Nigeria: A Failing Democracy?

By: Maria Lozano
ACN International
Republished with permission of Aid to the Church in Need.

Nigeria is one of the largest democracies in the world. With over 200 million inhabitants, it is the continent’s biggest country in demographic as well as economic terms and plays a key role in the geopolitics of sub-Saharan Africa. The African giant has been a multiparty democracy since 1999, but the past decades have seen its security problems grow bigger and more complex.[1] In 2022, Nigeria ranked sixth in the Global Terrorism Index[2] behind Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, Burkina Faso, and Syria, and placed 143^rd out of a total of 163 countries in the Global Peace Index.[3]

Almost every single problem that affects other African countries can also be found in Nigeria. The unification under British rule of territories with their own distinct ethnic, political, and religious realities created a dichotomy between the north and the south, divided by a Middle Belt that has borne the brunt of many of the current violent conflicts. 

Christianity is the majoritarian religion (46.2 percent) based principally in the south whereas Islam (45.8 percent) is found mainly in the north, though this does not mean that there are no Christians in the north and vice-versa. The north-eastern State of Borno, for example, the birthplace of Boko Haram, is 30 percent Christian. Although the number of Christians and Muslims is almost identical in the country, many websites insist that Islam is the majority religion. Reinforcing this false impression is Nigeria’s participation (since 1986) in the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, an alliance formed by 57 countries in which Muslims are the majority.[4]

Politically and administratively the Muslim north is more important, but it is home to only 40 percent of the population. In principle, in a multi-religious, multi-ethnic nation, this would give the Christian south equal or greater weight, however, almost 95 percent of the political and military power at the federal level is held by Muslims. The resulting tensions hindering the country’s democratic development are further exacerbated by the implementation of Shari’a Law in 12 of Nigeria’s 36 northern states. With the recently elected Muslim-Muslim ticket under President-elect Tinburu, there is scepticism that anything will change under the new national government. 

Although Christians with a population of almost 100 million – almost 50 percent of the population – are not a minority, those in the northern states complain of systemic and deeply entrenched religious discrimination. Their situation is reminiscent of minority Christian populations in Pakistan, Sudan, Iraq, and Arab countries. The most significant concerns for Christians regarding the lack of religious freedom – and democratic principles – in northern Nigeria (particularly where Shari’a is applied) include: that the Constitution recognises the (Shari’a) Penal Code in the north whereas the Criminal Code is applied in the south; that Christian girls and women suffer abduction, rape and forced marriages with little to no legal recourse; that while Muslim men may marry Christian women, Christian men may not marry Muslim women; that traditional Muslim moral standards – Hisbah – are often imposed by force, including on non-Muslims (i.e.: segregation by sex on public transport and enforcing dress codes in educational institutions); that Christians suffer political exclusion as well as a lack of equity in recruitment for the armed forces (police, military etc.); that Christian Churches are neither allowed to buy land nor given space to build chapels or places of worship in tertiary institutions; that while Christian religious education is not allowed in public schools, Islamic teachers are employed in all public schools; that Christians have fewer job opportunities, a lack of promotion opportunities in public positions, and a lack of access to social welfare; and that many Christian students opt to change their names to gain admission to professional courses.[5]

Religious communities, predominantly Christians, in the north and Middle Belt face the consequences of often indescribable violence – atrocities committed by armed groups (Boko Haram, ISWAP and Fulani militias) driven by a mix of toxic motivations including territorial gain, criminality, ethnicity and Islamist jihadism bordering, in certain states, on violence with genocidal elements. 

The final blow, however, is the silence and passivity of the political powers, which neither condemn nor persecute the systematic attacks, particularly by the Fulani militias, that have led to the massive internal displacement of Christians leaving entire regions depopulated. A recent report from the Makurdi diocese in Benue State denounced the fact that in one diocese in one year (2022) alone, Fulani herders attacked 93 villages and killed 325 farmers.[6] At present, of the almost six million inhabitants, two million are internally displaced, most of them Christian farmers. 

Nigeria is not alone suffering the jihadist violence with Niger, Chad, Mali, and Burkina Faso badly shaken by Islamic extremism. Nigeria, however, is unique and of crucial importance for the development of the African continent. As indicated, Nigeria is an economic and demographic powerhouse with the population expected to double to 400 million in two decades. The events, and governance, in the coming years will not only have an enormous influence in the country but throughout the region. If the Nigerian authorities do not address the conflicts concerning land, ethnicity, criminality, and religious extremism, as well as the breakdown in democratic values and the equal rights of its citizens including religious freedom, the cancer of Islamist jihadism and political disintegration evident in the northern half of Africa will spread. The socio-political pressure and unabated atrocities will provoke an exodus of young Christians seeing neither hope nor future in the land of the forefathers. 

[1] Nigeria at the crossroads, Aid to the Church in Need International, 2023 https://www.academia.edu/97352210/Nigeria_Country_Report

[2] Institute for Economics and Peace, Global Terrorism Index 2022, https://www.economicsandpeace.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/GTI-2022-web-09062022.pdf

[3] Institute for Economics and Peace, Global Peace Index 2002, https://www.economicsandpeace.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/GPI-2022-web.pdf

[4] “Any State, member of the United Nations, having Muslim majority and
abiding by the Charter, which submits an application for membership may
join the Organisation […]”, Chapter II, Membership, Article 3, 2, In the web: https://www.oic-oci.org/upload/documents/charter/en/oic_charter_2018_en.pdf [consulted 17.03.2023]

[5] Nigeria at the crossroads, Aid to the Church in Need International, op. cit.

[6] Makurdi Diocese Report, Fr Remigius Ihyula, Coordinator, Fjdp Makurdi, Aid to the Church in Need, 2023