Abstract The Nigerian civil service emanated from the colonial service which was still in force during the early years of Nigeria`s independence. A potpourri of indigenous officers and expatriates, the colonial model civil service was designed as a mere secretariat of government business, but the need to expand its scope and replace the expatriates with local workforce gave rise to series of reforms and challenges hitherto experienced in the service. The height of this disarticulation in the nation`s service occurred during the almost four decades of military rule. The regimented mentality and the customary command-and-control style of the military severely rubbed-off on the psyche and operations of the civil service. The noticeable manifestations of systemic weakness were over- expansion of the service, unification of erstwhile regional services, nepotism, corruption, etc. The colonial model started well in Nigeria and flourished up to the early post-independence years when the system opted for the replacement of expatriates under the Nigerianisation scheme. Although the expatriates were known for dedication and professionalism and even inspired the pioneer Nigerians who took over from them, the service was to witness a steady decline in quality service delivery and professionalism especially from the middle of the 1970s due to unhealthy inter-service rivalries for managerial talent and spurious promotions. In fact, such critical condiments of the public service such as officer deployments, job classification, grading and posting were routinely manipulated by politicians and senior service officials. The practice was for some unscrupulous officials to attach an occupational classification to a staff just to get the staff graded far beyond his mates. The paper opines that it was this state of affairs that pushed every administration to embark on reforms and rationalisation.

1. V o l u m e 2 , N u m b e r 4 , J u l y 2 0 2 0
A PUBLICATION OF
INSTITUTE OF PEACE STUDIES AND
CONFLICT MANAGEMENT (IPSACM),
A PUBLICATION OF
INSTITUTE OF PEACE STUDIES AND
CONFLICT MANAGEMENT (IPSACM),
CONTRIBUTORS
No. 51 Garu Street, Sabon line
Jalingo, Taraba State, Nigeria.
TEL 08036255661, 07035668900.
HPLHPL
HAMEED PRESS LIMITED
2682- 6194ISSN
1. TheTransformation ofTheNigerian CivilServiceFromColonialismTo Post- IndependenceEra
Philip Afaha
2. Africa: Could There Ever Be Renaissance?
Prof. Usen Smith,
3. An Examination of Election Related Violence and National Security In Nigeria
Charles Akale & Olajumoke Ganiyat Jenyo
4. The Contributions of United Nations To Decolonisation In Africa: An Assessment
Suleiman Bilal Ishaq & Abu Leonard
5. The Potentialities of Arabic Language In Promoting And Protecting Islam and Its Culture In Nigeria
Busari, Kehinde Kamorudeen, PhD
6. Jesus as The Cosmic Christ and The Ecology of The Human Person
Michael Gakbe Gokat and Gideon Y. Tambiyi, PhD
7. The Effects of Violent Students' Protests in Nigerian Universities, 1971-1999
Ajala, B. Luqman, Ph.D
8. Forms and Functions of The Nice Properties of English
Mohammad Idris S/kudu, PhD & Isa Adamu Haliru, PhD
9. Impact of Nigerian Civil War On Anyigba, North Central Nigeria, 1967- 1970
Ezeogueri-Oyewole, Anne Nnenna & Nda Mariam
10. A Historical Analysis of Political and Electoral Violence in Nigeria Between 2011 – 2018
Ene Gift Linus
11. Cultural Implicity of Naming Among the Mumuye
Juliana Aidan, Naomi Ishaya & Azinni Vakkai
12. An Assessment of the Role of River Basin Development Authorities in Agricultural and Economic
Development in Nigeria Since 1960
Luka, Nathaniel B. Gimba & Sylvester I. Ugbegeli, PhD,
13. Women's Status in Islam and their Role in Politics and Sustainable Development
Maunde Usman Muhammad, Adamu Alhaji Sa'idu & Amina Aminu Isma'il
14. The Role of Women in Traditional Mwaghavul Religion
Nakam Nanpan Kangpe
15. La révolte contre les pratiques traditionnelles abusives: Une étude de Le Bistouri des Larmes de
Ramonu Sanusi et Rebelle de Fatou Keita
Nev Beatrice Nguwasen & Musa Elisha
16. Blind Hatred and Religious Intolerance in Nigeria: Comparing the Biblical Saul and Yerima Musa in
Heart of Stone
Chentu Dauda Nguvugher, PhD & Bem Alfred Abugh,
17. An Assessment of The Challenges and Opportunities of The De-Radicalisation Programme in North-
Eastern State, Nigeria: A Case Study of Operation Safe Corridor Camp, Mallam Sidi, Gombe, Gombe
State, Nigeria.
Saleh Omar, PhD & Adamu Ahmed
18. Indigenous Knowledge as a Tool for Harmonizing Cultures in Nigerian Societies.
Patience Ngunan Kersha, Fagbemi Victoria Yemi, PhD & Linus Nihunga Ahaz
19. Arabic and Fulfulde Grammatical Processes: A Descriptive Comparative Analysis
Abubakar Mu'azu & Usman Bobbo Iliyasu
20. Vote Buying and Strategic Use of Money in the 2015 General Elections in Taraba State
Auwal Chul & Isa Mohammed

2. JOURNALOF
MULTI-DISCIPLINARYSTUDIES
A Publication of Institute of Peace Studies
and Conflict Management (IPSACM),
Taraba State University, Jalingo, Nigeria
Volume 2, Number 4, July 2020
ISSN: 2682-6194
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies

3. Institute of Peace Studies and Conflict Management (IPSACM),
Taraba State University, Jalingo,
Volume 2, Number 4, July 2020
ISSN: 2682-6194
Editorial Board
Editor-In-Chief
Akombo I. Elijah, PhD
Secretary
Abdulsalami M. Deji, PhD
Editorial Members
Isa M. Adamu, PhD
Aboki M. Sani, PhD
Atando Dauda Agbu, PhD
Haruna M. Suleimuri, PhD
Articles should be submitted online to the Secretary, Institute of Peace Studies
and Conflict Management (IPSACM), Taraba State University, PMB 1167,
Jalingo,TarabaState,Nigeria.
Email: cpscmjournal@gmail.com,
dejfat2009@tsuniversity.edu.ng,
journalofmultidisciplinary18@gmail.com
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies i

4. Editorial Consultants
Professor Talla Ngarka S., Director, Institute of Peace Studies and Conflict
Management(IPSACM),TarabaStateUniversity,Jalingo,Nigeria.
Professor Abolade Adeniji, Department of History and International Studies, Lagos
StateUniversity,Ojo, Lagos,Nigeria
Professor Oguntola-Laguda, Danoye, Department of African Traditional Religions,
LagosStateUniversity,Ojo,Lagos,Nigeria
Professor Mike O. Odey, Department of History, Benue State University, Makurdi,
Nigeria.
Professor E. C. Emordi, Department of History and International Studies,AmbroseAlli
University,Ekpoma,EdoState,Nigeria
Professor Adagba Okpaga, Department of Political Science, Benue State University,
Makurdi,Nigeria
Prof. Umar Habila Dadem Danfulani, Department of Religious Studies, University of
Jos, PlateauState,Nigeria.
Prof. OlubunmiAkinsanyaAlo, Department of Sociology, Federal University, Wukari,
TarabaState,Nigeria
Professor Saawua Gabriel Nyityo, Department of History, Benue State University,
Makurdi,Nigeria.
Dr. Gbemisola Abdul-Jelil Animasawun, Centre for Peace and Strategic Studies,
UniversityofIlorin,Nigeria
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies ii

5. Mission Statement
The world system is increasingly passing through very disturbing phases. Almost every
sphere of life is being subjected to unprecedented crises. Both the human and the physical
environments have come to crossroads of crises. There are, for instance, unprecedented
episodes of global warming; depreciating conditions of soil fertility caused by, mostly,
unregulated human activities; overflowing of banks of oceans and rivers on one hand,
and alarming rain failures in different parts of the world resulting in protracted droughts
and famine; on the other hand unprecedented frictions in human relationships across the
globe resulting in unprecedented inter-personal, inter-group, inter-regional and inter-
continentalconfrontations,amongothers.
The Nigerian society is caught up at a similar crossroad. This presupposes that what has
become, or is becoming, of the Nigerian society is directly a reflection of the predicament
of the international community. Indeed, the entire Nigerian system is increasingly
becoming alarmingly chaotic, resulting in unprecedented episodes of conflicts and
violent behaviours. For instance, relationship within, and between, families is
increasingly becoming very confrontational; the echoes of intra and inter-communal or
group conflicts and violence are assuming new disturbing dimensions; the educational
system is fast proving highly incapable of producing variables for positive national
growth and development; the two dominant religions, Christianity and Islam, are
disturbingly proving to be avenues for the promotion of intra and inter-religious rivalries
other than peace and unity which are supposedly their main tenets; the political system is
fast becoming terrains of unprecedented violence, conflict, misrule on one hand, as the
securityagenciesareincreasingly
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies iii

6. proving to be suspiciously incapable of performing their constitutional roles on the other
hand,amongmanyothervices.
Needless to assert at this juncture that conflict, violence and confrontation have become
the dominant features of the Nigerian society. This development results from a network
of causes.Apparently, therefore, for us to be able to adequately comprehend the adjoining
variables responsible for this down trend in our society, much mental, physical and
financial energies have to be exerted. This, of course, is the hallmark of Journal of
Multi-Disciplinary Studies, A Publication of Institute of Peace Studies and Conflict
Management(IPSACM), Taraba StateUniversity,Jalingo.
The Centre appreciates our renown academies who have identified with this mission,
particularly, the maiden edition of its Journal through their very valuable articles. Our
most reputable senior colleagues who have graciously accepted to be part of this mission
as editorial consultants cannot be appreciated enough. The Centre has, indeed, put its
hands on the plough and pledges to stick to the philosophy of “Forward Ever, Backward
Never”.Weremainresolute.
Akombo ElijahItyavkase, PhD
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies iv

7. Notes on Contributors
1. PhilipAfaha PhD, Dept.ofHistoryandDiplomaticStudiesUniversityofAbuja,
Nigeria
2. Prof.Usen Smith, DepartmentofPoliticalScience,FederalUniversity,Wukari,
Tarabastate
3. CharlesAkale&OlajumokeGaniyatJenyo,ResearchFellows,Centrefor
StrategicResearchandStudies,NationalDefenceCollege,Abuja-Nigeria.
4. SuleimanBilalIshaq &Abu Leonard,DepartmentofHistoryandInternational
Studies,FacultyofArtandHumanities,KogiStateUniversity,Anyigba,Nigeria.
5. Busari,KehindeKamorudeen,PhD DepartmentofReligionandAfricanCulture,
Facultyofarts,AdekunleAjasinUniversity,Akungba –Akoko, Ondo State,Nigeria.
6. MichaelGakbeGokatPostgraduateStudent,DepartmentofReligionandPhilosophy
UniversityofJos, NigeriaandGideonY.Tambiyi,PhD, DepartmentofReligionand
Philosophy,UniversityofJos,PlateauState, Nigeria.
7. Ajala,B.Luqman, Ph.D, DepartmentofHistoryandInternationalStudies,AlHikmah
University,Ilorin.
8. Mohammad Idris S/kudu, PhD, DepartmentofEnglishandLiteraryStudies,Faculty
ofArts,TarabaStateUniversity,Jalingo&IsaAdamu Haliru,PhD, Departmentof
LanguagesandLinguistics,FacultyofArts,TarabaStateUniversity,Jalingo.
9. Ezeogueri-Oyewole, Anne Nnenna &Nda Mariam,DepartmentofHistoryand
InternationalStudies, KogiStateUniversity,Anyigba,KogiState
10. EneGiftLinus, DepartmentofPoliticalScienceandInternationalRelational,Istanbul
AydinUniversity,Turkey.
11. JulianaAidan, NaomiIshaya &AzinniVakkai, DepartmentofLanguages and
LinguisticsFacultyofArtsTarabaStateUniversity,Jalingo.
12. Luka NathanielB.Gimba,DepartmentofHistory, AdamawaStateUniversity,Mubi,
Nigeria&SylvesterI. Ugbegeli,PhD, DepartmentofHistoryFacultyofArts, Benue
StateUniversity,Makurdi,BenueState.
13. Maunde Usman Muhammad, AdamuAlhajiSa'idu &AminaAminu Isma'il,
DepartmentofIslamicStudies,FacultyofArts,TarabaStateUniversity,Jalingo,
Nigeria.
14. Nakam Nanpan Kangpe, DepartmentofReligionandPhilosophyUniversityofJos,
PlateauState,Nigeria.
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies v

8. 15. Nev BeatriceNguwasen &Musa Elisha,DepartmentofFrenchLanguage,Taraba
StateUniversity,Jalingo,Nigeria.
16. Chentu Dauda Nguvugher,PhD, DepartmentofReligionandPhilosophy, Faculty
ofArts, UniversityofJos, Jos, Nigeria&BemAlfredAbugh, DepartmentofTheatre
andFilmArts, FacultyofArts, UniversityofJos, Jos, Nigeria.
17. SalehOmar,PhD, FederalUniversity,Kashere,GombeState,Nigeria&Adamu
Ahmed, DepartmentofSociologyGombeStateUniversity,Nigeria.
18. PatienceNgunan Kersha,NationalLibraryofNigeria,Abuja,FagbemiVictoria
Yemi,PhD, DepartmentofLibraryandInformationScience,Universityof
Nigeria,Nsuka, EnuguState,Nigeria&Linus NihungaAhaz, Departmentof
LibraryandInformationScience,ModdiboAdamaUniversityofTechnology,
Yola,AdamawaState,Nigeria.
19. AbubakarMu'azu&Usman Bobbo Iliyasu, FederalCollegeofEducation,Yola,
AdamawaState.
20. Auwal Chul &Isa Mohammed,DepartmentofPoliticalScienceandInternational
RelationsFacultyofSocialandManagementScience,TarabaStateUniversity,
Jalingo.
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies vi

9. Contents
1. TheTransformationofTheNigerianCivilServiceFrom
Colonialism To Post- Independence Era
Philip Afaha
2. Africa: Could There Ever Be Renaissance?
Prof. Usen Smith,
3. An Examination of Election Related Violence and National
Security In Nigeria
Charles Akale & Olajumoke Ganiyat Jenyo
4. The Contributions of United Nations To Decolonisation In
Africa: An Assessment
Suleiman Bilal Ishaq & Abu Leonard
5. ThePotentialitiesofArabicLanguageInPromotingAnd
ProtectingIslam andItsCultureInNigeria
Busari,KehindeKamorudeen,PhD
6. Jesus as The Cosmic Christ and The Ecology of The Human
Person
MichaelGakbeGokatand GideonY.Tambiyi,PhD
7. The Effects of Violent Students' Protests in Nigerian Universities,
1971-1999
Ajala,B.Luqman, Ph.D
8. Forms and Functions of The Nice Properties of English
Mohammad Idris S/kudu, PhD & Isa Adamu Haliru, PhD
9. Impact of Nigerian Civil War On Anyigba, North Central
Nigeria, 1967- 1970
Ezeogueri-Oyewole, Anne Nnenna & Nda Mariam
10. A Historical Analysis of Political and Electoral Violence in
NigeriaBetween2011–2018
Ene Gift Linus
11. Cultural Implicity of Naming Among the Mumuye
Juliana Aidan, Naomi Ishaya & Azinni Vakkai
12. An Assessment of the Role of River Basin Development
Authorities inAgricultural and Economic Development in Nigeria
Since1960
Luka, Nathaniel B. Gimba & Sylvester I. Ugbegeli, PhD,
13. Women's Status in Islam and their Role in Politics and
Sustainable Development
Maunde Usman Muhammad, Adamu Alhaji Sa'idu
& Amina Aminu Isma'il
14. The Role of Women in Traditional Mwaghavul Religion
Nakam Nanpan Kangpe
1-12
13-24
25-37
38-46
47-56
57-69
70-78
79-85
86-97
98-109
110-118
119-128
129-140
141-146
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies vii

10. 15. La révolte contre les pratiques traditionnelles abusives: Une
étude de Le Bistouri des Larmes de Ramonu Sanusi et Rebelle
de Fatou Keita
Nev Beatrice Nguwasen & Musa Elisha
16. Blind Hatred and Religious Intolerance in Nigeria: Comparing
the Biblical Saul and Yerima Musa in Heart of Stone
Chentu Dauda Nguvugher, PhD & Bem Alfred Abugh,
17. An Assessment of The Challenges and Opportunities of The De-
Radicalisation Programme in North-Eastern State, Nigeria: A
Case Study of Operation Safe Corridor Camp, Mallam Sidi,
Gombe, Gombe State, Nigeria.
Saleh Omar, PhD & Adamu Ahmed
18. Indigenous Knowledge as a Tool for Harmonizing Cultures in
Nigerian Societies.
Patience Ngunan Kersha, Fagbemi Victoria Yemi, PhD
& Linus Nihunga Ahaz
19. Arabic and Fulfulde Grammatical Processes: A Descriptive
Comparative Analysis
Abubakar Mu'azu & Usman Bobbo Iliyasu
20.Vote Buying and Strategic Use of Money in the 2015 General
Elections in Taraba State
Auwal Chul &Isa Mohammed
147-155
156-164
165-178
179-189
190-195
196-204
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies viii

11. The Transformation of The Nigerian Civil Service From Colonialism To Post-
Independence Era
Philip Afaha, PhD
Dept. of History and Diplomatic Studies,
University of Abuja, Nigeria.
E-mail: afaha2k4@gmail.com
Phone: 08035330806
Abstract
The Nigerian civil service emanated from the colonial service which was still in force during the
early years of Nigeria`s independence. A potpourri of indigenous officers and expatriates, the
colonial model civil service was designed as a mere secretariat of government business, but the
need to expand its scope and replace the expatriates with local workforce gave rise to series of
reforms and challenges hitherto experienced in the service. The height of this disarticulation in the
nation`s service occurred during the almost four decades of military rule. The regimented mentality
and the customary command-and-control style of the military severely rubbed-off on the psyche
and operations of the civil service. The noticeable manifestations of systemic weakness were over-
expansion of the service, unification of erstwhile regional services, nepotism, corruption, etc. The
colonial model started well in Nigeria and flourished up to the early post-independence years when
the system opted for the replacement of expatriates under the Nigerianisation scheme. Although
the expatriates were known for dedication and professionalism and even inspired the pioneer
Nigerians who took over from them, the service was to witness a steady decline in quality service
delivery and professionalism especially from the middle of the 1970s due to unhealthy inter-service
rivalries for managerial talent and spurious promotions. In fact, such critical condiments of the
public service such as officer deployments, job classification, grading and posting were routinely
manipulated by politicians and senior service officials. The practice was for some unscrupulous
officials to attach an occupational classification to a staff just to get the staff graded far beyond his
mates. The paper opines that it was this state of affairs that pushed every administration to embark
on reformsandrationalisation.
Evolution of The Federal Civil Service
The Nigerian Civil service as a colonial legacy is rooted in the 1854 Northcote-Trevelyan
Report of the British Civil Service. According to that report, the civil service must offer a
lifetime career to its officers who are mostly enlisted in their youth. These youths, armed
with requisite qualifications, were expected to advance up the ladder of their career
through promotion based on an appraisal and seniority until they reach the zenith of the
civil service and/or retirement at a certain age. Along this ladder, officers were expected to
fully grasp the modus operandi and set rules which make up the system's bureaucracy.This
traditional model of public administration is characterised by certain inalienable features
which include separation of roles, public interest, functional division of labour, merit-
basedrecruitment,andefficientoperationalmethodsbasedon standardisationoftasks.
The Nigerian civil service evolved from the bureaucracy of the Royal Niger Company at
th
the beginning of the 20 century, and had witnessed several pre and post-independence
reforms which included His Majesty`s Colonial Service and the Nigerian Civil service of
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies 1

12. 1954. While its main objective at inception was the maintenance of law and order,
manpower recruitment and placement, mostly with Europeans, were utilized to achieve
this objective. The pattern of recruitment and placement policy by the colonial
administration had some racial connotation as Africans were deliberately excluded from
1
civil administration. The downside of this manpower recruitment and placement policy
by a foreign colonial administration aroused political agitation amongAfrican members of
the Legislative and Nigerian Council. Although members of the Nigerian Council which
included both European andAfricans were to meet once a year merely to express opinions
which were hardly used in shaping institutional policies and structures for the Nigerian
civilservices.
Frederick Lugard conducted the two separate civil services of Northern and Southern
protectorates through a central secretariat in Lagos. Whatever such Lugardian separatist
policies were intended to achieve, one significant consequence for manpower placement
in the Nigerian civil service was the difficulty of finding sufficient number of indigenes
from the North to take up some posts in the service even before unification. This explains
the relatively high number of Europeans in the civil service who, by 1906, numbered locals
by 266. Knowledge of Hausa became the main criterion for appointment into the
administrative class just to enhance the recruitment and placement of northerners into the
civil service, and also as an avenue to select people from the junior ranks to higher posts.
This, no doubt, represented a lowering of qualification and was to have unpleasant
consequences not only for recruitment into the Northern civil service but also into the
federalcivilservice.
Sustained agitation by local members of the Nigerian Legislative Councils had its first
impact in the appointment of the Walwayn Committee in 1942 set up to consider the
question of admission ofAfricans to posts other than secretarial posts in the administrative
service. Observers link this change of policy to the Second World War since there was a
desire to compensate Nigerians in their support of British war efforts. Due to the Report of
the Walwyn Committee, the number of Africans in the senior service rose to 172 out of a
2
totalof2,207posts ascomparedwith26 in1938.
RichardConstitution and theNigerianisationoftheCivilService
Acceptance in principle of the right to recruit and place Nigerians in the civil service
brought about another important policy development, namely that of training. Here, one
must mention a related political development, in the form of the Richards constitution,
which granted a greater measure of political autonomy than before. Nigerian politicians
seemed to have seized upon the Nigerianisation of the civil service and training of suitable
Nigerians to occupy posts in it as a quicker way of obtaining the substance of power rather
than wait for the development of political institutions. The appointment of the Foot
Commission by the Governor-General in 1948/to make recommendations about the
recruitment and training of Nigerians fitted in to this policy objective. The report, among
others, contained valuable information on student and scholarship plans and resources for
thefinancingof thefirst 385 scholarshipand trainingawards by theNigeriansGovernment
forthenextthreeyears.
The creation of the Civil Service Commission's Department to handle civil service
matters, as part of the Foot Commission recommendations should be seen as an important
structure within which training was pursued. Training of Nigerians was therefore being
considered too important to be treated as part of the function of the Establishment Branch
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies 2

13. of the Chief Secretary's Office.The latter, mostly staffed with Europeans and advisory to
the Governor-General, had until then had responsibility for staff recruitment into the civil
service.
The Civil Service Commissioner's Department was therefore an agency with Nigerian
representation that advised the Governor-General on all matters relating to senior
appointments and promotions in the services. Side by side with it was created a Central
Public Service Board to handle recruitment and selection of candidates for scholarship
andtrainingtobeplacedinallGovernmentAuthoritiesorVoluntaryAgencies.
Marcpherson Constitution and theCreationofPublicServiceCommission
In 1948, the Macpherson constitution was introduced along with the House of
Representatives in operation. In furtherance of the policy of Nigerianisation, an order in
council was promulgated in 1951 which provided for the creation of a Public Service
Commission in Nigeria. The Commission which came into being in May, 1952, was to
advise on matters referred to it by the Governor-General relating to the appointment of any
person to an office in the public service of the federation or to the dismissal or disciplinary
control of officers in that service. The fact that the Commission had little powers was
reflected in the Phillipson-Adedo report, which Commission was set up in 1952 to
examine and review the policy of Nigerianisation introduced in 1948. The Report states
inter-alia:
“The circumstances attendant upon the establishment of the present
constitution did not admit of the creation at that time of such a body. Other
large change in administrative practice and organization were in progress
and those responsible for directing in details the course of those changes
recognized that the erection of a full-time Public Service Commission
competent to advise the Governor on the full range of subjects referred to in
section 169 of the order in Council. They raised many issues relating to
composition, procedure, regulation of powers (both advisory and
executive) and relations to other authorities, including regional
governments and the public service boards, which called for mature
3
considerationinthelightoffurtherexperience”
The Phillipson-Adebo Commission, like others that preceded it, was set up as a result of
Nigerian public opinion expressed in the House of Representatives. As noted in the
Commission's observation above, there was a need to establish machinery for making
appointments and promotions, a machinery in which the public would repose confidence
in the performance of the existing Public Service Commission which was in doubt, and
fears were expressed that in the existing arrangements, expatriates less suitable and
qualified than available Nigerians could be appointed. Meanwhile, the Northern
politicians had begun to express fears that unqualified application of the policy of
Nigerianisation was not in their interest because of the shortage of suitable and qualified
NigeriansofNorthernorigintomakeup civilserviceposts.
In its report published in 1953, the Philison-Adebo Commission noted a modest increase
in the number of Nigerians in the civil service, including “Senior Service” posts. In view
of progress made in Nigerianisation, it recommended the advertisement of vacant posts at
home and abroad and the control of expatriate contract renewal. Training schemes for
Junior and Senior officers was recommended, including the establishment of the Regions
todealwithappointments,recruitment,promotionsanddisciplinewithintheservice.
The Public Service Commission in the Regions should be distinguished from the regional
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies 3

14. Public Service Commissions. While the former were branches of the federal set up, the
latter, first requested for by the North, were to be under the control of the Regional
Governments. The Northern Regional Government's point of view concerning
Nigerianisation was that no appointments of non-expatriate officers (southerners in
particular) other than Lieutenant Governor, and that if there was a suitable Northerner with
the preference to all other claimants. A policy of Nigerianisation with predominant
Southern officers was therefore not acceptable. It is only fair to remark that this mutual
suspicion between the North and the South was political but its effect on the establishment
ofanefficientNigeriancivilservicewas notindoubt.
The difficulty of establishing under the 1951 Richard's Constitution a true federal Nigerian
civil service staffed mainly with Nigerians had no doubt surfaced under the serious
political undertones and reservations expressed by politicians from the North. This
explains why the Phillison-Adebo Commission report, especially their recommendations
concerningtheestablishmentofaNigerianCivilService,werenotaccepted.
It was under the Macpherson Constitution in 1954 that a federal structure of government
for Nigeria as opposed to the unitary system was established. The Constitution provided a
regionalized civil service in which four Public Service Commissions were setup to advise
the Governor-General and the regional Governors on questions relating to the
appointment, discipline or disciplinary control of any public servant which might be
referred to them. This situation fitted with what the North had desired of the civil service,
while the policy of Nigerianisation was also practiced.The Constitution also provided new
posts, salaries,allowancesandconditionsofservicefortheirpublicservices.
EvolutionofTheFederalCivilService
The breakup of what appeared to be unified civil service under the new Constitution raised
some problems that led to the setting up in 1954 of the Gorsuch Commission. The
Commission was to make enquiry into the constitutional changes on the future federal and
Regional Government since the machinery of government had remained unchanged since
1948 and the Phillison-Adebo Commission dealing with these issues had been overtaken
by the political developments since 1953. The Gorsuch Commission Report dealt
principally with the Federal Civil Service structure including pay as well as the structure
and composition of the Federal Public Service Commission, a commission that would
ensure impartiality in the recruitment of civil servants and loyalty to all Governments
without political influence and pressures.As a result of the Gorsuch Commission Report, a
st
Federal and three Regional Public Service Commissions were later established on 1
October,1954,andpublishedintheGazetteasLegalNoticeNo. 2 of1955.
The setting up of the Federal Public Service Commission with some Nigerians as
members, and the implementation of other recommendations of the Gorsuch Report was
followed by an important political event in 1956 when the House of Representatives,
elected under the self governing constitution of 1954, passed a Resolution on the
Nigerianisationofthecivilservice.TheResolutionStatesthat;
“this House, realizing the importance of education in the speeding up of the
Nigerianisation of the Federal Civil Service, and in the provision of higher
training to fit Nigerians for increased responsibility in all walks of life, calls
upon the Council of Ministers to make a comprehensive statement and
present specific proposal to this end at the next budget meeting of the
4
House”.
The debate of the Resolution resulted in a far-reaching policy statement highlighting the
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies 4

15. problems of training adequate manpower to fill vacant senior posts in the Federal Public
Service and the steps necessary to overcome them.As in the recommendations of the Foot
Commission of 1948 on Nigerianisation, the House resolution recognised that, although
the needs of the government service had first claim on the Government's met by
sufficientlytrainednumberofNigerians.
As in the House debate, the importance of training for the efficiency of the civil service and
the utilization of its manpower was not overlooked in the Gorsuch Report. In paragraph
176,itnotedthat:
“it is not enough that the structure of the public service should provide the
avenues of advancement. There must be in addition, a comprehensive and
coordinated system of training nor should this be merely a phase of limited
duration; there will always be room in the services for the two systems to
exist side by side-direct entry at various points according to qualifications
acquired before recruitment, and promotion from the lower ranks of those
5
whose qualitybyprovedabilityandtrainingfor higherresponsibility”.
The Report recommended that each of the four Governments should set up a standing
committee on training, comprising the Establishment Secretary, the Director of Education
and one member of the Public Service Commission. This was to allay the north's fears of
domination by the south, and to assure the development of federal service badly
undermined by the existence of Regional Public Service Commissions and Houses of
Assembly. Recruitment to fill junior posts in the Federal Service was to be drawn from the
Regions while recruitment above that level should be opened to all Nigerians irrespective
of their locations. The existence of two grades - the junior and senior services - which
encouraged the jump and the inefficiency in promotion from one grade to another were
recognised. The Commission therefore recommended the full establishment of an
executivegradetobridgethegapbetweentheSeniorandJuniorServices.
In spite of all the measures taken to effect rapid Nigerianisation of senior posts in the Civil
Service, and with the establishment of the Federal Public Service Commission in 1955, the
situation by the eve of independence showed that although there were qualified Nigerians,
opportunity to exercise responsibility was denied to them. In contrast, their expatriate
counterparts remained indifferent, or were simply opposed to the policy of
Nigerianisation. In their books, “The Autobiography of Chief Obafemi Awolowo” and
6
“My life” , both Chief Awolowo and Alhaji Ahmadu Bello had remarked on the over-
bearing attitude and instructiveness of the expatriate administrators. Thus, further
agitation by Nigerian politicians in the Federal House of Representatives in 1959 led to the
appointment of a Parliamentary Committee to examine the progress made with the
NigerianisationofthePublicService.
The report noted the big disparity that still existed between Nigerians and expatriates in the
superscale posts that not all Ministries complied with the requirement to review
prospective staff needs of their Departments and to inform the Federal Public Service. The
Committee further observed that the presence of expatriate permanent secretaries and
other highly-placed officers in what was described as “policy-making post” amounted to
an “external control, direct or indirect”, of the public service, and that while these officers
remained, it cannot be said that the federal service and that the most critical areas of
placement of Nigerians were the technical departments where few Nigerians could be
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies 5

16. found intheseniorposts.
The problem of Nigerianisation at the eve of independence then had two aspects. The first
was that qualified Nigerians should take over from the expatriates and to encourage the
latter to continue to serve under special conditions or be paid lump-sum compensations on
precipitate withdrawal. The second was the problem of finding suitably qualified
Northerners to fill positions in the federal service. By 1962, the Northern Regional
Executive Council had recommended a Nothernisation policy whereby preference would
be given to suitable Northerners over others, mainly Southerners. In place of fixed quotas
of senior posts in the federal public service being reserved for Northerners as demanded
before independence, it was suggested that the Northern Regional Government should
assistinreleasingsuitableNorthernerstofillvacanciesinthefederalservice.
Thus, at independence, following the report of the Nigerianisation Offices, and on the
basis of an evolving political and administrative developments, a federal civil service
7
emerged well defined but according to Olusanya , whose personnel still consisted of a
sizeable number of expatriates and of many Nigerians with little or no experience. This
situation was not surprising because as observed by the Parliamentary Committee and
accepted in the government statement of policy on Nigerianisation, it was not possible for
a country to get through the transitional phase of independence without deterioration in
standard, although it was necessary to avoid an intolerable degree of deterioration. What
was uppermost for Nigerian political elites was to achieve political independence together
with a reasonable Nigerianisation of the Administrative Cadre of the civil service and to
ensureadequaterepresentationinallgradesoftheservicefortheentirethreeregions.
The colonial administrative structure of the Federal Civil Service emphasized country-
wide administration through field officers which existed under the unitary system of
government between 1914-1946 and the federal system which emerged under the
8
Richard's Constitution of 1946.As noted by Nwosu, the pillars of colonial administration
rested on field officers represented by the Colonial Governor, the Residents and District
Officers. It was through them that the principal goals of colonial administration,
maintenanceoflawandorderandresourcesmobilizationwereachieved.
It can be concluded that the then Federal Civil Service was conceived as a colonial
institution serving mainly the interest of an external power, and that its structure and
personnel recruitment policies reflected this philosophy. The strong nationalist pressure
and constant demand for the Nigerianisation of civil service also served as an instrument
ofgainingindependenceandpoliticalpower.
Post-ColonialCivilService
At Independence, there were efforts to transfer both political and administrative
responsibilities to the indigenous elites. What this transfer of power and responsibilities
translated to for the Nigeria civil service was that the last leg of the race towards full
Nigerianisation, a process which started during the colonial period, commenced in 1960.
Regardless of the fact that as at that time, full Nigerianisation was yet to be attained, it
must be underscored that in contrast to political powers, the service was bequeathed to a
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies 6

17. relatively more sophisticated elites.Although, this has been mentioned early, the reason for
the state of affairs was that politician's participation in the colonial government had neither
challengingresponsibilitiesnorfullpower.
The pursuit of this colonial phase of Nigerianisation started with the establishment of the
Morgan Commission in 1963. This Commission and that of Elwood Grading Team (1966)
Adebo (1971) all premised their submission in line with their mandate. Accordingly, the
federal civil servants became the beneficiaries of an elevated remuneration package and
associated privileges commensurate with their grades. This notwithstanding, and integral
to this process, was the gradual increase in the future damage that expatriate civil servants
would be averted or controlled. With respect to recruitment, it needs to be noted that there
was only a marginal growth in the size of the services from 54,989 in 1966 the Federal Civil
9
Servicegrewto98,877 in1974.
This public service review commission was understandably the first comprehensive
attempt at restructuring the service in all its ramifications. Since the 1970s, the challenges
of post war reconstruction and management of the new oil factor in Nigeria rested on the
services. Fundamentally, it becomes imperative to gear it up. This necessitated the setting
10
up of Udoji Review Commission in 1972, whose term of reference covered structural and
conditions of service, examination of all laws regarding pension and rules guiding intra-
services movements. Similarly, it was expected to review grading and salary scales, among
others.
The Commission`s recommendations that the salary grading system be unified, new
management techniques be put in place, “open report system to replace the age old
confidentially reporting”, among others, are worthy of note. However, of direct relevance
here is its prescription for optimum utilisation of manpower and “how to evolve” a
development oriented public service. The Commission became popular with the civil
servants based on how it facilitated wage increases. It equally called for the recruitment
and training of specialised personnel in the application of scientific knowledge and new
management techniques, such a Planning, Programming and Budgeting System (PPBS),
Management By Objectives (MBO) and other qualitative measures for gauging targets and
results. In fact, the size of the federal civil service generally shot from 98,877 in 1974 to
11
257,103 in1984.
It is never in doubt that manpower development, placement and utilisation can be achieved
principally through training.Training in the federal civil service since the Udoji Report has
been on the upward trend in terms of resource allocation in the budget. This went up from
N500,000.00 in 1974 to N7milion in 1982. ASCON training, especially at management
12
level,increasedup to221 from1947-79.
Post training placement problems apart, other problems still persisted, as observed by
13
Adamolekun , notably in respect of qualitative aspects of training. Further, post-training
placement is compounded by the “pool system” centralized control and development of
officers, whereas individual ministries are required to manage their training functions
withinthecentralframework.
The worse that befall the Commission painstaking efforts was that it “Became
14
synonymous with bonus and new wealth” . The administration of Gowon factored this to
attract undue public attention to the salary increase which it retroactively implemented,
without implementing other areas of recommendations that could turn the service around.
Evidently, it was at this time that a bias was laid for the spade of inter service challenges
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies 7

18. from the state to the federal service which was very noticeable in the 1990s. This reason
lends itself to Ademolekun and Ayo's corroboration when they posited that “the state
permanent secretaries were portrayed as occupying inferior position below their federal
15
counterparts”.
The industrial unrest that resulted from the corrupted implementation process was said to
constitute a major factor that promoted the taking over of power by Murtala/Obasanjo
administration. To show the relationship between this public service malady and the coup
that brought Murtala/Obasanjo of power, no sooner did the regime settle on the job that it
set upWilliams Panel in 1975.The Panel received a mandate to look into complaints which
arose out of the grading and salary structure put in place by the Udoji Commission.
Consequently, the purge of the 1975 that came as the regime's corrective measure against
the prevalent civil service inadequacies, a footstep which Buhari administration followed,
visited more damage on the service.The fallout of this was captured byAugustusAdebayo.
“Never in the history of any human public organisation had so much havoc been wreaked
on the organisation by a ruthless decimation its labour force. Without establishing any
rational basis or any ascertainable reason, about ten thousand civil servants were thrown
out, a good many of them being the cream and the best in the service. This exercise
destroyed morale in the service, led to frustration and uncertainty and inevitably shattered
productivity and efficiency since many good ones were thrown out and those who
16
remainedlosttheirmoraleandsense ofdevotiontoduty(Adebayo,2000).
Rationalization
Another reforms effort which aimed to holistically overhaul the service structure was the
17
1988 reforms. Broadly, what came under its purview for streamlining were the structure,
size and overhead cost as well as how to make the service efficient as well as boost the
morale of the civil servants. It equally sought to determine the cause of problems like over
staffing, poor management and operation methods which give rise to avoidable
bureaucraticinefficiency.
As sweeping as this focus was, so unprecedented were the measures that followed from the
exercise. The ministers replaced the permanent secretaries as Chief Executives and
Accounting Officers of their ministries. The nomenclature of the permanent secretaries
was dropped for Director-General, but of critical implication to the service was that the
latter “ends of this radical reforms was the professionalization of the civil service”. This
meant the service had no place for generalist administrators any longer. Each ministry was
mandatedtoberesponsibleforallpersonnelandstaffmattersexcludingrecruitment.
Virtually all the pillars of the reforms have implication for the central concern of this paper.
18
To start with the impression created by Dotun Philips that the minister, by this reform
exercise, just assumed the status ofAccounting Officer was inconsistent with the reality. In
the words of Ogunlowo J., a former Head of Service with the Kwara state government, “we
doubt this because since the inception of the 1979 civilian regime, and has been that injury
inflicted on the public service by Murtala regime”. The truth has been that “the role of the
Permanent Secretaries as Accounting Officers has been meaningless, except where the
19
Ministers/Commissionerswereineffective.
Moreover, Ministers who could be in office for as period as to be counted in months not
years, and with the craze for primitive material accumulation prevalent in our society, they
might want to make “as much money as they could” yet the checks and balances between
the ministry and the career civil servant (Permanent Secretaries) was now removed by
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies 8

19. politicization that it does not exclude all the officers at senior levels. The service equally
loses its major attraction of 'insulated' tenure as a career officer for promising young ones.
Hence, they join the seekers of greener pastures elsewhere. All these taken together point
in a direction that lends to Amuwo's deduction that “the military can only conceive all
these either propitious for pattern maintenance or germane to the extension of political
20
landscapebothbeforeandafter1992”.
The manner the reforms eroded professionalism was such that it limped on job location,
that is the ministry, and not the function or ability of a personnel to become an organised
21
team player for goal achievement, is a contradiction of terms. As Olowu explicates
forthrightly that to professionalise is in consonance with horizontal movement across
22
ministries, Leleye buttressed same. The dangers inherent in trying a policy as far
reaching as professionalization to the ministerial structure of government can never be
overstressed.
This idea of each ministry being autonomous in personnel processes put an end to the
office of the Head of Service and reduced that of the Federal Civil Service Commission to
mere recruiting agents. This severely compromised the critical relevance of the
Centralised Personnel Agencies (CPA). In effect, the reforms circumvented the
bureaucratic essence of the civil service since it has always been the brief functions of
these bodies to harmonize personnel policies and co-ordinate the processes. The CPA is
the only unifying cord for all the ministries and extra-ministerial departments while
executing their differing schedules. By this autonomy, the 1988 reform exercise equally
shots itself in the foot. Its inclusion aimed at reducing the size of the civil service.
However, due to the stipulation that “every ministry may have up to a maximum of five
23
operational departments and three common services departments” ministry including
those with moderate number of schedules aspired to have the minimum number of
departments allowed resulting in an increase in the size of the Civil Service instead of
reductionasenvisaged.
The damages that 1988 reforms ushered into the civil services led to the formation of
Ayida Panel in 1994. Its report constituted the basis of the government white paper
released in June 1997. The Ayida Panel re-invested the service with its much desired
structural health and the civil servants' hope for a robust career prospect was equally re-
awoken. Placement and utilisation of the permanent secretaries that were restricted in the
1988 reforms regained their pristine career importance.The critical coordinating presence
ofCPAwithinthesystemwas restoredandreaffirmed.
Expectedly, pools system was restored particularly as it concerns certain professions.
However, given the inherited bloated size of the service, with the spectra of ghost workers,
theAbachamilitaryregimestartedanarbitraryrationalisationofstructureandpersonnel.
RemunerationVersus Institutional Reforms
Public perception of the role of the civil service has raised the issue of its productivity to
become an important political question. In the minds of the political elites and that of other
Nigerians, the civil service remains an important vehicle for economic development. The
significance of this perceived role for the service is its efficiency and capacity to fulfil such
role. It underscores the need to make the civil service manpower more productive and
emphasizes the importance of the factors necessary to raise their productivity and
performance.
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies 9

20. Towards this end, a strategy of eliciting, and/or sustaining a describable type of behaviour
from civil servants for higher productivity has been an agenda of successive governments.
It has been the general rationale behind setting up of service reform commission or panel.
Any situation that tends to inhibit the efficiency of the service at a given point in time
constitutesthedefiningvariableforthetermsofreferenceforacommission.
With this in view, all the reform commissions that ever existed in the annual of the Nigeria
Federal Civil Service could be broadly categorized into two depending on a commission or
panel primal focus. The Tudor-Davies (1945), Mbanefo (1954), Morgan (1963), Elwood
Grading Team (1966) and Adebo (1971) Commissions, to mention but a few, represent
structural reformation Commissions whose responsibilities or recommendations cut
across the divide. While the Gorsuch Commission (1995) was saddled with the task of
determiningthenecessityforbothremunerationandstructuralchanges.
Equally worthy of attention is the fact that the implementation of recommendations of such
Commissions was shaped not only by their terms of reference but also by political
expediency. It is therefore not uncommon in circumstances like the Gorsuch Commission
for government to accept most recommendations, be it monetary reward inclined or
institutional reform biased. The Udoji public service reform though comprehensive was
implemented as if the recommendations were solely on salary increases. In order words,
rather than giving at least a levelled or equal emphasis on all aspects of the
recommendations, Gowon, who wanted support for his plan to prolong his tenure, effected
the recommendations as if all to it was salary increment. The conceptualization of the 1988
reform and its implementation made it look as the administrative component of Structural
AdjustmentProgrammeandaself-successionagendafortheBabangidaAdministration.
Conclusion
The colonial model started well in Nigeria and flourished up to the early post-
independence years when the system opted for the replacement of expatriates under the
Nigerianisation scheme. Although the expatriates were known for dedication and
professionalism and even inspired the pioneer Nigerians who took over from them, the
service was to witness a steady decline in quality service delivery and professionalism,
especially from the middle of the 1970s due to unhealthy inter-service rivalries for
managerial talent and spurious promotions. The dynamics of manpower utilization which
hitherto relied on planning, forecasting, budgeting and control broke down as even job
designs, description and performance were determined by nepotism and other shady
factors. In fact, such critical condiments of the public service such as officer deployments,
job classification grading and posting became manipulated by politician and senior service
officials. The practice was for some unscrupulous officials to attach an occupational
classification to a staff just to get the staff graded far beyond his mates. The author opines
that it was this “character of the state” that dampened the competence and efficiency of the
publicservice.
Every succeeding government grappled with reforms to ensure the much needed
transformation of the Nigerian civil service from merely 'administrative to managerial
culture' to ensure optimal productivity. In 1974, the Udoji Commission set out to articulate
a functional template for the Nigerian public service “for it to become a more effective tool
to achieve results in its newer, more demanding roles as agents for development.” It was
not until in 1974 when the Udoji unified Grading structure attempted a redress of that
dysfunctional grading system in the public service. The grading system was not the only
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies 10

21. challenge that bedevilled the public system as at the seventies and the eighties. The
symptom of gradual system's collapse got somehow compounded with the neglect it
sufferedunderthegripofmilitaryruleonNigeria.
The next attempt to tinker on the service was in 1985 when the Buhari regime constituted
the Professor Dotun Phillips Committee to recommend ways to synchronize the
management and operations of the civil service with the presidential system of government
envisaged by the 1979 Constitution. This reform proposal was given the force of law by
Decree No. 43 of 1988 by the Gen. Babangida regime and was later supplanted by the
Ayida Reform of 1995 due to its disarticulated conception of service professionalism.
Apart from these conceptual shortcomings, these reforms were stymied by the command
and control tradition of the military which inexorably destroyed accountability
mechanisms and other core values of the civil service. For instance, between 1988 and
1999, the military had abolished the office of the Head of Service of the Federation with its
attendant backlash on the operations and psyche of the civil service. The paramount
consequence of that action was inadequacies and overcrowding of the administrative
system. The unguarded expansion was to create distortions in the size, skills and structure
of the Civil Service and its overall capacity to deliver services. The tradition of symbiosis
among different sectors as basis for policy intelligence was eroded, while the sheer size
and structure of the government outgrew its capacity for policy making, programme and
projectimplementationaswellaseffectivemonitoringandevaluationofsame.
From the onset of the Fourth Republic in 1999, several efforts has been made to restructure
the civil service for optimal outputs. Some of these efforts came in form of reform
packagesandisolatedpoliciesbyeachsucceedingadministration.
References
1. Olusanya G.O Evolution of the Nigerian civil Service 1861-1960. The problem
of Nigerianisation, University of Lagos Press, 1975, p.2-4.
2. Katagum, sule (Alhaji), The Development of the Public Service Commission
System, Lecture delivered to the Public Service Forum, Fed. 22, 1974, p. 4
3. Ibid, p. 4
4. Gorsuch, L.H., Report of the Commission of the Public services of the
government in the Federation of Nigeria, 1954-55, Federal Government of
Nigeria, 1955. P. 29
5. Ibid, p. 31
6. Awolowo, Chief Obafemi: My Life
7. Olusanya, op.cit., p.16
8. Nwosu
9. Olusanya G.O. op. cit. p.85
10. Federation of Nigeria, Statement of policy of the Government of the Federation
on the Nigerianisation of the Federal Public Service and the Higher training of
Nigerians, 1956-60; (sessional Paper No.4, 1956) p.8
11. Sessional paper No.6 op. cit. p.5
12. S. Bamidele Ayo, “The Contributions of Practitioners to Administrative
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies 11

22. Reforms” in Nigeria Public Administration past present and Future, Dele
Olowo, S. Bamidele Ayo John Erero (Eds.) (Shonenkan C.I.,Ibadan, 1991)
p.69; Augustus Ibid.
13. Ademolekun L., Politics and Administration in Nigeria, London, Hutchinson,
1986) p. 17
14. S. Bamidele Ayo, op. cit, p.71
15. Adamolekun, L. and S.B. Ayo “The Evolution of the Nigeria Federal
Administration”. Publius: the Journal of Federalism, Winter Volume 19, No. 1,
p. 162 cited by S. Bamidele Aya op. cit. p.70.
16. Augustus Adebayo, Public Administration in Nigeria second Edition (Spectrum
Ibadan, 2000) p.213
17. Augustus Adebayo, Op. Cit
18. Dotun Phillip, Preliminary Policy-impact Assessment of the Reforms of the
Nigerian Civil Service in Journal of Nigerian Public Administration and
management, Vol.1. No. of 1991.
19. Ogunlowo J., “Result_Oriented Public Service in Nigeria-Illusion?' University
th
of Ilorin. Master in Public Administration. Guest Lecturer, 28 Fed. 1991. P.5;
Bamidele Ayo, Ibid.
20. Amuwo
21. Olowu, Dele and Oshionebo Basil, A Report on the National workshop on
Manpower Utilization and Development in Nigeria. A post-Udoji evaluation.
(ASCON presses, Badagry, January, 1986) p.5
22. Leleye
23. Ogunlowo J. op. cit. p. 11-12.
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies 12

23. Africa: Could There Ever Be Renaissance?
Prof. Usen Smith,
Department of Political Science,
Federal University, Wukari,
Taraba state.
E-mail: lizzyusensmith@gmail.com
Phone: 08063168529
Abstract
Those who seek to understand post-colonial African continent and the problems confronting it
could only discern what is taking place. The Cold War and apartheid ended and their departure
removed two issues that shaped international interest in the continent. Domestically, continued
economic crisis, the collapse of neo-patrimonial post-colonial state, and, in response, a surge in
pressure for reform shifted political calculations. These international and domestic transformations
altered the topography of power and institutional arrangements across the continent and hence the
context in which elites made decisions relating to peace and conflict. In some cases,African leaders
responded with difficulty and fragile efforts to reform their economies and political systems while
in others the pressures led to violence or state collapse. Many states fell somewhere in between
these two extremes, with the future still in the balance. This paper will analytically study the
situation and sort of prognosticates whether there could be any hope to move away from the present
condition.
Introduction
Africa is increasingly an integrated regional political system, that shares a history
of colonial oppression; a new but still evolving, state system; a marginalized place in the
international political economy that is still reliant on primary commodity exports; and a
widespread desire among its people for democracy, prosperity, and secure livelihoods. To
understand where Africa's countries are headed to today, including the big players of
1
NigeriaandSouthAfrica,wemustunderstandtheircommonpast.
Current anthropological theories concur thatAfrica is the cradle of all humankind.
The “African genesis” theory holds that the earliest hominids, the primordial ancestors of
human race, lived in the Great Rift Valley of Central Africa and the Ethiopian highlands.
Thus the beginning of African history is the beginning of human history. African history
and its present are marked by extensive cross-border and internal migration, changing
structures of authority and governance between traditional and modern forms, evolving
boundaries of the state and society, and contested concept of religious, ethnic, and national
identity. Historically, great ancient kingdoms developed in Africa, including the Gao in
present-day Senegal, the Mali dynasties of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries and the
regal traditions of the Ashanti in present-day Ghana. During these times, Africans
interacted with Islamic traders such as the Berbers, and a vibrant system of exchange
developedacrossthesands ofSahara.
Early in the fifteenth century, Portuguese fortune-seekers and emissaries of
imperialistic monarchies crossed the straits of Gibraltar, and eventually rounded the Cape
of Good Hope, and began the European colonization of Africa. This system of colonial
domination lasted in some areas until the early 1990s, when independence of Namibia
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies 13

24. marked an end to colonialism. Before European rule, traditional authority in the persons of
African monarchs and chief, rooted in agrarian systems of livelihood, was the dominant
mode of governance. Colonial rule changedAfrica significantly, and its long-term effects
tothepresentcannotbeoverstated.
Over the seventeenth to twentieth centuries, additional imperial powers invaded
Africa.They carved up the continent along artificial and illogical boundaries, manipulated
social systems, and created economic legacies that continue to bedevil African countries.
An initial impetus for the colonial exploitation of Africa was the slave trade, in which at
least twelve million Africans were enslaved and forcibly trafficked to destinations in the
colonial Americas to work plantations of cocoa, coffee, tobacco, cotton, and sugar. The
legacies of the slave trade informed the strength of anticolonial movements into the
presentin termsof theexploitativerelationshipthatAfricanshavelong hadwithforeigners
who intervene primarily in their own interests. Indeed, just west of the capital of Dakar,
Senegal, lies Goree Island, once a prison where slaves were auctioned to slave traders in
2
passing ships; todayithouses aninstitutefordemocracy,development,andhumanrights.
With the British decision to abolish slavery in 1833 and the emancipation of slaves in the
Americas during the US Civil War, the nature of European subjugation changed. Colonial
powers annexed large swaths of African territory in an effort to fuel their industrial
revolution with raw materials extracted from the rich natural resources found on the
continent. Principally, these resources included cotton, peanuts, cocoa, palm oil, coffee,
sisalandmineralssuchascopper,gold,diamond,andotherpreciousorrareearthmetals.
Colonization accelerated in the final three decades of the nineteenth century. In 1870, only
10% of Africa was colonized; by 1900 only 10% was not. At the infamous Berlin
Conference of 1884, the major European colonial powers-Britain, France, Belgium,
Germany, Italy, Portugal, and Spain-divided Africa's territory among themselves. Their
colonial “state” was rather arbitrary in terms of then-existing African social patterns. For
the most part, the colonial administrative entities simply reflected the pattern of military
control exercised by the colonial armies of the European imperialist powers: whoever
controlled an area took it as a colony. The borders of most African states today are the
legacy of the ill-considered partition ofAfrica in the mid-nineteenth century, based on the
“principle of effective occupation” of territory. These boundaries often did not correspond
to a consistent geographic, national, or ethnic logic. Ultimately they set the stage for many
of the problems of ethnic tension that challenge the majority of African countries today.
This process of change is ongoing, as evidenced by the secession of Eritrea from Ethiopia
in 1993 or the independence of South Sudan from Sudan in 2011. Whether Eritrea and
South Sudan's independence are still part of decolonization as a broad historical process or
thebeginningsof theunravelingof contemporaryAfricanstatesintosmallerones willonly
be known by future observers. For the present, though, it is safe to say the process of nation
building and state building inAfrica remains incomplete, and that theAfrican state system
itselfisstillverymuchawork inprogress.
Patternsofcolonialism
The discovery of rich diamond and gold deposits in South Africa in the 1860s
heightened what became known as the “scramble for Africa”. To fully exploit Africa's
wealth, colonizers required ever more effective occupation and social control. Although,
different in their approaches-the British used “indirect rule” whereas the French, Belgians,
and Germans preferred more direct administration-the colonial powers engaged in the
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies 14

25. widespreadpoliticalmanipulationofAfricansocieties.
1. The British relied on agreements with traditional rulers to impose their policies,
usually backed up with superior military might. Consequently, we find today that in
erstwhile British colonies such as Ghana, Kenya, South Africa, or Uganda, traditional
rulers remain very powerful as informal institutions with their own authority, legitimacy,
governance functions (for example, on land tenure), and de-facto territorial control by
ethnicgroups remainscriticallyimportant.
2. In French and Belgian colonies, centralized power was more important and to a
certain extent it eroded more fully traditional power structures. The French sought to exert
cultural influence through their language policy, and they ruled their colonies as an
extension of France itself. Colonial subjects were to become evolues, or “people evolving”
into Frenchmen. In contrast, though, Belgian colonies such as the vast Congo were ruled as
thepersonalpropertyoftheeccentricKingLeopardII.
3. In Portuguese colonies, such as Angola, Mozambique, and Cape Verde,
assimilation was encouraged and many inter-racial marriages occurred. As a result,
assimilados (or mulattos, the product of mixed marriages) became an important social
3
group that blurred the lines between colonial and indigenous rule. Lusophone (Portuguese
speaking) countries inAfrica today thus have social structures that are remarkably different
from those of former British or French colonies, and assimilados are still influential leaders
inthesecountries.
Thus another legacy of the colonial period was the stark division of a large part of Africa
into Anglophone (English-speaking), Francophone (French-speaking), and Lusophone
(Portuguese-speaking) colonies. These language difference affect the way today'sAfrican
countries relate to one another and stymie the development of a common approach to
contemporary problems. Former British colonies tend to have special ties with one another,
as do former French colonies. For example, former English colonies are active members of
4
the British Commonwealth, while French WestAfrican countries have adopted a common
currency(theCentralAfricanfranc,orCFA, whichisguaranteedbyFrenchtreasury).
The reliance onAfrican land and labour to grow crops and extract mineral wealth in service
to the colonial powers in severe distortion in traditional African societies. The colonial
authorities introduced European concepts with no indigenous roots inAfrica: Christianity,
monogamy, formal education, and wage labour, among others. New stratifications based
on socio economic class came into being, ethnic identities were transformed, and basic
economic infrastructures and modes of production were created to serve the single-
commodity economies needed by the colonial powers. In Southern Africa, European
immigrants set up white minority “settler states” that systematically displaced Africans
from the land and created a new form of what was described byAfrican liberation leaders in
these countries as internal colonialism. In many colonies, the imperial powers imposed a
“head tax,” in which anAfrican peasant had to work for a European plantation owner or an
enterprisetopayoffdebttothemetropolitanstate(thecolonialpower).
After the creation of the Union of South Africa following the British defeat of the Dutch-
origin colonists (then known as the Boers, or today, the Afrikaners) in 1902, and after
Germany's defeat in World War I, the shape of colonialism in Africa was nearly complete.
European plenipotentiaries and bureaucrats ruled the vast continent, and their oppression
of the indigenous population was nearly universal. Once Germany lost its colonies after
1918, most decisions affecting the masses of the continent were made in Paris or London,
with little regard for their implications for the millions of people whom colonial policy
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies 15

26. affected. Only Liberia and Ethiopia, each owing to their own historical contingencies, were
independentcountries.
LegaciesofColonialism:ExplainingUnderdevelopment
Colonialism's legacies are thus pervasive throughoutAfrica some 60years after the system
of domination began to crumble beginning with Ghana's liberation in 1957. These legacies
5
arepolitical,economic,andcultural.
1. Politically, the territorial boundaries of today's countries are the result of the
competition among the European powers over arable land, water, blue-water harbors,
transportationarteriessuchasrivers,andpreciousmineralresources.
2. Economically, the African colonies were reliant on single commodity, resource-
extraction economies. Urbanization was inhibited, subsistence agriculture encouraged,
andthedevelopmentofdiversifiedindustrialproductionwas stultified.
3. The cultural units that had existed before colonialism were also affected, and in
many regions ethnic and linguistic groups are now divided by artificial lines on a map.As a
result most African countries today are a mosaic of ethnic, linguistic, racial, and religious
diversity. One of the consequences is a pattern of distorted social relations. Conflict in
Rwanda, for example, between the minority Tutsi (now 15% of the population) and the
Hutu (84%) were fanned by the Belgian colonists' support for the Tutsi. A Hutu revolt in
1959 ended Tutsi domination. Violence erupted periodically after independence in 1962 as
theTutsi challenged Hutu power. In 1994, more than 800,000 people died in a hundred days
intheworst genocidesinceWorldWarIIasHutus lashedoutagainsttheTutsi.
AfricanNationalism:ThePursuitofthePoliticalKingdom
World War II had significant material and psychological effects on the continent
and its people. As a consequence of the war, the colonial powers were weakened and the
legitimacy of occupation began to erode; at the same time, the message of the struggle for
civil rights in countries such as the United States spread abroad. U.S presidents such as
Dwight Eisenhower pressed for decolonization to open Africa's markets to free trade.
Encouraged by civil right activism in the United State, African nationalist movements
emerged to resist colonial rule and exploitation. Under the leadership of these movements,
demands for independence from the colonial powers grew rapidly in the late 1940s and
1950s. Although there had been prior resistance to colonial rule,notably by the Ashanti
Kingdom in the late nineteenth century, the Ndebele-Shona uprisings in current-day
Zimbabwe in 1896-97, and the Maji-Maji rebellion in present-day Tanzania in 1905-07,
more consequential resistance to European rule emerged in the continent after World War
II. Among the most significant of these new awakenings was the Mau Mau rebellion in
Kenya in 1950, in which Kikuyu tribe's people articulated the legitimacy of African
aspirationstobefreeofcolonialyoke.
African nationalism arose from the frustrations of educated elites that deeply
resented that the highest positions in commerce, finance, government administration, and
even religious organizations were controlled by foreigners, as were the rewards of
economic success. African nationalists from within this educated elite sought
independence from colonial powers, a goal that would bring them complete control over
the state apparatus and territory of their respective countries. Buoyed by the promise of the
Charter of the United Nations to promote the “self determination of peoples”, and imbued
with the post-war optimism reflected in the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights,
African leaders began to agitate for decolonization.Western-educated, skilled professional
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies 16

27. leaders organized independence movements and petitioned for independence. Tanzania's
Julius Nyerere, Jomo Kenyata of Kenya, Leopold Senghor of Senegal, Kwame Nkrumah
of Ghana, and Kenneth Kaunda of Zambia, to name a few, articulated philosophies of
independence,self-reliance,andeconomicdevelopmentforAfricancolonies.
The aforementioned men were the founding fathers of today'sAfrican states, much
like Mohandas Gandhi and Jawaharal Nehru, who led India to independence in 1947.
Senghor, for example, argued for a rekindling of traditional African values. He coined the
term negritude to encompass “the whole complex of civilized values (cultural, economic,
social, and political) which characterize the black people”. Senghor and other nationalists
believed that cultural nationalism could unify countries whose people had little in common
other than their suffering to bind them in their post-colonial political units. To achieve this
unity, African anti-colonial nationalists sought the reins of state power. This drive for
power, waged in revolutionary struggles of armed resistance and guerrilla warfare in many
colonies, was heralded by Nkrumah's dictum, “Seek ye first the political kingdom”.At the
same time, the United States, in conformity with its own anti-colonial past, pressured the
European powers to loosen their control of markets and commerce withAfrica, in turn, the
Soviet Union saw African liberators, especially in the Afro-Marxist movements in
countries such asAngola, Mozambique, and Namibia, as vanguards of a global revolution
6
againstimperialism,offeringthemideologicalandtangiblesupport.
Independence came rapidly for many countries in the 1960s. Fueled by UN
General Assembly Resolution 1514 (1960), which called for decolonization and the
sanctity of existing borders. The claims of African nationalists could not be denied. As
early as 1957, Ghana's Nkrumah had succeeded in his effort to seize the political kingdom.
His Convention People's Party won a pivotal election, assumed power, and forced the
British to relinquish control. In 1960 alone, 26 African colonies became independent, and
by 1969 some 42 countries had emerged as sovereign states, becoming full-fledged
members of the United Nations. In subsequent years, after bitter struggles for
independence, Portuguese colonies such as Mozambique andAngola were finally freed in
the mid-1970s.The settler societies of southernAfrica, such as Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe),
Namibia and South Africa, also came over time to be ruled by African nationalist
movements.Across the continent, in the short historical span of some 30years, colonial-era
flags went down and the flags of newly independent African countries were crafted and
raised.
As it happened, however,African nationalism in these formative decades of decolonization
was not tightly linked to democracy. Unlike leaders in Britain and the United States, where
nationalism and democratic tendencies were virtually inseparable from the beginning,
most African independence leaders defined their nationalism in pronouncedly anti-
Western terms. Upon taking power, most of them quickly abandoned any pretense to
Western liberal democratic ideas and practices, establishing authoritarian or semi-
authoritarian regimes based on the military or one-party dominance. African democracy
was setbackfordecadesasaresult.
From LiberationStruggletoNeo-Patrimonialism
Initially, the constitutions of the newly liberated states tended to establish the minimal
framework of democracy: constitutionalism, the rule of law, and elections. In countries
throughout Africa, the anticolonial nationalist movements, such as TANU in Tanzania,
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies 17

28. KANU in Kenya, and UNIP in Zambia, won elections. With charismatic leaders such as
Nyerere, Kenyatta, and Kaunda, these movements inherited a highly centralized state and
highly diverse populations. But contrary to the democratic tenets of political pluralism,
which rest on free and open competition among political parties and freedom of
expression, some of the most prominent leaders ofAfrican independence quickly turned to
patronage forms of politics, what some scholars have called neo-patrimonialism.
Liberation elites then argued that African states needed one-party rule to unify their
populations and “build nations”. Creating new countries required emphasizing common
struggles and sufferings; competitive, multiparty elections, in their view, would tear the
nascentnationsapart.
The hypothesis that multiparty competition is ill suited to Africa's multiethnic,
impoverished societies because it divides rather than unifies is a common and recurrent
7
theme in Africa's political development. It reverberates through the region today. For
example, Uganda's President Yoweri Museveni experimented with a system of “no-party”
politics, in which candidates for office could stand as individuals and are allowed to a party
identification. The National Resistance Movement, which he leads, is the guiding force in
the country despite a popular referendum on constitutional change in 2005 that abandoned
the “no-Party” notion. Although it espouses such democratic notions as market-oriented
economics, freedom of expression and free primary education (a rarity in Africa), it
resolutely monopolizes power. At the same time, President Museveni maneuvered a
change in the constitution that enabled him to serve a third term, circumventing the
provision barring more than two terms in office. In election in 2011, Museveni's party won
handily with 68% of the vote, even as opposition leaders and international observers
claimedtheelectionsweremarredby irregularities.
While rejecting British-style parliamentarism and other Western models of democracy,
most African states in the post-colonial period turned to one form or another of
authoritarian or semi-authoritarian rule. In virtually every newly independent African
country, the formal institutions of democracy that may have been in place when self-rule
began were systematically undermined by power-accumulating elites. Democratic
practices and human rights fell victim to political and military elites who sought the reins of
8
office for their own personal power and enrichment. These elites relied on the centralized,
bureaucratic structures of the states that they inherited from the colonial powers to become
Africa'snewdominantclass.
In the worst instances, some countries such as Angola and Mozambique suffered from
protracted civil war in which independence movements fought against the Portuguese and
among themselves over who would wield power in the independence era. In both instances,
the hasty retreat of Portuguese colonizers in 1974-75 left a power vacuum in which the
competing local factions vied for dominance.These factions obtained arms and ideological
support (and sometimes troops) from their respective benefactors, especially the United
States, the Soviets, the apartheid-era South African regime, and the Cubans-who were
lockedintheirglobalColdWarconfrontation.
Despite several effort and peace agreements and UN peacekeeping efforts in the 1990s,
Anagola's civil war continued nearly uninterrupted for 25years. Tragically, as a result
Angola has the highest proportion of victims of land mines of any country in the world,
including some 100,000 land-mine victims. In 1999, an estimated 200 people died per day
in Angola's tragic war. The war finally ended in 2001 when rebel leader, Jonas Savimbi,
was killed on battle field. Today, Angola is yet to see meaningful democratization and the
wartime ruling regime, the MPLA (Movement for the Popular Liberation of Angola),
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies 18

29. remainsinpowerinLuanda.
The Ivory Coast, Liberia, and Sierra Leone were also embroiled in civil war in the 1990s
and into the 2000s. International peacekeeping missions involving British, French, or (in
Liberia's case)American troop gathered with troops from many other countries under the
UN flag, were sent to these countries to provide security, build peace, and support the
developmentofmorelegitimate,inclusive,andcapablestateinstitutions.
Perhaps, no country has seen postcolonial civil war in Africa more than Sudan. Since its
independence from British and Egyptian joint-rule arrangement (known as
condominium), Sudan was embroiled in almost constant war between the mostly Islamic
north and mostly Christian and animist south, a division that also reflected differentiation
between Arab and African identities. In the so-called second civil war of 1983-2005,
more than 2million people lost their lives, and more than 5million were displaced, with
many more suffering from famine and loss of livelihoods. The civil war in Sudan was
ended only after years of international mediation in 2005 with a comprehensive peace
agreement, one that turned out to be only a segue to the partition of the country with the
independence of South Sudan following the UN-facilitated referendum that led to the
creation of Africa's 55th country. Even with the creation of South Sudan, the region
remains deeply conflicted with armed conflict over disputed territories, ethnic violence,
andanon-goingfoodsecuritycrisis.
Among the several forms of authoritarianism that emerged in Africa between the early
1960s and the late 1980s, one variant is semi authoritarian one-party rule. Examples
include TANU in Tanzania and Guinea's Parti democatique de Guinee. In these and
similar examples of this political system, political power is monopolized and guided by
famous and generally popular political leaders. The government and party structures
operate in parallel, with some similarities to the relationship between party and state in
communist Russia and China. These parties voiced socialist rhetoric and have sought to
achieve economic development by breaking the bonds of dependency that tied the
prosperity of their country to uneven and disadvantageous trade relation with Europe.
These parties still exist in most countries. Some of them remain in power despite the
introduction of multiparty politics; for example, TANU (which was renamed Chama Cha
Mapinduzi, or CCM) continues to dominate politics in Tanzania as it has since
independence in 1962. Elsewhere, as in Zambia, one-party governments were defeated in
electionswhenpoliticalliberationbeganintheearly1990s.
Zimbabwe experienced a fundamental transformation of its one-party system in 2000 as a
relatively new party, the Movement for Democratic Change, won nearly half the
parliamentary seats up for election, delivering a stunning blow to the ZimbabweAfrican
National Union-Patriotic Front (ZANU-PF), the party that had dominated the country for
20years under liberation-leader, President Robert Mugabe. In 2002, Mugabe claimed he
has won a hotly contested presidential election against Morgan Tsvangirai, a popular
trade union leader and democracy advocate. The election outcome was regarded as
fraudulent by Mugabe's opponents, and in 2003 Tsvagirai was put on trial for treason.
Mugabe's despotic leadership and the country's rapidly deteriorating economy prompted
some 3million people to flee the country. In 2008, the main political parties (ZANU-PF
and the Movement for Democratic Change, or MDC, headed by Tsvangirai) agreed to a
power sharing deal. In reality, though, ZANU-PF under Mugabe continued to wield the
levers of power, intimidated MDC officials, and was implicated in human rights abuses
such as targeted assassinations and illegal property seizures; more or less collapsed
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies 19

30. power sharing in Zimbabwe, as was meaningful constitutional reforms. And despite
elections in 2013, few observers expected much change toward the return of democracy in
9
ZimbabweuntiltheMugabeerapassed.
Other countries have had patrimonial rule, which is rule by a domineering and personalistic
elite. In Belgian Congo (later known as Zaire and now as the Democratic Republic of
Congo, or DRC), a troubled decolonization process in the 1960s was marked by civil war,
UN military intervention, superpower rivalry, and assassinations. Eventually, Mobutu
Sese Seko seized power and ruled as a veritable monarch until his despotic regime was
toppled by rebels in May 1997. Mobutu's assets at the time of his death were estimated at $8
billion in property and money, while his country sunk to the bottom of the global list in
virtually every conceivable development indicator. A prolonged war for control of the
country involving both Congolese factions and interventions from not less than 11 other
Africanstates(which was dubbedAfrica's “firstworld war”) claimed3.8 lives.Following a
South Africa-brokered peace agreement, which led to the deployment of a significant UN
peacekeeping force in 2004, the DRC remains a country bedevilled by conflict and a weak
state that does not have authority over its vast territory despite the continued deployment of
UN peacekeepers. Indeed, in the eastern DRC, an on-going humanitarian emergency
persists and rampant rape or gender-based violence has garnered the attention of the entire
worldasacontinuingcrimeagainsthumanity.
In other countries, the military stepped in and took over power from corrupt or incompetent
elites. Military coups were rampant in Africa from the 1960s through the 1980s: In 75
instances between 1952 and 1990, military officers gained power through violence or the
threat of it and ruled the country as dictators. In Ethiopia, military officers with pro-Soviet
leanings and a Marxist ideology seized power in 1974, deposing the aging emperor, Haile
Selassie. Under the despotic rule of the military committee, known as the Dergue and led
by Mengistu Haile Mariam, the junta unleashed a reign of terror and embroiled the country
in devastating civil war and wars with its neighbours (notably the war with Somalia over
the Ogaden desert in 1975). It used its radical Marxist-Leninist ideology to justify
dictatorial rule at home and to establish international alliances with the Soviet Union,
Cuba, and other communist states. After inflicting untold suffering on the Ethiopian
people, Mengistu fled the country in 1991 as rebel forces closed in on the capital, Addis
Ababa. (Mengistu fled to Zimbabwe, where he eventually became a “security advisor” to
PresidentMugabe).
Several countries inAfrica, such as Botswana, Mauritius, Gambia, and Senegal, and more
recently, Ghana, have managed to remain near or partial democracies with constitutional
systems, regular elections, and relatively good human rights records. But only in a few
instances have elections ever led to the ouster of the ruling party. For example, in
Botswana, Africa's oldest surviving democracy, elections held in 2009 returned to power
the only party that has governed the country since independence in 1966. Alternation in
power, the periodic transfer of state power from one party to another over a succession of
elections, is a key indicator of the vibrancy of democracy as traditionally defined.
Unfortunately, until the dawn of the twenty-first century, it was largely absent fromAfrica.
The relative success of some of these countries in avoiding the complete collapse of
democracy has tended to stem from the responsiveness of the dominant party to ethnic and
religious groups. This type of political system has been labled a hegemonic exchange
regime in which for the right to exercise its hegemony over the state and the population, the
dominant party provides benefits to the country's main ethnic or religious groups. It is
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies 20

31. equally fair to describe the post-genocide regime of President Paul Kagame of Rwanda in
this fashion, although some wonder about whether instability could return to Rwanda over
time.
In the 1980s and 1990s, global factors such as the collapse of communism in the Soviet
Union and in Eastern Europe, together with a new assertiveness of multilateral financial
institutions to advance “good governance”, converged with domestic pressures to
undermine the alternatives to democracy in Africa. International lending organizations,
including the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, along with aid providers such
as the United States and Western Europe, increasingly insisted on “good governance”,
private enterprise, and trade liberalization as conditions for future economic assistance.
They called on the states ofAfrica to root out official corruption, reduce state control over
economic activity and remove tariffs and other barriers to trade with the outside world.
They also enjoined them to take more responsibility for their governance, economic
development, and human rights records. Sanctions on apartheid-era South Africa in the
1980s, including the country's expulsion from the Olympic Games, placed special external
pressure on that country's white minority government to open negotiations with African
nationalists with the aim of democratizing the entire country. Under these mounting
outside pressures, political practices within individualAfrican countries gave way to new
continentalandglobalrealities.
In many countries, popular movements arose that demanded space for the development of
an autonomous civil society outside the single-party framework. They called for
multiparty competitive elections, new constitutional framework, an end to corruption, and
a more equitable distribution of wealth. In Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, and Zambia, new
coalitions of organizations in civil society came together and pressured the incumbent
governments to open the political system to multiparty competition. Africa was clearly
caught up in the third wave of democratization that spilled across the world in the early
1990s.
Over the course of 1990s, nearly all ofAfrica's then 54 states underwent dramatic political
changes.As we've seen, the pressures for democratization were both external, a condition
of further loans, foreign direct investment, and foreign aid, and internal, the result of
widespread public disaffection with the status quo. Whether through negotiated
agreements (“pacts”), the victory of rebel movements on the battlefield, or the passing of
long-time liberation-era leaders, the stereotypicalAfrican one-party state became a relic of
the past in the early 1990s. During the 1990s,Africa witnessed scores of governments that
have come to power seeking to inaugurate a new era, such that some dubbed the period of
10
the1990s “Africa'ssecondindependence”.
More than anything, the process of democratization inAfrica was characterized by the rush
to multiparty elections. Between 1992 and 1994, 20 countries held national level elections.
These elections swept away one-party regimes in the Ivory Coast, Gabon, Mali, and
Zambia. In some instances, as in Angola, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Liberia, Mozambique,
Namibia, Sierra Leone, South Africa, and Uganda, votes were held to restore and
legitimize a new political order after years of civil war or political violence. Many
Francophone countries held “national conferences” to arrive at new constitutional rules of
thegamefordemocraticpolitics.
The track record of the remarkable attempts at democratization of Africa is demonstrably
mixed. Some experiments of the 1990s were relatively successful, in that legitimate
government was reconstructed and the stage was set for a long-term evolution to mature
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies 21

32. democracy and its consolidation (e.g., frequent or occasional alteration in power by
governing coalitions). In Benin, Madagascar, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, South
Africa, Uganda, and Zambia, elections have been more or less successful vehicles for
ushering in fledgling democracies. But there have been failures as well. Elections went
awry inAngola, Burundi, Liberia, and Sierra Leone, leading to renewed civil violence, the
suspension of human rights, and sharp declines in the standard of living as well as in the
prospect for future prosperity. Observers have differed over whether the electoral contest
of 1990s produced greater accommodation among conflicting groups within these
countries, especially along ethnic lines, or whether they exacerbated tensions and
underminednationalcohesiveness.
Among the alternatives to elections as a route to democracy is the promotion of viable civil
societies inAfrica. Some have suggested that popular participation and consensus building
decision-making processes are more suited toAfrica's divided societies than are the rough-
and-tumble of Western-style competitive elections. John Harbeson suggests that
democratization efforts in Africa have relied too much on elections, arguing, “This
overemphasis derives from an inaccurate reading of the most widely accepted definition of
'democracy', upon which most of the contemporary democratic transitions appears to rest”.
He suggests as an alternative that “a broadened conception of democratization will result in
a significantly improved understanding of the status and quality of democracy (in Africa)
and the prospect for it”. African countries should engage in more constitution-making
exercises that establish a consensus on the rules of democratic game before rushing into
electionsintheabsenceofthatconsensus, Harbeson maintains.
TheAfricanRenaissance?
In recent years, some African leaders have called for a “renaissance”. This appeal for a
rebirth is a response to disillusioned pessimists who decry the persistence of war,
authoritarian rule, and poverty in Africa and the continent's marginalization in the
international economy. Thabo Mbeki, former president of South Africa, advocates for a
renaissance that motivatesAfrican leaders to take responsibility for the continent's security
andeconomicwell-being.As Mbekiputsit:
Renaissance has to be about democracy, peace and stability throughout our
continent. It has to be about economic regeneration so that we pull ourselves
out of the category “the underdeveloped” permanently. It has to be about
11
vastlyimprovingthequalityof lifeof allourcitizens.
There is widespread agreement that, if the hoped-for African renaissance is to occur, the
further broadening and deepening of democracy in African nations will be necessary.
Positive signs include the much heralded elections in Rwanda in 2003, the first since the
1994 genocide,and theintroductionof a new democraticallyelectedgovernmentin Kenya.
At the same time, the tainted senate elections held in Zimbabwe in 2005 failed to force
Robert Mugabe to step down; instead, Mugabe's forces perpetrated human rights
violations against white former settlers and the government's political opponents in a
desperateefforttoretainpower.
Food shortages and starvation have resulted, severely halting progress toward Africa's
renaissance. In fact, the years 2007-11 saw movement away from democratic practice in
Africa, as countries limited the activities of opposition parties and civil societies, restricted
mass protests, and conducted elections in which electoral processes lacked sufficient
integrity to call the regime fully democratic. Thus, most regimes today inAfrica, as seen in
the 2012 Freedom House rankings of African states, are at best partial or, perhaps more
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies 22

33. accurately, façade democracies in civil liberties. For 2012, only 21% of Africa's countries
werelabeled“free”,with37%codedas“partlyfree”,and42% as“notfree”.
Democratization has also been problematic in postcolonial Africa as electoral processes
have at times featured devastating election-related violence. In 2007-08, for example,
elections in Kenya generated violence that cost an estimated 800 lives and displaced some
600,000 others. Only after international mediation by former UN Secretary General Kofi
Annan, who invoked the principle that governments have a responsibility to protect
innocent civilian from violence, did the violence subside. Annan succeeded in leveraging
the parties into an agreement on power sharing that averted a broader civil war in Kenya.
Similarly, elections in Ivory Coast in 2010, verified by the UN, put the country back on the
brink of civil war (and produced some 2,000 fatalities until the UN and the former colonial
power, France, intervened forcefully to require the incumbent president (Laurent Gbagbo)
tostepdown andhandoverpowertothepresumedwinnerofthepoll,AlassaneOuatarra.
Mali, a democracy thought to be stable, succumbed to a military coup in March 2012
following the seizure of the country's north by separatist Tuareg rebels together with
Islamist groups, thus reversing democracy in what had been an African success story. The
crisis in Mali shows the continued vulnerability of democratic African regimes to
instability and conflict that may well be driven by underlying factors such as
environmentalchange,migration,or foodinsecurity.
Conclusion
Democratization continues to be accompanied by crisis, turbulence, and sometimes
violence in Africa's varied contexts reflect and further informs some of these broader
patterns. Despite these significant obstacles, Africans generally tend to strongly favour
democracy. In the systematic sampling on attitude toward democracy of theAfrobarometer
(a survey carried out in 18 African countries), more than 70% of respondents preferred
democracy to any other elected kind of government, and more than 79% disapproved or
strongly disapproved of the statement that “elections and the parliament (can be) abolished
so the president can decide everything”. Support for democracy in the Afrobarometer
survey was strong in South Africa, with 67% in favour of democracy, and in Nigeria 72%
favoureddemocracy.
References
1.Howard W. French, A continent for the taking: The Tragedy and Hope of Africa (New
York:
AlfredA. Knopt,2004).
2. Colin Legum “The coming ofAfricas second Independence” The Washington Quarterly
25, (winter 1990). Pp 129-40. See also Claude Ake, “Rethinking African Democracy”,
JournalofDemocracyVol.2No1. 1991,Pp. 32-44.
3.StatementattheAfricanTelecomforum,Johannesberg,May4,1990.
4.Seehttp://www.refer,sn/sngal-ct/cop/goree/fgoree.htm.
Gerald Bender, Angola Under the Portuguese: The Myth and Reality (Berkeley and Los
Angeles:UniversityCaliforniaPress, 1978).
5. The Commonwealth consists of former British colonies or dependencies that are
now independent countries. Membership is voluntary, and the organization's main function
is consultation on such matters as economic cooperation, technical assistance, terrorism,
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies 23

34. anddrugtrafficking.Attheendof2006 therewere53memberstates.
6. Gus Liebnow, “The Impact of Colonialism”, in African politics: Crisis and
Challenges(Bloomington,IN:IndianaUniversityPress, 1986).
7 Zaki Laidi, The Superpower and Africa: The Constraint of Rivalry, 1960-1990
(Chicago:UniversityofChicagoPress, 1990).
8. This argument was first articulated by SirArthur Lewis in his classic book, Politics
inWestAfrica(London:AllenandUnwin, 1965).
9. Robert Jackson and Carl Rosberg, Personal Rule in Black Africa. (Los Angeles
and Berkeley (University of California Press, 1982). See also Robert H. Bates, When
Things Fall Apart: State Failure and Late Century Africa (Cambridge: Cambridge
UniversityPress, 2006).
10 Robert I. Rotberg, “Wining the African Prize for Repression: Zimbabwe”, in The
Worst of The Worst: Dealing with Repressive and Rogue Nations, ed. Robert I. Rotberg,
(WashingtonDC:BrookingsInstitutionPress, 2007).
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies 24

35. An Examination of Election Related Violence and National Security In Nigeria
Charles Akale
&
Olajumoke Ganiyat Jenyo
Research Fellows, Centre for Strategic Research and Studies,
National Defence College, Abuja-Nigeria.
E-mail: akalecharles@yahoo.co.uk
Phone: 08064179445
Abstract
The Nigerian democratic space has been bedeviled by several elections related violence. In some
cases, the negative impact of these election related violence create a state of national insecurity in
the country resulting in loss of lives and destruction of properties. The conduct of elections since the
return to democratic rule in 1999 has been seriously flawed and marred by violence. The violence
usually arises from problems of electoral malpractices necessitating the deployment of military
personnel to safeguard national security.This paper examines the effects of election related violence
on Nigeria's national security, by diagnosing the nexus between election related violence and
national security. Drawing data from both primary and secondary sources such as in-depth
interviews, key informant interviews (KII), questionnaires and extant literatures, this paper argues
that in the past, there were more cases of snatching of ballot boxes and other forms of violence by
politicians wanting to win elections by all means. However, recently, the country has seen a wave of
thuggery, rigging and vote-buying often culminating to election violence. This act obstructs the
democratic process by interfering with the rights of citizens to freely decide who will represent them
andtheirinterests,whichunderminesnationalsecurity.
Keywords: Election,Violence,Democracy, NationalSecurity,Nigeria.
Introduction
Worldwide, people's voice and their ability to influence the course of their government
have become imperative. This is achieved through electoral process which involves the
vote of the people. Elections are of utmost importance in any democratic society as people
participate to choose their representatives. The elective process provides an opportunity
for all eligible members of the society to participate in the process of determining who
would become their leader. The process of free and fair elections makes the people to have
the sense of belonging in the determination of their leaders. Regular elections serve to hold
leaders accountable for their actions and permit an exchange of influence between leaders
andthegoverned.
In view of the foregoing, election represents the lifeblood of modern democracy hence the
frequency, fairness and openness of conducting such elections are crucial to the political
stability of the polity. The extent to which elections advance democratic order depends in
large part on the existing electoral system, its nature and its acceptance by the stakeholders.
Basically, the stakeholders include the people and the political parties, in the electoral
process. Usually, complex rules and regulations govern the selection of the leaders in a
democratic context. People are therefore aware of their fundamental human rights as
related to the electioneering processes. Consequent upon this, any attempt to manipulate
election results is usually resisted and sometimes leads to election related violence. These
Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Studies 25