi ADEBANWI ( Seing a Dissertation in the Department of Political Science Submitted t!) the Faculty of The Sqcial Sciences in pa~ial fulfilment of the requirements for the award of the ' • 1~ ; · DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY' (Ph. D) of the CODESRIAUNIVERSITY OF - IBADANLIBRARY Department of Political Science, University of Ibadan, Ibadan, Nigeria. August 2002. ABSTRACT One of the central problems facing many post-colonial states is defining the terms on which the various ethnie nationalities within the polities will co-exist. The mass media are pivotai to contestations over defining these political identities and constructing the narratives of the nations in these post-colonial states, as well as the grand narrative of the emerging nation-state itself. This role of the media has not received sustained--academic attention. This research examines the contending narratives on the Nigerian 'nation' as reflected in the Nigerian press within the context ofLIBRARY other narratives in the polity. lt studies how meaning is deployed or mobilized- in the press either to establish, nourish and sustain relations of domination/power or to counteract, subvert and deflect power within and among ethnie nationalities in the context of the evolving idea of the Nigerian nation. The study uses the depth-hermeneutical framework to investigate how the CODESRIA interpretation of ideo\ogy - recast as meaning in the service of power - in the press serves to stimulate critical reflections on the relations of power and domination in the grand narrative. The nexus of nation, narratives, myth, discourse, power and ii meaning against the backdrop of depth-hermeneutics is examined in the theoretical framework. Four crises in the history of Nigeria are examined including the crisis on the date of independence and related issues, the post-independence crisis of statehood, particularly the vents before the civil war, the crisis following the annulment of the June 12 presidential election, and the crisis following the restoration of democracy in ., ..• .. : . ' May 1999. The findings outline how the media narratives provide the interpretative lens through which the ethnic-nationalities and meta-nation are viewed, defining identity LIBRARY and enacting discourses that sùpervene other arenas- of power in society. The narratives explore the legitimacy of the myth of the grand nation, touching the nerve­ centre of power through the mobilization or/and demobilization of specific meanings. ln effect, the grand ..nation is narrated in the Niger/an press as an instrument io the relations of domination, the press being seriously polarized along the different axis of power. CODESRIA The study points to the general modes through which meaning is used in the service or disservice of power in the narration of nations and grand nations. lt iii concludes by highlighting the limitations of the mobilization of meaning in the service of power and the inherent contradictions in the politics of meaning. LIBRARY - CODESRIA lV DEDICATION This one .is for Damilola Taylor - about whom Jam~s Baldwin could as well have been writing: "There are deaths and there are deaths. There are deaths for which it is wrong and even ignoble to forgive the world". LIBRARY lt is the negation of your nation that- drave you to your death. CODESRIA V ACKNOWLEDGEMENT Imagine the silence of words in fheir maferia/ify on paper .... But you can hear fheir voices - Ngugi Wa Thiong'o (Penpoinfs, Gunpoinfs and Dreams) I am absent because I am the sforyf el/er. On/y the story is ff/,ai .· .. Edmond Jabes (Je batis ma Demeure: Poemês, 1943- 1957) History sfammers Through ifs long tirade ... Never again wi/1 our sfory go Wifhout a proper te/Jing - Niyi Osundare (Missing Tongue) ln many ways, life is narrative. LIBRARY Once upon a lime, 1decided on a career in journalism- that would end in old age in my seeking a place in the academia. But, then God had other plans. An amendment, in effect. 1was not to wait lill old age before \ left journalism for the academia - even while remaining essentially a reporter, one for whom lite and living are perpetual narratives waiting to be told. Thal lnfinite Mercy that is the Creator cou Id not have been more merciful. He led me to the righf path just al a lime when all I craved was an environmenf to re-engage with my nation. ln many ways, my life is a narrative. But that could wait. Il is the impersonal abstraction that is my country andCODESRIA the passionate devotion to push her towards her man if est destiny that is the transcendental task of my present engagement. The reason for this devotion is al once enabling and ennobling. Enabling because the tragic romance of my nation with perfidy has trans\ated to persona\ tragedies for we, the sons of the soi/. 1, for instance, am a narrative of possibilities, stunted, for the most part, like and by my nation, but now unbound - unlike my nation - toreach out to my possibilities, even beyond that nofionlnafion-space. And ennobling because of the latter Vl reason too. ln this narrative of possibilities, many people have made light, in very significant ways, that almost unending burden of living in (and as a) Nigeria/n. 1turn shortly to thank these people, but only alter an attempt to engage with the elementals that have defined these possibilities in the midst of ail the mess that the semi-evil, semi-criminal ru Jing elite have made of that nation. How can I say what / know with words whose signification is multiple? At the lime I began this thesis, my nation was groaning under the violent enforcement of the logic of eternal and infernal rule, championed by perhaps the most incompetent and most gluttonous ruling elite on the continent. One of the worst members of this treasonable power group, the hideous infantry general, Sani Abacha, was in the middle of what was to become the ~orst experience that the nation has had under martial serial rapists. Abacha seemed to possess an incurable grudge against mankind, so much so that the impending death of the nation, which he dominated for live years, was the least of his lookout. lt was in the middle of the attempts by genuine patriots to seize our country from this semi-evil, LIBRARYsemi-criminal gang and the simultaneous struggle to re-validate the nation idea - which Wole Soyinka- so competently captured in his book, appropriately sub-titled, A Persona/ Narrative of the Nigerian Crisis - that I began this doctoral work. The newspaper where I worked, Punch, had been shut down by the maximum ru Ier and the anguish into which several people who worked in Punch and sundry other newspapers proscribed meant nothjng to him and his gang. Alter 15 months at home during which I wavered between singularity and solidarity, 1took up a job in Tribune, where I attempted to use my talent to savage that infernalCODESRIA order which was c/osing off the Nigerian nation idea and threatening to close it up completely. As it happened, this national tragedy was recreated al the lower level as Abacha's agents in Tribune saw to my exit and that of a few others who were engaged in this individual and collective fight against the negation of our persona! and national beings. At the close of Abacha's infamy, which, at Omega Weekly, we had dubbed, "end of an Errof', 1was hopeful that my nation would begin, with new possibilities, to work towards its Vll manifest destiny. 1, like many other patriots, was mistaken. The members of the old order, contrary to our calculations, quickly regrouped, with General Ibrahim Babangida - the facilitator of Abacha's infamy, whose infamy was perhaps only bested by Abacha's - leading a .crucial arm of that crusade to re-snatch our nation from our infant hands. They succeeded and therefore terminated our attempt at building a nation under God. 1 have in my very humble ways devoted my talent to confronting this dilemma that democratic forces, particularly the young, face in this historie battle to deliver our motherland from the clutches of armed and unarmed gangsters. What then is the role of this thesis in this humble effort? 1 am persuaded that the battle will ., • 1 be long and tortuous. Those we fight against have ranged on their side the most persuasive means of confiscating a system in its totality. For me, the challenge is to understand this nation better and in theorizing the crisis, to engage with il from a position of mental strength. Simply stated: Praxis for national redemption. lt is to this task that I have had occasion to solemnly swear. 1 am therefore committed to transcending even this national space in order to seek for fts redemption within a Global Discourse in which ail mankind belong to a single family. No one is alone, or as I have had occasion to confess in the pas!, no one travels alone. 1 carry my home along with me wherever 1 go. Your solitude is an alphabet of squirrels at the disposition:of forests By studying the narration of this attempt al nation-being, 1can only re-arm myself to face the challenges ahead, in the hope thal that Eternal Grace which has brought me thus far, will hold me strong in the confrontationCODESRIA wilh the Grand Narrative - that LIBRARY is as much my narrative as il is of millions of my compatriots. Il would have been impossible to corne this far - which is not far al ail! - and to this resolve but for many people who have given of their life, lime, resources and love in many ways to facilitate the completion of this work and the possibilities thal define lite.