This is a book that is meant as a kind of introductory text for a class about Nigeria, covering the broad topics regarding the country like a kind of expanded encyclopedia page. I thought it was a very digestible read, but it left me wanting more on certain topics since it was so brief. That said, I feel like I got a good introduction and valuable background information that will inform me in future readings on Nigeria.
Nigeria did not exist as a political entity until the arrival of British colonization late in the nineteenth century. Even the major ethnic groups that exist today had not coalesced, and so the authors write that there was no Yoruba people, but instead Oyo, Ijebu, Ife, and others. There were no Hausa, no Fulani, no Igbo, and no Niger-Delta. All of those names were given to Nigerians by Europeans, and the generic names relate to languages rather than ethnic compositions. The British practiced divide-and-rule tactics that privileged the Muslim north, allowing the emirs to maintain their hold on society, limiting nationalist sentiments mainly just to Islamic ideals. In the south, the British courted the established, traditional authorities while marginalizing educated elites. In the end, the northern regions of Nigeria ended up favored and are still politically stronger to this day. In the colonial economy, the British tried to expand the Nigerian economy through the export of raw materials and import of finished goods (essentially mercantilism), to bring Nigeria to a cash economy based on the pound sterling, and to force Nigerians to work for British currency. While these were all meant to make Nigeria dependent upon Britain, they did result in some British investment into Nigeria, such as new railroads and development of the harbor in Lagos.
Nigeria gained independence from the United Kingdom in 1960, but it spent the rest of the twentieth century dealing with political instability. The first coup came in 1966, when the Igbo Major General Johnson Aguiyi-Ironsi created a new military government. But he was not acceptable to Hausa soldiers in the army, who replaced him just a few months later in July 1966 with Lt. Col. Yakubu Gowon. Then, things got out of hand in September 1966 when Hausa soldiers attacked and massacred Igbos living in northern Nigeria. This led to the Biafran Civil War until 1970, in which Igbos in the east of the country sought to escape persecution by creating their own state that would protect them. But the government won the war and reintegrated the Igbos into Nigeria. The suffering of the Igbo people was enormous, and about 2 million Igbos were killed in the war, with 3.5 million dead total, mostly young children who starved.
Nigeria joined OPEC in 1971 and has since then made lots of money as an oil exporter. General Murtala Muhammad staged a bloodless coup in 1975 to oust Gowon, but he was assassinated in 1979 and replaced by Lt. Gen. Olusegun Obasanjo. In 1979, Nigeria adopted a constitution modeled on the American system, but the civilian administration that implemented it managed to break the cycle of military coups. But not for long. On December 31, 1983, a bloodless coup put Major General Muhammadu Buhari in power, allegedly overthrowing the government to get control of unbridled corruption and to turn back economic decline (which was really probably the result of falling oil prices in the early 1980s). While Buhari was successful in bringing inflation down from 23% to 4%, his human rights record was abysmal, arresting more than 500 politicians, businessmen, journalists, and others in just two years. Buhari fought a "war against indiscipline," punishing people for littering, cheating, rushing onto buses, working without commitment, not queuing, and other petty offenses.
But Buhari's hardline was not popular, and another bloodless coup overthrew him in 1985, bringing Major General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida into power from 1985 to 1993. Initially a champion of human rights, Babangida released political prisoners , but over time his approach deteriorated, and he jailed opposition groups, labor leaders, and antiestablishment persons into jail or exile. Babangida finally lifted the ban on political activities in 1989, and announced that elections would be held for Nigeria's legislature in 1992, with a presidential election later in that year. However, the election for president that year was annulled due to alleged fraud. But in June 1993, Nigeria had its fairest and freest elections in its short history, and they returned results for Babangida's opposition. Babangida stepped down and handed power to his second-in-command, General Sani Abacha, who returned the country with military rule, with Abacha's government being synonymous with state-sponsored terrorism and human rights abuses. Although he was a cruel dictator, Abacha was at least successful in his economic program, reducing inflation from 54% to 8.5% and increasing Nigeria's foreign reserves while decreasing Nigeria's debt (all while oil prices were falling). Abacha died of heart failure in 1998, and his replacement, General Abdulsalami Abubakar announced that Nigeria would have elections the next year. There were huge celebrations of Abacha's death throughout the country, and in 1999, Nigerians elected Olusegun Obasanjo as their president, the first of Nigeria's Fourth Republic.
Over the eight years he was President of Nigeria, Obasanjo made enormous efforts to rid Nigeria of foreign debts, succeeding in getting extensions on $12 million of debt and forgiveness of the other $18 billion of the country's $30 billion total debt. Obasanjo tried to gain a third term in power, but that constitutional amendment was rejected and Umaru Musa Yar'Adua was elected to replace him in 2007. Yar-Adua was forced to seek medical care abroad two years after he took office, and the Senate transferred power to President Goodluck Jonathan in 2010. Since the book was written, Muhammadu Buhari ran for president and won in 2015, returning to power.
Today, Nigeria has made many improvements, but still struggles. For example, as of the book's publication, 67% of Nigerians still live on less than one dollar per day, and GDP per capita is lower than when Nigeria became independent. Nigeria's oil production has not kept pace, declining from being the world's fifth-largest producer in the 1970s to twelfth today. But Nigeria has great potential, with the world's tenth largest proven oil reserves and the largest natural gas reserves in Africa, still mostly untapped. Nigeria struggles to employ its people, especially the youth. Between 35 and 50% of the unemployed have secondary education and about 40% of the unemployed are between 20 and 24 years of age, with 31% between 15 and 19.
Miscellaneous Facts:
- Nigeria has over 356,000 square miles of land area, making it twice the size of California and one-third larger than Texas.
- More than 90% of Nigeria's revenue comes from the export of crude oil.
- Ife-Ife is considered the cradle of the Yoruba people, founded between the seventh and eleventh centuries.
- Between 1914 and 2014, Nigeria had nine different constitutions.
- In 2014, Nigeria passed a law prohibiting gay relationships, with punishments from 10 to 14 years in prison.
- In pre-colonial times, people used pawnship and indentureship as systems of credit. Pawnship allowed the poor to raise capital by surrendering a family member to provide labor in lieu of interest on a loan, and indentureship sold labor to repay the principle of a debt.
- With more than 170 million people (now already 200 million), Nigeria was already at the time of publication home to twenty percent of Africa's population with only three percent of the continent's land area.
- 45% of Nigerians are Christians, 45% are Muslims, and about 10% practice traditional religion. Catholicism predominates in Igbo areas, while Protestantism is more popular in Yoruba areas.
- In Yoruba languages, military autocracy is known as "government by khaki-wearing people" whereas civil government is known as "government by flowing gown-wearing people."
- Three of the four major African language families are found in Nigeria. Kanuri is a Nilo-Saharan language (as well as Dendi), Hausa is Afro-Asiatic, and Fulani is Niger Congo (also Igbo, Yoruba, and many others, this being the largest group in the country). Only Khoisan languages are not spoken in Nigeria.
- Public speaking is a major part of Yoruba culture, and it is considered a mark of culture to use proverbs, although a younger person should ask the permission of the older to use a proverb, and the elder will usually grant it.
- Benin City is one of the largest cities in Nigeria and flourished until it was sacked by the British in 1897. Its city walls were famous for extending nearly ten thousand miles in 500 twisting settlement boundaries, making them longer than the Great Wall of China, using more material than the Great Pyramid of Cheops. The Benin City Wall was the largest single archaeological structure and the world's largest man-made structure. Today it is being destroyed by development.
- Nigeria has the second-largest number of people living with HIV in the world, with 3% of the population aged 15-50 having the disease.
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