What happened to Nigeria was, unfortunately, not all that uncommon. At one point or another, well over half of the sub-Saharan African countries have had military rulers, and almost all the rest have had some other type of authoritarian regime.

Nigeria's case was typical, too, in that the military had two reasons for intervening. The obvious one was the one they spoke about--the need to restore order. But, there were ethnic reasons as well, for the Nigerian military was by no means neutral in the ethno-partisan battle that had done in the republic.

Like everything else in Nigeria, the army had changed rapidly after independence. In 1960, 90 percent of the officers were British expatriates; by 1966, 90 percent were Africans. Most of the officers, in other words, were young and had risen through the ranks very quickly. A disproportionate number of them, too, were Igbo and resented the way easterners had been treated.

After some initial confusion, Maj. Gen. J. T. U. Aguiyi Ironsi, an Igbo, took control of the new military regime. He moved quickly against corrupt officials and promised a rapid return to civilian rule. Ironsi also suppressed civil liberties and established a Supreme Military command (SMC) arid Federal Executive Council (FEC) of leading civilian civil servants that were to govern the country for the next thirteen years.

On 24 May 1966, however, Ironsi made a terrible mistake. He announced plans for a new, centralized constitution. This confirmed northerners' worst fears that the coup had, in fact, been carried out to achieve Igbo control over the entire country. Hundreds of Igbos were killed in riots that broke out throughout the north.

In July, another set of officers staged a second coup that brought the thirty-two-year-old Lt. Col. Yakubu Gowon to power. Gowon was chosen in part because he was a "compromise" ethnically--he was a northerner but a Christian.

Now, the task was not simply containing the conflict but maintaining the integrity of the new nation itself. One cannot overemphasize the fact that Nigeria was a new and artificial entity and that, therefore, there were few compelling reasons for any of its dissatisfied groups to feel any loyalty to it or even want to stay a part of it.

The first serious talk of secession came from the north, but the second coup ended that. The SMC divided the country into twelve states in an attempt to reduce the ethnic and regional polarization, but nothing Gowon and his supporters did could stem the anger and violence.

The eastern region's governor and military commander, Col. Chukwuemeka Ojukwu, refused to recognize Gowon's government and demanded more autonomy for his region. More riots broke out. A million Igbo refugees hastily returned to the region, and Ojukwu ordered all non-easterners to leave the region.

The east then attempted to secede, creating the independent Republic of Biafra and plunging Nigeria into a bloody civil war. Over the next thirty months, hundreds of thousands of Nigerians died before federal troops finally put down the rebellion. By then, the size of the military had swollen to 250,000.

In sharp contrast with events of the preceding decade, Gowon and the SMC were generous in victory. Gowon announced that the military would remain in power another six years and then hand the government back to civilians. Moreover, oil revenues, especially after the price increases following the 1973-1974 OPEC embargo, left the government with unprecedented resources to use in smoothing the reintegration of the east. Nigeria began to cultivate its image as a continental leader, even entertaining some global pretensions, including the possibility of building its own atomic bomb.

By 1974, it had become clear that things were not going well. Many officers proved to be as corrupt and arrogant as the civilian politicians had been. In October, Gowon announced that the return to civilian rule would be delayed indefinitely. Ethnic tensions and political violence reappeared.

Finally, nine years to the day after he seized power. Gowon was overthrown in a bloodless coup and replaced by General Brigadier Murtala Muhammed and a group of fellow officers who claimed they were committed to reform. The first day he was in power, General Murtala removed the twelve state governors and quickly moved on to fire 10,000 government officials and 150 officers. On 1 October 1975, he took the most important step of all, outlining a four-year, step-by-step plan the restoration of democratic rule. Unfortunately, Murtala also incurred the wrath of many of his fellow officers, who assassinated him during a failed coup attempt on 13 February 1976.

He was replaced by Lt. Gen. Olusegun Obasanjo, who continued preparations for the return to civilian rule. Over the next three years, Obasanjo was a model of integrity and made certain that the evolution of the new regime went smoothly. Press and other freedoms were extended, a new constitution was drafted, seven more states were created to help ease ethnic tensions, and a powerful Federal Election Commission (FEDECO) was established to remove the conduct of elections and the counting of ballots from the partisan process. In July 1978, civilians replaced military officers as governors of the now nineteen states. In l979, Obasanjo gracefully gave up power.

The Second Republic

Like the Gaullists in France, Obasanjo and his colleagues set out to draft a constitution that they felt would give the country the best chance of avoiding a repeat of the catastrophic original regime. Parliamentary institutions were rejected in favor of a presidential system modeled quite closely on the United States.

At the heart of the Second Republic was a directly elected president who, it was hoped, would provide the country with a symbol of its unity. The president and vice-president would be eligible to serve two four-year terms. In a measure designed to break down the ethnic stranglehold on the parties, to get elected a candidate would need to win a majority of the vote and at least a quarter of the ballots cast in at least two-thirds of the states.

Table 3
Major Parties, Regions, and Leaders
in the First and Second Republics

The president would appoint a cabinet that would neither be drawn from nor be responsible to the Parliament but would be broadly representative of the population as a whole, though the constitution was quite vague about what that meant. The Parliament would have two houses with equal powers. The House of Representatives would have 449 members elected from single-member districts drawn up on a one-person-one-vote basis (although, of course, no census had been conducted to provide accurate population figures). There would also be a Senate with ninety-five members, five from each of the nineteen states.

The states would have a similar governmental structure. The only significant difference was that their legislatures were to be unicameral.

Parties had to be officially licensed by the Federal Election Commission, which was given unprecedented power to supervise election campaigns and generous resources to help fund them. All First Republic parties were banned. To be licensed, a new party had to demonstrate that it had a national and not just a regional organization.

Problems actually began before the new republic came into existence. The military government waited until September 1979 to lift its ban on partisan politics. That meant that political parties would only have three months to organize, establish national offices, and file the required papers with FEDECO.

Not surprisingly, only nineteen of the fifty or so potential parties were able to file papers, and of those, only five were finally licensed. Not surprisingly, too, four of the five were quite similar to First Republic parties, in large part because only the surviving politicians had well-established networks that would allow them to put together even the appearance uf a national organization in so short a period. Thus, the National Party of Nigeria (NPN) succeeded the NPC and was based largely in the north and led by Alhaji Shehu Shagari, a former First Republic minister. Chief Awolowo headed the Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN) whose Yoruba base of support coincided with that of his faction of the old AG. Dr. Azikiwe headed an Igbo-based replacement of the NCDC, the Nigerian People's Party (NPP). The Peoples Redemption Party (PRP) appealed to the same radical minority in the north as the old NEPU. Only the small Great Nigerian People's Party (GNPP), itself the result of a schism within the NPP, had no clear First Republic roots. Each party tried to broaden its base of support and each had some success in doing so. Nonetheless, since they had so little time to prepare for the first elections, all the politicians found it easy to return to the rhetoric and style of First Republic days.

Five separate elections for state and federal offices were held in July and August 1979 (see Tables 4 and 5). Although there were quite a few charges of fraud and unfair campaign practices, the elections were conducted relatively freely and honestly. The NPN won 37.8 percent of the House and 37.4 percent of the Senate vote respectively. Its candidate, Shagari, won 33.8 percent of the presidential vote, 4.6 percentage points more than his chief rival, Chief Awolowo.

Awolowo challenged the results, claiming that because Shagari had only won 25 percent of the vote in twelve of the nineteen states, he had not met the constitutional requirements for victory. FEDECO ruled that Shagari had won the 25 percent in twelve and two-thirds states, thereby giving him the minimum required. Awolowo and the UPN, and the ethnic tensions that plagued the first republic were rekindled before the second formally began.

The first serious conflict broke out in 1981 in the northern states of Kaduna and Kano, which had PRP governors but NPN-dominated legislatures. In Kaduna, the radical governor proceeded with his socialist-oriented policies only to be impeached by the more conservative legislature. In Kano, violence broke out between radicals and conservatives and quickly reached mid-1960s levels.

Popular disillusionment with the new regime spread quickly once it became clear that the politicians were not going to be any more honest this time. Ministers were accused of taking bribes. A governor was arrested for allegedly trying to smuggle millions of naira into his private British bank account. The national telecommunications center was burned down to keep evidence about fraud and mismanagement from being made public.

Meanwhile, world oil prices collapsed. Well over 90 percent of Nigeria's foreign earnings came from oil sales, so when its income dropped by nearly 60 percent from 1980 to 1983, the government found itself in desperate straits. The federal and state governments no longer had enough money to pay civil service salaries or complete development projects. "Still," as Larry Diamond put it, "the politicians and contractors continued to bribe, steal, smuggle, and speculate, accumulating vast illicit fortunes and displaying them lavishly in stunning disregard for public sensitivities. By its third anniversary, disenchantment with the Second Republic was acute, overt, and remarkably broad-based."

The second set of elections were scheduled for 1983. All observers assumed that they would be a "make-it-or-break-it" event for the second republic. Unfortunately, the campaign proved even more violent and fraudulent than any of the earlier ones.

There was blatant manipulation of the voter registration lists, which showed an unbelievable 34 percent increase in the size of the electorate in just four years, most of which occurred in the north. Meanwhile, millions of names were missing altogether in the south and east.

Both Awolowo and Azikiwe insisted on running for president. Most observers expected that the thus-divided opposition would guarantee Shagari's reelection. But fearing the worst, the NPN passed out thousands of ballots that had already been filled out, bribed election officials, and refused to allow opposition poll watchers to do their jobs. When the votes were "counted," Shagari and the NPN had "won" a landslide victory. The official--and unbelievable-figures gave him nearly 48 percent of the presidential vote, an almost 50 percent improvement over his 1979 tally. Even more amazingly, not only did all the corrupt NPN incumbent governors win, but it won in six more states, giving it control of thirteen in all. And, despite all the evidence of growing dissatisfaction with the government and the NPN, it turned its slim plurality into a two-third" majority in the House of Representatives.

Table 5
Seats in Parliament: 1979 and 1983
 

To no one's surprise, the military stepped in again on New Year's Eve 1983. Like its predecessor, the Second Republic was not to survive its second election.

Military Rule II

At first, the military coup was widely accepted as inevitable given the level of corruption. As a former army leader put it, "[d]emocracy had been in jeopardy for the past four years. It died with the election. The army only buried it."

This military regime led by Muhammadu Buhari was a lot like the first one. The Supreme Military Command was reconstituted. The military rulers cracked down, arresting hundreds of civil servants and politicians, including the president, vice-president, and numerous ministers and governors. Soldiers found vast quantities of cash in the homes and offices of those arrested, lending ever more credence to the rumors of corruption in high places.

Decree Number 2 gave the government broad powers to arrest anyone thought to be a security risk. The military interpreted this to mean anyone who criticized the regime. Decree Number 3 established military tribunals to try former politicians and government officials. Decree Number 4 banned any publication or broadcast that inaccurately criticized any government official or policy.

Support for the Buhari regime was not to last, however. Soon, it became clear that the regime was far less vigilant in prosecuting former NPN leaders than other politicians. Moreover, the economy continued to founder as the oil-induced crisis sent unemployment, inflation, and foreign debt skyrocketing. And, the government gave indications that it would not prepare a transition back to democracy.

Few were surprised when Buhari was, in turn, overthrown on 25 August 1985 in yet another coup, led by General Ibrahim Babangida who was the first general who actually took the title of president. In the first months, Babangida sent mixed messages. On the one hand, he immediately repealed Decree Number 4 and declared that his government "does not intend to lead a country where individuals are under the fear of expressing themselves." Journalists were released from jail, and the detention centers created to hold all those arrested under Buhari were opened for public inspection. On the other hand, Babangida continued the crackdown, banning serving politicians from public life for a decade. Police invaded Ahmadu Bello University, killing as many as twenty students. The security apparatus was widely believed to be responsible for the assassination of the editor of the weekly Newswatch who was generally considered to be the country's most outspoken journalist. Babangida renamed the SMC the Armed Forces Ruling Council (AFRC), but in practice there was little difference between the two.

In 1986, however, the regime embarked in two new directions that made Babangida's rule seem much like Obasanjo's and which will be explored in more depth in the section on public policy below. First, the AFRC accepted a new economic policy of structural adjustment, including fiscal austerity and the support of market and other capitalist practices. Second, it announced a phased transition back to democracy to be completed by 1990.

The latter was greeted skeptically by critics who had come to doubt any general's commitment to civilian rule. Their skepticism only mounted as the government announced a series of delays in its plans to hand over power. Nonetheless, the military plugged ahead with its reform effort, guiding a constituent assembly through the process of writing a constitution for a third republic in 1988.

The next year, it began rebuilding the political parties. All politicians who participated in the First and Second republics were banned from involvement in at least the first round of elections. Thirteen groups asked to be certified as political parties, but all were rejected. Instead, the government created two new ones, the National Republican Convention (NRC) and Social Democratic Party (SDP), which were, in Babangida's own terms, "one a little to the left, and the other a little to the right of center."

Both parties settled on rich business leaders with close ties to the military regime as their candidates once presidential elections were finally scheduled for 1993. And, despite the regime's attempt to cast politics in national and economic terms, ethnicity remained on center stage. The NRC's candidate, Bashir Tofa--a Hausa-Fulani banker--assiduously chose Joe Nwodo--an Igbo Christian--as his vice-presidential running mate. The SDP, in turn, nominated Yoruba Chief Moshood Abiola, a well-known shipping magnate, publisher, and sponsor of soccer teams. Because he is a Muslim they thought Abiola might appeal in the north as well.

Neither candidate would have made an American campaign manager happy. Tofa was so unknown he did not even appear in Nigeria’s Who’s Who. His commitment to democracy was suspect, since he had publicly urged Babangida to stay in power until the turn of the century. Abiola was better-known in part because of Afro-Beat star Fela Kuti's song about him and the publicity he received in 1992 for demanding that Britain and the other colonial powers pay reparations for the damage they did to Nigeria and the rest of Africa.

The election campaign had little of the violence that marred earlier campaigns and contributed to the collapse of the first two republics. But that is about the only positive thing that one can say about it. Only about 30 percent of population turned out to vote. Voting patterns once again broke along ethnic lines, as Abiola ran far better in the east and west and Tofa in his native north.

Unofficial results showed that Abiola had won easily with perhaps 55 percent of the vote. But even before the election occurred, a shadowy group close to. Babangida, the Association for a Better Nigeria, called on the general to stay in power. As the results began coming in, the association went to court, citing rampant corruption in an attempt to get the publication of election returns postponed.

Finally, on 23 June, the military nullified the results of the elections. It issued a decree claiming "these steps were taken to save our judiciary from being ridiculed and politicized locally and internationally." Babangida insisted the military still intended to return the country to democratic and civilian rule in August, but it was hard to see how that could happen under the circumstances.

In July, tensions continued to mount. Abiola and his supporters went to court and took to the airwaves to defend what they clearly saw as a victory at the polls and to proclaim their boycott of any subsequent elections. More public protests, some of which turned violent, took place, especially in Lagos, Abiola's base of support. On 26 August, Babangida decided to forgo another election and turned power over to a hand-picked civilian government, headed by Ernest Shonekan, the former chief executive officer of Nigeria's largest business conglomerate. Although Shonekan claimed otherwise, he was little more than a pawn for Babangida and/or the rest of the military.

This even half-hearted attempt at civilian rule was to last but eighty-three days. In November, the Supreme Court ruled that the Shonekan government had been put in office illegally. Within days, he was forced out of power by yet another military leader--Sani Abacha, who had been a coconspirator with Babangida in 1983 but had since become one his fiercest critics.

Abacha did appoint a number of civilians to his cabinet, including Abiola's running mate, a leading civil rights lawyer, and the editor of the largest independent newspaper. Nonetheless, Abacha’s rule turned out to be the most repressive and the most corrupt in Nigerian history.

In summer 1994, Abiola declared himself president in what one observer called the strongest challenge to central authority since the secession of Biafra in 1966. The government responded by arresting him and dozens of others. Abacha noted that "choosing the path of confrontation and subversion at this time of our national history will not be tolerated. Such acts will be sternly punished." Opposition within the country continued with a long series of strikes, concentrated in the petroleum industry located mostly in the southwestern part of the country where Abiola came from. The southwest is also the base of support for two new opposition groups, both loosely affiliated with the Abiola forces--the National Democratic Coalition (Nadeco) and the Campaign for Democracy.

The government cracked down harder than ever to keep its real and potential opposition cowed. In late summer 1995, Abacha purged the cabinet and fired the heads of the trade unions, the army and navy, and all the government institutions except for the elementary school system. More worrisome for most is the repression against dissidents, including the Nobel Prize-winning author Wole Soyinka who had his passport seized and was forced into exile. Other opponents like radical lawyer Gani Fawehinmi spent time in jail under a new law that allows the government to detain people without trial. Others detained included leaders of Nadeco and the Campaign for Democracy as well as former President Obasanjo.

In other respects, the military was losing its grip on power. It makes more sense, however, to defer dealing with more recent events until we discuss the prospects for democratization in the section on public policy below.