Nigeria’s democracy at 20:  The gains and the pains

Beyond the fanfare of the June 12  Democracy Day, marking the 20th democratic governance in Nigeria, experts have continued to count the gains and pains the globally accepted best form of government has brought to Nigeria.

Though Democracy Day has always been celebrated on May 29 since 1999 when the present democratic dispensation was birthed, the 20th anniversary was held on June 12 following the declaration and enactment of a law by President Muhammadu Buhari to honour the late Moshood Abiola, the acclaimed winner of the June 12, 1993 annulled Presidential election.

Since 1999, Nigeria has to a large extent experienced some sorts of democratic principles such as representative government in which the people vote for their leaders, rule of law where the constitution is supreme, exercise of fundamental human rights including the freedom of association and freedom of speech.

On the other hand, Nigeria has also within this period witnessed some social maladies that were not prevalent during the military rule such as general insecurity- terrorism, killings, kidnapping, ethno-religious conflicts, arson, anarchy, cultism, flippant corruption, indiscipline, among others.
The rising insecurity for instance has limited productive deployment of citizens’ capacities for development purposes.

There has been deliberate and unpardonable failure to build institutional and leadership capacities, the same way there is no result-oriented effort to address the socio-economic cum political variables that keep the country in constant retrogression in the last 20 years.

According to experts, the 20 years of democratic governance in Nigeria have been mixture of sweetness and bitterness, hence, there are both gains and pains brought by the system.
Idayat Hassan, director, Centre for Democracy and Development identified the gains of the 20 years of democracy in Nigeria to include; increased number of political parties, improvement in the electoral process, separation of powers among the three arms of government, human rights, infrastructural development, youth empowerment schemes and so on.

Hassan, however, counted ethnicsation of politics, ethno-Religious conflicts, corruption, poverty, insecurity, shrinking democratic space, among others as the pains of democratic rule in Nigeria in the last 20 years.

She stated that, “this year, 2019, marks the twentieth anniversary of Nigeria’s return to civilian rule and the country longest uninterrupted run on democracy since independence. This is a milestone for Nigeria, considering her over 58 years of independence has only experienced democracy between 1960-1966, 1979-1983 and proudly now 1999-2019.

“Between 1999-2019, the country has conducted six consecutive elections with some forms of improvement in election administration. The twenty years have witnessed an increase in the numbers of political parties, a rise of startups and civic techs, youth demography, opening civic space, some forms of infrastructure development, separation of powers and human rights.

“However, the twenty years have not been without its challenges; they include the ethnicisation of politics, Ethno-Religious conflicts, corruption, poverty, insecurity, shrinking democratic space, booming population, amongst others.”

To Christian Okeke, lecturer in the Department of Political Science, Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka, the first gain is that democracy remained uninterrupted in the last 20 years and Nigeria could not be categorised as a failed state.

Okeke on the other hand observed the last 20 years of democratic governance in Nigeria has witnessed woeful failure to meet the constitutional stipulation that security and welfare of the people shall be the primary purpose of government, leading to be insecurity, poverty, suppression and general state of sabotage.

According to the political Scientist, “as Nigeria’s democracy turned 20 in its unbroken experience, perhaps it is trite to say ‘hurray’. This is partly because 20 years is significant enough and in the case of humans, a 20-year old person is no longer a teenager. However, the occasion calls for deep national introspection. To me, what could serve as gains are in two folds. The first is the uninterrupted component.

“Many will agree that the fact that the country’s democracy has remained unbroken since 1999 is a blessing. It is unarguably a clear departure from previous experiences when military interventions truncated the democratic journey. Beside that fact, the second gain is the reality that within the period under review and under our democratic watch, Nigeria is not yet a failed state.

“Be that as it may, I believe that our joy should not be that the men in ‘agbada’ have effectively replaced men on ‘khaki’ in our national dialectical existentialism. This is premised on the fact that the 20 years in question organically brought pains and woes in alarming proportion.
“Sadly, when a deep thought is given to the entire democratic experience from 1999, a salient question that comes to mind is, what exactly is the raison d’être for our Statehood?‎ Put insecurity what purpose does our democracy serve?”For 20 years, Nigeria witnessed dominant elites on rampage. There was overbearance of demagogues within the political space. We saw repression and eventual conquest of a malleable populace; we saw governments that were incapable of generating wealth for the people and providing enabling environment for creative minds to prosper.

“A salient question to ask is how much democratisation did we achieve? We need to answer this by examining issues around sovereignty of the people, equality before the law, guarantee of basic rights, protection of minorities, due process, accountability of rulers and the level of citizens’ faith and participation in the democracy within the period under review.
“Obviously, the saddest story is that looking back into the last 20 years, we see that Nigeria perfectly fulfilled most of the identified metrics of state decay. The Foreign Policy magazine in its Failed State Index (FSI) ranking in 2008 placed Nigeria as 15 out of the 20 most vulnerable countries surveyed. In 2010, the country featured again as 14th while it was 16th in 2013.
“In fact, as we ‘celebrate’ unbroken democracy‎ in the country, there is serious concern that Nigeria’s democracy is yet to start to work for her people. And except there is a re-engineering of our democracy, except patriotism supersedes parochial interests, benefits of democracy will continue to elude the people, and sadly so”.

Also Yusuf Shamsudeen Msudeen, programme manager, Centre for Democracy and Development noted that Nigeria’s 20 years of democratic governance present gains as evident in improved conduct of elections, inclusion of marginalized groups, and pains as seen in the outright disregard for court orders, insecurity and corruption.

“Of course, we have recorded some gains but not without challenges. Our elections have improved compared to the past, and the fact that campaigns for inclusion of marginalised groups have gained momentum in recent time is a clear indication that civic space is gradually widening.
“However, we cannot say we live in a democratic regime when court orders are not respected. Rule of law is not an optional principle of democracy. Laws should not be applied unjustly and in a bias manner. We need to unlearn behaviours that limit press freedom and human rights, and rise against corruption and poverty”.

James Kwen, Abuja