From: Berhane Habtemariam (Berhane.Habtemariam@gmx.de)
Date: Thu Jul 30 2009 - 10:12:47 EDT
Nigeria in the shadow of Sudan or Rwanda: A Political and Social quagmire
A legendary religious multiculturalism under threat
Thursday 30 July 2009 / by Prince Ofori-Atta
http://en.afrik.com/article15983.html
Africa, in recent years, has seen a spate of violent clashes among
populations that have co-habited since time immemorial. Inter-communal
tensions have been one of the major causes of civil strife in Africa, and
more often than not, politics, which is to help curb this growing trend, has
made matters worse. Although recent religious clashes and renewed violence
in the central and northern regions of Nigeria, respectively, can neither be
compared with the Sudan crises nor the events that led to the 1994 genocide
in Rwanda, among others, the only culprit here is the lack of political will
that could help curb these conflicts. Politics in Africa has all too often
been linked to partisanship, which runs on ethnic lines and thrives on
nepotism.
The legendary Nigerian religious multiculturalism is under a serious threat.
Although very complex, communal violence in Nigeria has always evolved
around land, resources, power and, until recently, religion. And despite the
fact that the Nigerian constitution protects multiculturalism, politics,
which is traditionally founded within ethnic boundaries, has done little to
protect national cohesion. In a country where democratic governance is seen
as an opportunity to enter into a system where public 'contracts' are doled
out on partisan basis and former ruling party 'contracts' frozen, an ethnic
group or an area that does not appear on the party map is cast away. It is
no wonder that communal violence in Nigeria has seen people who claim to be
'indigenes' fighting against 'settlers'. Very little has been done to foster
a wider national cohesion. So do Nigerians see each other as strangers?
Recent demands by the Militants of the Emancipation of the Niger Delta
(MEND) brought important questions to the fore: Was the distribution of
wealth in Nigeria fair? Who was really benefiting from the spoils of the
Niger Delta? The questions revealed a substantial level of nepotism in
Nigerian politics. The oil producing areas are, in fact, among the dismally
poor areas in the oil rich country. The fact that Nigerians were split by
the demands of the MEND should have led to a more serious examination of the
militant group's demands. Instead, months and even years went by without any
tangible negotiations, thereby educating the Nigerian populations to hold on
to violence to obtain their demands.
About 3000 people were killed in the northern state of Kaduna, in the year
2000, when the anti-constitutional Sharia law was enforced in 12 out of 36
states. Widespread violence was recorded when non-Muslims protested against
the Islamic law. A year later, riots between Christians and Muslims saw over
a thousand people killed. In 2004, another fight broke out between the two
communities in the central region town of Yelwa in the Plateau state,
killing 900 people. In 2006, 200 people were killed when Muslims protested
against publications of the Prophet in a Danish newspaper. In 2008, over 300
people lost their lives in the central state city of Jos after word was
spread that unreleased local government election results showed that a
Christian majority party had won. The Boko Haram Islamist group from the
north, also known as the local al-Qaeda, in its turn has demanded Sharia for
the whole country, irrespective of ancestry, ethnicity, place of origin or
creed and a ban on western culture, including education!
Fifty years after independence, the level of development in the West African
country is questionable. Torn between party lines, which were mainly founded
according to ethnic groupings, political progress to enhance national
cohesion and influence a fair distribution of wealth was not only painfully
slow but became murkier as political parties fought to control and benefit
from resources that were out of their ethnic boundaries, while remaining
'tribalistic' (as termed by Nigerians). The civil and military strife that
followed taught Nigerians a lesson, then. There could only be national
cohesion if political parties reached out across the ethnic and religious
divide.
Recent conflicts have seen groups from defined areas fighting for fair
distribution of wealth, religious identity or control of land. Is this proof
that Nigeria has failed in holding its legendary multiculturalism together?
Experts have claimed that by protecting their party base while consolidating
their singular and unadulterated cultural masses, the three main ethnic
groups (Hausas in the north, Igbos/Ibos in the east, Yorubas in the west) in
Nigerian politics could control national wealth and better the lives of
their own, thus garnering massive votes and ensuring a return to power. If
this is so, the culture of separatism is, indeed, being nurtured. Should it
therefore come as a surprise when one group opposes another? The culture of
ethno-political impunity, which has served Nigerian politicians well, is
breeding inter-communal hate and wrecking havoc to/and eroding the envious
social fabric of the oil rich west African country and its poverty stricken
populations.
For now, Nigeria can be best described as two hostile countries with the
central states serving as a disputed land and the Niger Delta an occupied
territory. It should be remembered that after several centuries of peaceful
co-habitation, the Hutu and Tutsi populations of Rwanda and Burundi were
split because of partisan politics. The resulting factor was genocide. The
mainly Muslim and light skinned (Arab) people of northern Sudan against the
Black African and predominantly Christian south have registered large scale
deaths and horrors due to religion and partisan politics. To get out of this
quagmire, there is the need for political parties to mix, to find a
blueprint for social cohesion as well as review institutions that affect the
Nigerian society at large, irrespective of ethnicity or religious beliefs.
Then only can Nigerians see themselves as siblings together in one united
country, rather than the eerie feeling of alienation from the nation, which
gave the Boko Harem the impetus to seek foreign help to butcher their fellow
countrymen. The reliance of the Nigerian government on the military to
enforce law and order is commendable, but if national cohesion is not
consolidated with political cohesion, the military which is made up of
citizens from various parts of the country. ahem. The clock is still
ticking, but if wishes were horses, beggars would certainly ride.
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