Surging population growth will see Nigeria emerge as the third largest country in the world by 2050. If properly harnessed, the so-called demographic dividend could turn Nigeria into a global economic engine – as it did in China, India and Southeast Asia. If it isn’t, a youth bulge facing a paucity of employment opportunities breeds instability, threatening to sink the region and precipitate a crisis with global ramifications.
Insecurity is already strangling Nigeria’s potential. As millions head to pivotal polls later this month, it stands stark as the top issue in voters’ minds. From Islamist insurgents in the North and secessionist agitators in the South East to pervasive banditry and kidnapping for ransom, the country is awash with threats to civilians’ personal safety.
Once the region’s security linchpin, Nigeria’s internal problems now drain its peacekeeping capacity. Consequently, the Sahel, the arid strip where the Sahara meets Sub-Saharan Africa, is on fire. Mali and Burkina Faso have both experienced military coups, triggered by flailing civil wars with Islamist insurgents. If security continues to deteriorate, migratory flows to Europe and the West will intensify. Neither the region, nor Europe – whose leaders have faced political pressure since the 2015 migration crisis – can afford for Nigeria to fail.
Subsequently, the security credentials of the three leading electoral contenders warrant attention. One is a former vice-president, Atiku Abubakar; the others former state governors, Peter Obi and Bola Tinubu. Abubakar is a perennial contender; this will be his sixth shot at the Presidency. 61 year-old Obi is seen as a fresh faced progressive who has won the support of the country’s youth. Bola Tinubu is running for the governing party All Progressives Congress, given the sitting president Muhammadu Buhari has reached his two-term limit.
Both Abubakar and Tinubu have sought to position themselves as experienced law-and-order candidates who will resolve Nigeria’s security issues by beefing up the capabilities of the police and military. Obi, on the other hand, propagates a consensual, social justice and dialogue-driven approach aimed at tackling the deeply entrenched inequalities that exist in Nigerian society that he sees as the root causes of the country’s security issues.
Although Obi’s words will sound appealing to liberal Westerners, his arguments should be treated with some scepticism. Last May, Obi’s home state of Anambra was targeted by the Indigenous People of Biafra, a violent secessionist group in the South-East of the country, in a series of attacks that killed 14 civilians, including a pregnant woman and several children. IPOB is designated as a terrorist organisation by the Nigerian government, yet Obi has consistently taken a soft touch approach to the group and refused to condemn them. This is concerning, particularly as he is seen as the frontrunner, according to a poll conducted by Bloomberg.
The candidate’s refusal to criticise IPOB has fuelled rumours of ties to the group. The separatists have denied these allegations, which aren’t substantiated with convincing evidence. But it is plausible that Obi is hesitant to call out IPOB for fear of alienating sympathisers. The South-east is both the area the group seeks independence and Obi’s electoral stronghold. His reticence could be a temporary political calculation that will be abandoned in office, but there are fears that the separatist struggle in the southeast could spiral out of control under an Obi presidency.
The Labour candidate has also had to defend his questionable security record as governor. He was forced to deny allegations that he was involved with the Awkuzu Special Anti Robbery Squad, an elite police unit that oversaw a brutal reign of terror in Anambra state during Obi’s governorship. SARS were known for detaining suspects, often on trumped up charges, and allegedly murdering many of them.
In contrast to Obi, PDP candidate Abubakar is seen as a more experienced candidate. However, his long career in politics has been dogged by allegations of corruption – which itself poses challenges for peace in Nigeria. The corrosive effects of graft spread like tentacles through state institutions, not least military and security agencies. The White House has recently defined the fight against corruption as a core national security interest. Incidentally, Abubakar was prevented from entering the US for 10 years due to graft.
The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace has described him as someone “well-known to international law enforcement agencies” and his multi-million dollar property assets in Dubai were detailed in the Panama Papers leak. In January, an audio recording was leaked by one of Abubakar’s former aides in which the candidate allegedly describes how he successfully siphoned away state funds from public work projects during his tenure as vice-president. For the record, Abubakar rejected the allegations.
The Nigerian Armed Forces already have significant problems with graft. As a result, salaries – when they are paid – have remained stagnant despite galloping inflation in the country. Morale on the front line has waned. If corruption infects the allocation of security contracts, the fight against terror will suffer once more.
Whether Abubakar will be able to grapple with such forces is questionable. Indeed, this could be one of the reasons why Nigeria finds itself in its current state and it might also explain Obi’s surging popularity: few seem to believe that an establishment man like Abubakar is likely to deliver the changes that the country needs.
Tinubu too is tainted with graft allegations. Though tax revenues quadrupled under Tinubu’s tenure as Governor of Lagos (1999-2007), he allegedly has ties to Alpha Beta Consulting, a company contracted to collect state taxes in return for a commission. However, he is regarded as an effective governor of Lagos who laid the groundwork for the prosperity boom that the state has experienced.
When he took power in 1999, Peter Lewis described the city as in stationary crisis. Despite its problems, it is now a megacity with the country’s best infrastructure, a growing tech industry and cultural sectors, and technocratic institutions – as well as being the only state that doesn’t rely on federal oil exports to fund budgets.
Security is also regarded as one of Tinubu’s strong points and he is often credited with driving down high crime rates in Lagos by reforming and properly funding the police. He established the Rapid Response Squad, a highly-trained and well-equipped unit tasked with targeting the city’s gang problem. Social programmes were also designed to pull at-risk youth away from criminality, thereby making the state safer. Nigeria at large is a more complex challenge, but his supporters believe his track record on security could translate to the national level.
Regardless of who eventually wins the race, Nigeria’s next president faces daunting security challenges. But the ramifications of regression or, worse, collapse will be global.
Mat Whatley is former Security Chief for the EU Election Mission in Abuja. He is a British army veteran and former head of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) in Donetsk Ukraine, the EU Monitoring Mission in Georgia in the Caucasus, as well as former OSCE spokesman in then Yugoslavia.
