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IBB Speaks on ethnic nationalities and the Nigerian State
Being speech by General Ibrahim Babagida at an AANI Distinguish Annual Lectrure It
is always with a mixture of enervating feelings and nostalgia coupled with uplifting intellect and experience for me whenever I return to the serenity of my alma mater, NIPSS, Kuru either for reason of State
responsibilities as in the period, 1985-1993 or for engagements, such as the one of today, for exchange of views, perspectives and experience. This high-ranking Institution is of great symbolic significance for our
country. From the point of view of shared experience and the role of ideas in development, NIPSS is a work ever in progress. It is our country's response to the challenges of nation building, and indeed of continental
renaissance. I am a proud pioneer alumnus of this citadel of reflection and learning. When NIPSS took off in late 1979, the Kuru location was still being put together; and although the compact class of the pioneer
participants stayed in Jos city and commuted between hotel accommodation and Kuru, we nevertheless, got adequate intellectual fulfillment and erected enduring social relations among the participants. As you all know,
about five years after graduating from Kuru, I found myself, by providence, steering the ship of the Nigerian State and also providing the necessary nurture for the development of the National Institute.
Between
the Senior Pioneer Course or Executive Course No. 1 and the participants of the present Senior Executive Course No. 24, NIPSS has turned out a good deal of very highly placed citizens of this country, and they are
available not only in the various units of the public sector -from the armed forces and security services to the civil bureaucracy, but also in the various theaters of the private sector -from manufacturing, banking and
finance, commerce and industry to social services. It was therefore more or less a design rather than an accident that members of the NIPSS Alumni Association have continued to be deeply involved in the affairs of this
nation whether or not the alumni are still in active service or in retirement. Indeed, I obtained highly valuable counseling as President particularly in the first two years of the administration which I led, from the
Alunmi Association. I say all of these things simply to indicate the value of your participation in the NIPSS programme. The collegial feelings and experience, which you acquire while in Kuru, will remain with you all
through your life. In several ways, the Kuru experience moulds our thoughts and social relations in our contributions to the development of the nation.
But before I get carried away by reminiscences about Kuru, I
wish to deeply acknowledge the memory of Gen. Joseph Garba, the late Director-General of the National Institute. Aside from being my senior in the Nigerian Army, he was a good friend of mine, and in several ways we
shared the responsibilities of governance of this country at various points in the regimes which we served. It was at late Gen Garba who invited me for this lecture. While I had looked forward to exchanging our usual
banters and to expressing my appreciation to him for the invitation, no one except the Almighty Allah knew that he would not be alive at the time this lecture would hold. We have all paid deserving tributes to the
values of Gen. Garba's personality and to his manifold contributions to Nigeria both at home and abroad, and especially at the United Nations as well as to humanity. We have all borne the grief of his untimely death
with faith in divine manifestation. Although today is certainly not, and cannot be another occasion for further funeral oration on the late Gen. Garba, yet I wish to record the expression of my deep condolence to the
National Institute and to all of you who started this programme under his institutional leadership. We will all continue to remember him. May his soul rest in perfect peace Amen.
INTRODUCTION
I was invited
to speak to the subject matter of "Minority Nationalities and the Nigerian State: The Dynamics and Challenges of Governance in a Plural Nigeria." I had serious perturbations over any focus on "minority
nationalities" as if they alone constitute the core issue or socio-cultural variable in our plural social formation for which governance should hold out for public policy. Structurally fundamental as they are to
the foundation and progress of the Nigerian social formation, all the ethnic nationalities of the country constitute only one major domain of contemporary "plural Nigeria." Colonialism and the political
economy of the post-colonial state have engendered several dimensions of plural, complexity and corporatism in the country. Within social classes which have accelerated in development since the Nigerian civil war in
response to public policies on the economy, there are multiple segments of social stratification. There are also the pluralism of geo-political zones, and demography, of occupation and professionalism, and even of
thought processes and orientations. I have drawn attention to these other dimensions of "plural Nigeria" merely to point out the need for an appropriate perspective for this discourse.
Within the
social anthropology of ethnic nationalities, there are objective difficulties in the country in separating 'minority nationalities" for public policy. You can therefore appreciate why I have re-ordered the topic of
the lecture around "ethnic nationalities" rather than "minority nationalities." This is to accommodate a more robust perspective for the dynamics and challenges which the national question, ethnic
nationalism or ethnicity pose for governance, and for my idea of the policy framework for responding to, or for dealing with the challenges.
THE RESURGENCE OF ETHNIC NATIONALISM OR ETHNICITY AND THE NIGERIAN STATE
One basic fact of the Nigerian social formation or the Nigerian State is its composition by multi-ethnic nationalities or multi-ethnic groups. Interestingly though, both scholarship and experience have not come
to terms with the exact number of Nigeria's multi-ethnic groups. We speak often of the ethnic tripod consisting of the Hausa/Fulani, Yoruba and Igbo; and the others generally referred to as minority ethnic groups.
Sometimes too, in political terms, the minority ethnic groups are referred to collectively as the fourth force or fourth dimension.
It is also generally claimed that the minority ethnic groups constitute a
dominant majority if it were possible for them to assert political power together outside the territorial enclave of each minority ethnic group. In the absence of an agreed actual number of the component ethnic
nationalities in Nigeria, people often resort to ascribing to the country as made up of "over 250 ethnic groups" or "about 300 ethnic groups." This vagueness or imprecision about the number of ethnic
components of the Nigerian State is not caused by absence of academic or intellectual research. On the contrary, the phenomenon of ethnic nationality in the post-colonial social formation tends to defy precision on
definitional elements. The best application of five characteristics of ethnic nationality derived from a combination of political sociology and social anthropology that I am aware of, comes from a distinguished scholar
at the University of Ibadan, Prof. Onigu Otite. The five characteristics are:
a.Share in a common culture and identity, language, history and kinship; this element is also conveyed in the literature as
"complementarity of communication."
b.There is the encapsulation of the full range of demographic division of age and gender, and a network of economic, political and social institutions.
c.There is,
within an ethnic nationality, a differentiation in wealth, status and power, that is, social stratification.
d.There is the element of a homeland or home territory for an ethnic group.
e.Yet, members of an
ethnic nationality share co-existence with other groups outside the homeland in the post-colonial state system.
The computation of Nigerian ethnic nationalities by using the above five characteristics have
provided a total number of 389 ethnic groups in the country. Interestingly, the majority ethnic groups predominate in only three core areas, namely: the North-West and part of North-East zones, the South-West and
South-East zones. The ethnographic survey has, assigned as many as 80 nationalities to Adamawa State, 50 to Bauchi State, 52 to Plateau State, 39 to Taraba State, 32 to Kaduna State, 30 to Cross-River State, 25 to
Nasarawa State, 22 to Niger State, 23 to Borno State and 19 to Kebbi State. The other state range between 4 in Kwara and Bayelsa, and 17 in Gombe.
The existence of multiple ethnic nationalities does not by itself
constitute a problem or an issue with political consequences. It is in the process of social change or modernization that the interest of ethnic groups becomes elevated to the political realm. In fact, contemporary
development in Nigeria appears to have elevated ethnic nationalities into the corner stone of social and political organizations. Contrary to an earlier proposition in scholarship of social change and modernization
destroying or weakening ethnic groups or sub-groups along with modernizing public policy framework.
Let me explore a little further the politics of social change as it creates and nurtures ethnicity or ethnic
nationalism, as I will return later in this presentation to the matter by way in which it informed the approach which I developed for dealing with the challenges of this phenomenon in the second half of the 1980s when I
was President of this country.
The theories of modernization and liberalism have generally taken the view as mankind moves from pre-capitalist and tribal stage of social organization towards large-scale
industrialization and commerce within the modern nation system, the various primordial ties of religion, kinship, language and ethnic solidarity would gradually lose their hold on a people or community and they would
disappear. The expansion of modern capitalism on a world scale was assumed to induce and sustain nationalist and universal values, which are incompatible with ethnic nationality. In fact, the new forces of
globalization, which have grown from technological revolution, would expand communication and mass tourism across the nation and indeed across the world.
In political terms, liberal thoughts assumed that
ethnicity and sub-nationalism would disappear in the currency of modernization. In a paper which I delivered in 1998 entitled "Africa and Globalization: The Challenges of Co-operation and Linkage in the 21st
Century" under the auspices of the Institute of Governance and Social Research based here in Jos, I treated the aspects of globalization which touch on the assumed reasoning in the relationship between the
post-colonial state system and ethno-nationalities in Africa.
Simply put, the assumptions have not and could not be proven. Indeed, we have observed generally on the continent and in Nigeria in particular that
inter-group conflicts and ethno-nationalities have tended to increase as social horizons of various ethnic nationalism increased in response to the process of modernization. Conflicts, which arise in this process, tend
to be defined in ethnic or communal terms. Similarly, the different rates of social mobilization among the ethnic nationalities in the country have tended to exacerbate social cleavages. Some scholarly observers of the
Nigeria development process referred to the consequences of social change and modernization on ethnic nationalism and activism many years ago as "competitive communalism."
The value of this perspective is
limited to Nigeria or Africa. What happened in the defunct Soviet Union during the second half of the 1980s when its economy and society completely broke up was a product of the opening up and restructuring of the
economy and political spaces. Under the administration of Mikhail Gorbachev, the two strategies of perestroika and glasnost (economic reforms and political liberalization) were formulated and implemented.
Within
five years, the Soviet empire had collapsed with its East European allies, and among other consequences, the collapse gave rise to renewed assertiveness by the various ethnic nationalities of that empire. Today, the old
empire has been reduced to the main State of Russia and a large number of other independent States with claims to membership of the United Nations. The points in all of this is to emphasize the social and economic
foundations and processes of ethnic resurgence or revivalism across the world, including Nigeria.
Ethnicity or ethnic nationalism has historically been part and parcel of the political process, economy and
statecraft of Nigeria. It gave rise to the colonial investigatory committee usually referred to as the Willink Commission, which became the precursor of the multiple creations of sub-system states in the country between
1963 and 1996. In the mid-1960s, ethnic tensions contributed in no small measure to the environment of the military coup of January 1966. There is evidence to link the Nigeria civil war to the consequences of ethnic
nationalism.
The Phenomenon of ethnic nationalism appeared to have been subdued by Federal victory in the civil war. The national policies and programmes of reconciliation, rehabilitation and reconstruction in
the post-1970s period also appeared to have hastened the cause and course of unity and national integration. The original federalist credo was "unity in diversity." Indeed, the replacement of the old Nigerian
national anthem by the post-civil war national anthem, currently in use, stood the reality of ethnic nationalism upon its head. The old national anthem had appropriately postulated, "though tribe and tongue may
differ, in brotherhood we stand," whereas the new anthem attempts to play down the multi-ethnic compositions of the country.
It should, however, be acknowledged that there was positive experience arising
from the major post-civil war policies and programmes of both the federal and state governments. The national development plans, the gradual retreat in the salience of regionalism, increased concentration of power at
the federal/national level coupled with the new political order of centralization of resources and responsibilities, the build-up to the making of the 1979 constitution, the many social exchange programmes in human
resources and culture by the state governments through the unique characteristics and consequences of military rule all of these and many more areas of public policy provided a seemingly accelerated unification of
the structures of the Nigerian nation state. Although there were a variety of experiences of ethnicism and ethnic tensions, they were largely de-emphasized or suppressed by prolonged military rule. Indeed, in the
elections to local and state governments preparatory to the return to civil rule between 1987 and 1991 under the regime in which I was President, Nigerians freely contested and won elections in various parts of the
country outside their states or local governments of origin. Examples of the states where this phenomenon was experienced included: Lagos, Kaduna, Kano and Plateau where non-indigenes were elected to offices. It was an
experience historically unknown to previous regimes, military and civil-cum-constitutional.
The situation has unfortunately become worse in the past three years of the present leadership of the 4th Republic. Some
of the fears in many States today consist of "so-called settlers" who would face the ethnicists barricade in the next series of elections.
There was, obviously, an appearance of a lull in the salience
of ethnic nationalism as fundamental factor in the political process. However, the aftermath of the inconclusive presidential election of June 1993 and the unique excesses of the military regime under Gen. Sani Abacha
nurtured a resurgence of ethnic nationalism reminiscent of the crises leading to the civil war. By May 1999 when the military exited from governance of the country and was replaced by the 4th Republic, the normally
liberal environment provided democracy for the exercise of freedom and liberty engendered an unprecedented wave of ethnic activism and political tensions across the country. There has been undue intensification of
ethno-regional nationalism since 1999, demanding a re-negotiation of the federalist foundations of the Nigerian State. Foundational issues which I had justifiable reasons to describe in 1987/88 as "NO GO
Areas" in the constitution making process of the late 1980s appear to have been worrisomely re-invented in recent times.
I believe that there has been a failure of public policy agenda coupled with a
poverty of leadership. I shall return to this matter in the concluding section of my presentation.
In the period up to 1966, ethnicity and regionalism acquired structure and ideology of legitimation for ethnic
nationalities. As a consequences, the legitimation by the Nigerian nation-state was contested by ethnic nationalities. One of the many explanatory variables for the collapse of the First Republic and implosion of
military rule in Nigeria was the ideological supremacy of ethnic nationalities over the Nigerian State. As a contrast, in the period of the post-civil war, and particularly after the second coming of military rule
following the collapse of the Second Republic, the Nigerian State acquired greater legitimation over and above ethnic nationalities. The resurgence and intensification of contemporary ethnicity is, therefore, a reversal
of legitimation for ethnic nationalities as opposed to the Nation-State.
Ethnicity is currently a huge social movement and human investment across the country. It is not only nurtured around the structure and
ideology of ethnic nationalities, it is also increasingly becoming a preferred mode of loyalty by Nigerians as opposed to loyalty to the Nation-State. It is therefore an important subset of the national question in
Nigeria. Legitimation of ethnic nationalism involves a system of social insurance and a first line or prime loyalty for ethnic nationalities.
For the first time since the civil war, the Nigerian Nation-State is
increasingly being characterized by social ingredients of retreat and doubtful legitimation. There has been, even, an underground articulation and subtle organization by the champions of ethnic nationalism for a
dismantling of the federation or secession from Nigeria. Certain ethnic nationalities are known or alleged to articulate and to establish institutions and symbols of autonomy, including those of armed militias for
defence of their ethnic territories, and for offence against other nationalities.
Explaining ethno-nationalism appears no longer as difficult as resolving its challenges and manifestations. Ethnic nationalism is
rooted in the colonial social formation of the country. The phenomenon is, thus, embodied in the disarticulated economy of the society by colonialism such that the experience of being a Nigerian citizen and being a
member of an ethnic nationality can be extremely traumatizing. The primary source of the phenomenon is the nature and character of the Nigerian State. It can also be argued with confidence that in multiple ways,
civilian and military regimes in the post independence period had themselves increased the variety and complexity of the phenomenon.
When ethnic tensions surged with menace to the new democratic order since 1999,
the initial reaction was that it was the product of previously bottled-up disenchantment or dissatisfaction of various ethnic nationalities. But by now in 2002, this initial perspective appears quite thin in content. In
fact some manifestations of ethnic nationalism are the reactive excesses of the elected governments in 1999; and others are the product of selective injustice meted out to certain ethnic nationalities by the governments.
The overall consequences of contemporary ethnic nationalism consist of the following, among others:
§Agitation for self determination with the rationalization for a national conference or sovereign
conference of ethnic nationalities to renegotiate the foundations of the Nigerian national project;
§Wastage of enormous human and material resources in ethnically inspired violent encounters, clashes and even
battles;
§Increasing gaps in social relations among ethnic nationalities including structural suspicions and hate for one another;
§The ever shifting arena of ethnic nationalism spanning regions and zones,
communities and neighbourhoods, reactive and vengeful reprisal in locations outside the ethnic territories;
§Threat to security of life and property and disinvestments of local and foreign components with continuous
capital flight and loss of confidence in the economy;
§The heightening of fragility of the economy and political process;
§The exacerbation of violence and more violence together with erosion of legitimacy and
also disinvestment in the political process;
§Frustrations in "competitive communalism" for the ingredients of power, authority and status in the political economy including activities in the private sector;
§As already indicated before, poverty of leadership behaviour in attempts to respond to the escalating ethnic nationalism across the country.
There is an ethnic trap in the country's political economy. As
indicated previously, the mere existence of multiple ethnic nationalities in a social formation or modern State system does not automatically translate into ethno-nationalism. Ethnicity normally arises and thrives in
stress or distress, and in situations of competition. When differences of interests and objectives coincides with pervasive or concrete deprivation, marginalisation or justice, it is then that ethnic based conflicts
begin to acquire destabilizing dimensions. In such situations, ethnic nationalism becomes structural and ideological weapons in the hands of ethnic leaders.
The Nigerian experience, as I had previously inferred
in the preceding paragraphs of this presentation, is rooted in the political economy of the country from the 1950s. it is in order to transcend or resolve the challenges of the problem that the phenomenon was elevated
from being not only a social force but also constitutional and legal anchor. Before 1979 the principle of quota system was employed to address the inequality of access by ethnic groups to the bureaucratic institutions.
It appeared not to have worked satisfactorily, hence the concept and principle of "federal character" was instituted in the chapter of the 1979 Constitution, which deals with "fundamental objectives and
directives of State policy." This principle or instrument has remained in our constitutional documents since 1979, although it is observed much in the breach than in compliance, and thereby worsening the problem.
The constitutional provision for federal character is a clear acknowledgement of socio-cultural differences, and of the responsibilities of governments to deal with the differences. Accordingly, the constitutional and
political processes are ordered to take due account of ethnic nationalities, yet they are equally and paradoxically ordered to transcend ethnic nationalities so as to re-constitute the Nigerian State on the basis of
wholesome citizenship. This is the trap which ethnic nationalism has posed for governance in the country.
The paradoxes of ethnic nationalism are many. They range from a Nigerian being resident or being born in a
locality, yet considered as being alien or non-indigenous to that locality. It includes being a Nigerian of a settler community, yet confronted by the stark forces of indigeneity. It also includes being married across
ethnic divides with the offsprings being fully Nigerian citizens, yet they can be caught up in the structures or the politics of ethnic nationalism. Even in competing for power or office, the trap makes it difficult to
exercise full electoral rights you can vote but in reality you cannot be voted for. The ethnic trap includes discrimination by state and local authorities in access to health facilities, business opportunities and
acquisition of landed property. With the trap of ethnic nationalism, it has become difficult for loyalty and obedience to the norms, conventions and rules of being a Nigerian overriding loyalty and obedience to one's
traditional community or ethnic nationality. The trap of ethnic nationalism nurtures structural alienation, and negative motivations and attitudes.
DEALING WITH THE CHALLENGES OF ETHNIC NATIONALITIES IN GOVERNANCE
I believe in the unity and indivisibility of Nigeria. I believe in the framework of the federalism. I also believe that the future stability of the country rests on the sustenance of democracy. The country
should continue to sustain and deepen its republicanism.
Three areas of social reality in the country's social formation, which the beliefs I have stated above and which the challenges of ethnic nationalities
pose for governance, should be borne in mind. The first is Nigeria consisting of the people's attitude towards traditionalism and traditional institutions including attachment to ethnic homeland. With all the
manifestation of modernity, and of the effects of globalization, the Nigerian State is heavily traditional in structure, thought processes and perspectives. Our experience to date suggests that rather than
traditionalism being eliminated in the course of social change and modernization, our inherited social reformation has tended to preserve large elements of traditional values, orientations and structures, Nigerians are
engrossed in the pursuit of modernity yet respectful of traditionalism. The second area of social reality which ethnic nationality rests upon is retention by Nigerians of "double homes" and even "multiple
homes." The Nigerian citizen is at once at home in his place of residence and occupation as he is equally at home in his ethnic nationality or locality of origin. No matter the number of years of residence by the
Nigerian in a different part of the country or even abroad, he willingly upholds responsibilities and obligations in his ethnic nationality. In fact in recent times, depending on availability of wealth and capacity for
mobility, the Nigerian can conveniently retain "homes" and discharge obligations in London or Manchester, Paris, New York or Dallas just as he does the same in Nigeria in more than one location. This
experience contrasts with the typical American citizen who, once he relocates from one district or state to another and he remains in the new location for a specified period, cuts off filial attachment to, let alone
discharging obligations and responsibilities in, his previous place of abode. The typical American is not as attached as the Nigerian is, to his family place of birth, or traditional locality. The third area of
social reality is that of the federal character principle which the country has elevated from being only a social structure, to a constitutional imperative.
For me, by the mid-1980s I had developed a fair
perspective about the challenges posed by ethnic nationality for governance. I was conscious of, and convinced long before the wind of social change in defunct Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, about the necessity for a
thorough-going and systematic reforms of our economy, society and political process in order to assist in creating a better space for the multiple nationalities of the country. This was the basis of the economic reforms
and democratization of the political process which the regime that I led, undertook between 1985 and 1993. the regime may not have succeeded in its self-imposed reformatory programmes, yet I believe that Nigerian ethnic
nationalities, in order for them to be productive and comfortable in the political system, require to be involved in an environment in which they can be made to participate in productive activities by themselves rather
than being reliant upon State-driven activities. They should also be made to participate in all levels of statecraft. It is not easy to compartmentalize the application of my views here. I wish however to draw attention
to some of the critical ones because I believe that a sustained leadership commitment to elements of structural reforms would go a long way to reducing ethnic nationalism even if ethnic nationalities will continue to be
part of the pillars of the Nigerian federation.
§The 1999 Constitution as a variant of the 1979 and 1989 Constitutions, was built to sustain the post-civil war political order, which is now generally acknowledged
to contain numerous imperfections. The general complaint is that the political order has become top heavy and should therefore be re-examined. The entire constitutional order should be reviewed so as to further empower
the states, local governments and communities. In fact what has been happening since 1999 by way of implementing that constitution is, to say the least, quite disappointing and perfunctory.
§This is the reason
why not much attention has been devoted to the reformation of the Constitution handed down by the retreating military regime to the 4th Republic so as to make it constant with the processes and expectations of democracy.
§I am not an admirer of the advocacy of sovereign national conference of ethnic nationalities. Yet it is obvious that the national consensus over the contemporary political and constitutional order as being over
concentrated at the federal level should be re-examined for the reason that I have just indicated above. We need in this country more space for individual and nationality participation in the affairs of the nation and
of the various communities. If a national conference of ethnic nationalities, properly thought out and organized can do so, so be it.
§The federal character principle is by itself not bad. But like other
government efforts of commissions in the country such as the Code of Conduct Bureau, it is not being properly endowed to carry out its responsibility of injecting social justice, equity, integrity and merit in the
composition of the decision-making status in the country, in the states, and even in the localities.
§As in the above observation about the federal character commission, it is sad that the acclaimed noble objectives
of the National Youth Service Corps scheme and unity colleges have virtually collapsed or eroded on the country. Government needs to return to the drawing board on these schemes so that appropriate reform can be
undertaken. In fact those that may have little or no experience about being attached to the homelands of their ethnic nationalities can become much better Nigerian citizens than the current near wastage of the time
spent by NYSC graduates.
§The Nigerian State is, through its formation, part and parcel of the challenges of ethnic nationalism. As a power site, the State is neither neutral, objective nor just in organization
and discharge of its responsibilities. It may sound difficult particularly for those who are in authority yet there is need to re-examine how to re-constitute the Nigerian State so as to endow it with a modicum of
neutrality, objectivity and justice in its operation. I confess to the fact that although this matter was examined by a Presidential Committee which I empanelled in 1986/87 to provide a policy direction on the national
question, unfortunately, the report of that committee which worked under the leadership of AVM Shekari (Rtd.) as well as the recommendations of the Political Bureau on this matter were not implemented before we exited
from office. I believe the country should examine the need to adopt the policy of residency rights for citizens. In doing so however, the phenomenon of multiple homes or double homes, which I pointed out earlier, will
need to be tackled. This is important because the country could easily and unwittingly enacts a process in which some Nigerians would enjoy more citizenship rights than others. In fact, there is currently an exercise of
political gerrymandery in which ladies married outside their state of origin rather than going into politics in constituencies of the communities or states into which they are married are also being prompted to return
to their parents' communities or states of origin to contest election. I am told that this PDP bizarre devise is to accommodate the women aspirants for elective office whose husbands' state of origin appear hostile or
inhospitable to them and their husbands. I wonder whether the PDP is aware of the constitutional implications of this otherwise good gesture for gender justice.
I believe too that dealing with ethnicity can be
tackled from the political process with particular reference to the political party system. although we have gone beyond the experiments of the two party system which I inaugurated as President in 1989, there is no
doubt in my mind that multi-ethnicism feed upon a multi-party system. this is the image, right or wrongly, that come out in the present Alliance for Democracy (AD), which is wholly located in the homeland of an ethnic
nationality. A multi-party democracy creates a greater democratic place but it also creates leverage for an intensified multi-ethnic nationalism. The two party system was intended to reduce the role of inter-ethnic
squabbles in the body politick, and reshape the polity for greater and deeper national integration.
I drew attention earlier in this paper to the poverty of leadership. It may be debatable whether Nigerians have
experienced good leadership since 1999 in terms of forgoing national integration among the multiple ethnic nationalities in he country. I know that there are observers who would argue strongly that the nation today has
grown worse in terms of inter-group relationship than in the period before 1999. There is no doubt that this experience is a product that directly emanated from public policy and leadership style. I believe that the
quality content, profile and temper of political leadership can go a long way either in undermining multiple ethnic nationalism or in promoting national integration.
The most fundamental underlying forces which
propel ethnic nationalism in Nigeria are those of pervasive poverty, mass unemployment, underdevelopment of productive forces and non-absorbance of the economy. The absence of developed productive forces constrains the
transformation of the structures of the economy and society. Mass poverty and unemployment create alienation and insecurity, which in turn encourage Nigerians to experience and prefer accommodation within the social
insurance system of ethnic nationalities. In this regard, people are easily excited about injustice of other groups against their own groups. Poverty also creates frustration and divisiveness. At the level of
government it makes the control of the State and its enormous power apparatus very vicious. Accordingly, it is necessary that within the limitation of global market forces, the State and the political class must face up
to the challenges of a collapsing economy and poverty, and their consequences for the salience of ethnic nationalities in the country.
Government should create employment; but I am not advocating the past
practice of government being the dominant employer of labor. There must be a conducive and an enabling environment for the private sector to expand and deepen. Here too. I must say that I have more confidence in the
private sector in Nigeria predominating rather undue reliance on foreign investment. What I have in mind here include, if you do not mind the illustration, some of the things which I inaugurated when I was President,
such as the Directorate of Food, Road, and Rural Infrastructure (DFRRI), employment of women and of the youths through skills acquisition by the National Directorate of Employment (NDE) and such other programmes that
can empower generations of craftsmen, designers and tailors, fish producers and sellers, small scale farmers and so on.
CONCLUSION
I have drawn attention to the pervasiveness of ethnic nationalism in our
political process and economy. Social change and modernization cannot destroy and eradicate the phenomenon, particularly in a multi-ethnic Nigerian State which also exhibits a huge backlog of poverty. Purposeful
leadership however, can tackle the challenges which multi-ethnic nationalism poses for governance. In fact, we need to appreciate that our cultural and social diversity constitutes an asset rather than a liability. The
task before leadership at all levels of governance is the use to which government apparatus and public resources are ordered around public policy in order to reduce the destabilizing dimensions of multi-ethnic
nationalities, and the forging of a wholesome Nigerian State within the Federation.
I thank you for your patience in listening.
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