Nigeria: Country's Faltering Federal Experiment [press release]

Nigeria faces grave risks unless the government addresses the causes underlying the crisis in the country's failing federalist system.
Nigeria's Faltering Federal Experiment,* the latest report from the International Crisis Group, examines a deeply flawed political system, which contributes to rising violence that threatens to destabilise one of Africa's leading countries. The conflict in the Niger Delta, inter-communal violence in Plateau State and the rise of ethnic militias, sectarian vigilantes and separatist groups are all indictments of the federalist experiment and the failure of political leadership at every level.

Poor governance, lack of leadership and pervasive corruption ndash; these are the root causes of the failing system today, and these are the issues the government must tackle to avoid destabilisation , says Nnamdi Obasi, Crisis Group's Senior Analyst in Nigeria.
In the 46 years since Nigeria gained independence from Britain, successive governments have attempted, with varying degrees of sincerity and commitment, to fashion federal institutions that can accommodate the country's ethnic, cultural, religious and linguistic diversity and nurture a sense of national unity. However, the leaders of these governments, at all levels, have failed to live up to their obligations to offer good governance based on equitable political arrangements, transparent administrative practices and accountable public conduct.

Failing to encourage genuine power sharing, they have sparked dangerous rivalries between the centre and the 36 states over revenue from the country's oil and other natural resources; promoted no-holds-barred struggles between interest groups to capture the state and its attendant wealth; and facilitated the emergence of violent ethnic militias, while they play on and exacerbate inter-communal tensions to cover up their corruption. The government has been too quick to brand many of the symptoms, especially the rise of militancy, as simple criminality to be dealt with by more police and more troops. It needs to engage with the underlying issues of resource control, equal rights, power sharing and accountability.

The federal government should grant a significant level of resource control to local communities and replace the anachronistic concept of indigeneity with a residence test when applying the federal character principle. Perhaps most fundamentally, it should create a democratic constitutional reform process that would allow Nigerians, so often since independence under military governments, to engage for the first time in a free and wide-ranging debate over restructuring the country's power-sharing arrangements.
Nigeria is a political and economic giant in Africa, but its future can either be a shining example for the continent or a cautionary tale of what happens when great potential is sabotaged by greed and mismanagement , says Crisis Group's West Africa Project Director, Carolyn Norris.

to read the International Crisis Group report Nigeria's Faltering Federal Experiment.

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