Nigeria cannot be a functioning state unless it is first a nation

The difference between a “state” and a “nation” is significant. A state is a legal-cum-political entity with a territory, government and sovereignty; a nation is a social-cum-cultural concept, which refers to a group of people who act as a cohesive and coherent unit, with a common identity and shared sense of purpose. A state may not be a nation, and vice versa. Nigeria is certainly a state, but is it also a nation? Does it have the attributes of nationhood?

That question takes us first to Chief Obafemi Awolowo, one of Nigeria’s founding fathers. In his book ‘Path to Nigerian Freedom’, published in 1947, Chief Awolowo wrote: “Nigeria is a mere geographical expression”. His opponents ignored the context in which he used the phrase and called him names. But what Awolowo meant was that Nigeria was not a nation. Recently, General Ibrahim Babangida, former military head of state, used the same phrase to describe Nigeria immediately after independence.

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In an interview with Arise TV, General Babangida was asked why there were instabilities, leading to riots, two coup d’etats and a civil war, just within seven years of Nigeria’s independence. Babangida replied: “We were struggling to be a nation. We hadn’t fully become a nation; we were just a group of people in a geographical environment called Nigeria”. So, Babangida agreed with Awolowo: Nigeria was a mere geographical space.

But over sixty years after independence, has Nigeria stopped being a mere geographical expression? Is it now a nation? The answer is an emphatic NO. Nigeria is still struggling, utterly struggling, to become a nation.

Of course, Nigeria is a “state”. It has the essential elements of statehood: population, territory, government and sovereignty. But it’s a fragile state because it lacks the capacity for essential functions and lacks a monopoly on the use of organised violence. Indeed, some have argued that Nigeria is a failed or failing state.

In an article titled “The Giant of Africa is Failing”, published in Foreign Affairs magazine on May 31, 2021, Robert Rotberg, a political scientist, and John Campbell, former US Ambassador to Nigeria, wrote: “If a state’s first obligation to those it governs is to provide for their security and maintain a monopoly on the use of violence, then Nigeria has failed, even if some other aspects of the state still function”.

In a multi-ethnic country, nation building cannot just focus on individual interests, it must protect group interests. It requires a collective sense of belonging, a collective sense of fairness and justice.

Let us face it, Nigeria has most of the symptoms of a failed state. Yet, Nigeria is still a “state”, even though its government is dysfunctional, even though it lacks control over security threats from non-state violence. Truth is, Nigeria still has external sovereignty, that is, it is recognised by other states and can make treaties with other states. But, as I said earlier, being a “state” is not necessarily the same thing as being a “nation”. The latter requires national unity, internal cohesion, and a shared purpose.

Nigeria state

But nationhood matters because it’s impossible to have an effective state without a nation. As Professors Paul Collier and Tim Besley, co-authors of the LSE-Oxford University report on state fragility, put it: “State building requires nation building, and nation building requires actions by the state”. In other words, you cannot have a functioning state without a strong nation, and without deliberate state actions, you can’t have a nation.

Someone recently wrote that even if Nigeria is a failed state, the Nigerian entity will still remain intact because the elites, out of self-interest, would keep it intact. But if the elites can’t stop the state from failing, how can they stop a country from disintegrating? Truth is, the elites and their hangers-on cannot survive a popular revolt. Think of the #EndSARS riots, who were the targets? Of course, the elites and their commercial interests. They are always the targets of social disorder. And when the state resorts to suppression to maintain order, its actions undermine social harmony rather than support nation building. Thus, anyone who thinks businesses and the economy can prosper amid deep divisions in the society misunderstands the nexus between stability and progress.

Sadly, there is no stability in Nigeria. The so-called Nigerian identity is not a unifying one. Nigeria is like a big tent under which every group does its own thing without caring about the condition of the tent itself: everyone simply fights for his own individual or group interest. Former Governor Seriake Dickson of Bayelsa State once wrote: “In business, politics and even professions, primordial and ethnic sentiments override rational thinking depriving the country of its best leadership resources in critical areas at critical times” (Vanguard, July 23, 2020).

So, what Chief Awolowo said in his book in 1947 and the picture of the 1960s that General Babangida painted in his recent interview are still largely true today. Of course, there have been individual actions at nation building. For instance, since the 1960s, there have been lots of intermarriages, and social and commercial interactions, between Nigerians from different ethnic groups. But it’s absurd to think that these individual actions alone can forge Nigeria into a nation. Indeed, they’ve made little difference!

Last year, Nimi Akinkugbe was appointed as the ambassadorial nominee representing Ondo State, but some Ondo State people cried foul. Why? Because her parents are from Rivers State, while her husband is from Ondo State. They said she should not get the slot for Ondo State because her father was not from the state, only her husband! The current Olu of Warri was denied the throne in 2015 because his mother is Yoruba. Last week, Vice President Yemi Osinbajo criticised the “indigenes” and “non-indigenes” dichotomy, saying that such classification “is a form of apartheid and contradicts our declared aspirations towards equality and unity”.

But in a multi-ethnic country, nation building cannot just focus on individual interests, it must protect group interests. It requires a collective sense of belonging, a collective sense of fairness and justice. For instance, if an Igbo man marries a Fulani woman or does business with a Yoruba man, does that individual action matter if, collectively, the Igbo are marginalised and made to feel like second-class citizens who cannot provide national leadership? No, it doesn’t!

So, while individual actions are important, nation building requires inclusive state actions. Again, to quote Professors Collier and Besley: “Shared identity across something as large as a country can only be built by the state, and in doing so, the state strengthens its own capacity to achieve other national goals”. But in Nigeria, the state is utterly unwilling to forge a nation out of a deeply polarised country.

The problem dates back to the creation of Nigeria. The British cobbled Nigeria together from centuries-old independent and proud nations. But, as former Vice President Atiku Abubakar put it recently: “You can whip groups together into forming a country, but you cannot whip them into forming a nation”. Well, the British didn’t even attempt to forge Nigeria into a nation; instead, they sowed seeds of disunity by favouring the North over the South. Those seeds of disunity produced the political intolerance that destroyed the First Republic, causing ethnic riots, coups and, eventually, the civil war.

Sadly, since the war ended, the Nigerian state has made little effort at national building. The situation is even worse under President Buhari. Recently, Atiku accused Buhari of “destroying the fabrics of Nigeria’s unity in six years”. One can hardly disagree. From his kid-glove treatment of killer herdsmen to his plans to “recover” 1960s grazing routes and his hasty signing of the controversial Petroleum Industry Bill into law, Buhari has mismanaged Nigeria’s diversity, seemingly protecting the North against the South.

Truth is, the Nigerian state and its leaders have failed to build the country into a nation. And without a nation, it’s no surprise the state is dysfunctional, failing!