Nigeria is Africa's most populous country.
It's also resource-rich.
However, it's a country in deep crisis.
At the start of June 2022, the world was shot by an attack on a Catholic
church in the country's southwest that left 50 worshipers dead.
But as brutal as it was it's merely the tip of a huge and seemingly growing problem.
Nigeria now endures daily violence from a bewildering array of quarters.
With very real doubts about the government's ability to handle the situation,
this prompts the obvious question: is Nigeria collapsing?
Hello and welcome. If you're new to the channel, my name is James Ker-Lindsay and
here I take an informed look at international relations, conflicts, security, and statehood.
Many countries around the world face some sort of serious and sustained security challenge.
In some cases, it may be an armed secessionist movement fighting for independence.
In others, it could be terrorism centred on religious or political extremism.
Some countries face serious societal violence from gangs and organised crime,
or from bandits or pirates.
And then there are conflicts over resources, such as water or precious minerals.
However, there are few if any countries that currently face
as great range of serious security threats as Nigeria.
From north to south, and east to west, it's grappling with a bewildering array
of grave challenges covering practically every major recognised cause of conflict.
But what makes all this particularly worrying is that not only is the
government seemingly unable to tackle the security aspects of the problem,
but it's also failing to address the underlying problems that feed them.
So, what are the threats? How can they be fixed? Or do we perhaps need to face the real possibility
that Nigeria - one of the most important countries in Africa - is now falling apart.
The Federal Republic of Nigeria lies in West Africa.
With the Gulf of Guinea, a part of the Atlantic Ocean, running along its south coast,
its neighbours are Niger to the north and Chad and Cameroon to the east. Benin lies to its west.
At 930,000 square kilometres, or 360,000 square miles,
it's the 31st largest of the 193 members of the United Nations.
Since 1996, the country has been divided into 36 states and a federal capital territory, Abuja.
Its population currently stands at almost 220 million.
This is made up of more than 250 ethno-linguistic groups.
The largest at the Hausa and Fulani in the north,
the Yoruba in the southwest, and the Igbo, based in the southeast.
Religiously, the country is split between mainly Sunni Muslims in the
north and largely Protestant Christians in the south central and southeast areas.
In the centre and southwest the population is religiously mixed.
Endowed with significant resources, including oil and natural gas,
Nigeria's GDP per capita is around US$2,100.
Nigeria has a long and culturally rich history; including the Benin Empire,
one of the oldest civilisations in West Africa.
However, our story really starts in the late 19th century when Britain established two
colonial territories - the Northern and Southern Nigerian Protectorates.
In 1914, these were merged to form the Colony and Protectorate of Nigeria.
40 years later, in 1954, as Britain prepared for decolonisation,
the country was reorganised as a federation of three parts:
the Hausa and Fulani dominated Northern Region; the Yoruba-dominated Western Region;
and the Igbo dominated Eastern Region.
Four years later British rule ended and the country became
independent on 1 October 1960 as the Federation of Nigeria.
The first major problems emerged in early 1966.
Following disputed elections the previous year,
southern army officers attempted to overthrow the government;
assassinating senior political figures, including the premier of the Northern Region.
This led to reprisal attacks on Igbo living in the north.
As over a million fled to the southeast, the region unilaterally declared independence,
creating the Republic of Biafra in May 1967.
The resulting civil war became a humanitarian catastrophe,
leaving up to 3 million dead from fighting and starvation.
This lasted until January 1970, when the government finally defeated Biafran forces.
In the years after the war, Nigeria seemingly began to recover.
In large part, this was fed by the rapid growth of the country's oil industry
in the Niger Delta, in the central south of the country.
However, by the 1990s deep discontent had set in
as local communities not only failed to see the wealth from oil production,
but also suffered from the devastating environmental damage that came from the industry.
As opposition grew, the military government cracked down hard on any dissent.
This came to international attention when a leading activist, Ken Saro-Wiwa,
was executed in 1995; despite worldwide calls for mercy.
Over two decades later, and despite efforts to tackle the uprising, including ceasefires and a
widespread amnesty, many of the problems remain and the insurgency continues.
Meanwhile, the Delta conflict has also sparked a revival of tensions in the southeast.
Beginning in the late 1990s, Biafran campaigners, who claim a part of the oil producing region,
relaunched their efforts to establish an independent homeland.
Built on decades of lasting resentment and perceived discrimination following the civil war,
this has gained prominence over the past seven or eight years with the high profile activities
of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), whose charismatic leader,
Nnamdi Kanu, is presently on trial in Nigeria for terrorism and separatism.
All this has led to widespread protests in the southeast and clashes with the police.
While the tensions in the south are undoubtedly serious, over the past
decade they've been almost entirely overshadowed by the deteriorating situation in the north.
Violent islamism, which has been growing in West Africa as a whole,
has brought terror to the northeast.
Starting around 2010 with the emergence of a group now known as Boko Haram,
this came to international attention in 2014
when the organisation kidnapped almost 300 schoolgirls; many of whom remain missing.
Although Boko Haram has been increasingly overshadowed by its rival, ISWAP,
the Islamic State in West Africa Province, the islamist insurgency in the northeast
has nevertheless led to more than 40,000 deaths and has seen over 300,000 people displaced.
In the meantime, another dangerous threat has emerged over in the northwest.
As climate change has led to greater desertification across the Sahel region of Africa,
Muslim Fulani cattle herders in the region have
increasingly pressed south into lands held by settled farmers.
Combining elements of religious and ethnic tensions, the so-called Herder-Farmer conflict has
led to the deaths of over 10,000 people and has also seen many tens of thousands more displaced.
Now widely regarded as the single biggest security threat in Nigeria, the well-armed herder bandits
are increasingly driving tensions elsewhere in the country, including in the southeast and southwest.
Indeed, it was the encroachment of herders that saw IPOB establish an armed wing - the
Eastern Security Network - which has since led to confrontations with security forces,
further destabilising the situation in the southeast.
In comparison with the rest of the country, the southwest
has generally tended to be rather more peaceful.
This isn't to say that it hasn't faced its own share of issues.
For example, secretive ultra-violent cult gangs have terrorised Lagos,
Nigeria's largest city, for many years.
But in comparison, it's tended to be seen as rather safer than elsewhere.
Worryingly, though, this too appears to be changing.
Like the central and southeast regions,
it has also started to face violent encroachment by Fulani herders.
Moreover, there have also been signs of growing separatist sentiment;
although this hasn't yet led to an organised armed insurgency as in the southeast.
However, it was a brutal attack on a Catholic church in the town of Owo
on 6 June that's really cast a light on the region.
While it's unclear who exactly carried out the attack,
the government has blamed ISWAP for the killings.
Of course, if it was ISWAP then this represents a dangerous new direction for the group.
But even if it wasn't directly involved, the mass murder represents a very dangerous development
in the religiously mixed southwest of Nigeria.
All this means that Nigeria is now facing
insecurity and instability in every single part of the country.
As well as the long-standing separatist challenge in the southeast,
and the continuing low-level insurgency in the Delta,
the northeast remains beset by islamist violence, which may now be spreading to the southwest.
Meanwhile, herder bandits from the northwest not only continued to terrorise the centre,
but also seem to be pushing into the southeast and southwest.
And this isn't even the whole story.
These are just the main recognised threats.
On top of this, there are all sorts of localised ethno-religious tensions.
Then there's the emergence of armed vigilante groups.
Set up to tackle the violence, many of these are now turning to crime.
Of course, the authorities argue that they are addressing the problem - pointing to an
increased military and police presence in affected areas.
But critics point out that this is insufficient, with police often failing to move out beyond
the cities and built up areas and when they do extend their range they often make matters worse.
For instance, the are allegations of widespread and systematic human rights
abuses including torture and extrajudicial killings.
This feeds resentment and discontent.
As does the painfully slow criminal justice system,
which means that many of those arrested then wait years for a trial.
And, even then, the widespread use of amnesties and pardons for those who
are convicted contributes to a sense of impunity.
But all this is just the surface of the problem.
More worryingly, the government is accused of failing to address
the underlying long-term causes of violence.
Nigeria is regularly cited as one of the most corrupt countries in the world.
This means that money from things such as oil revenues aren't being spent on developing local
communities, improving decaying infrastructure, or investing in economic diversification.
Nigeria is also a young country, which brings other problems.
Youth unemployment now exceeds 40 percent.
And it's believed that Nigeria has more children
out of education than any other country in the world.
Then there are a host of other major contributing issues over which the government has a varying
degree of control, such as climate change and the proliferation of guns and small arms.
And, looking ahead, the problems look likely to get worse as the
government faces declining revenues as the world moves away from fossil fuels.
Needless to say, the sheer scope and scale of the
violence is feeding deep concerns about the direction the country is taking.
Quite apart from the human toll of the violence, which has seen
more than 80,000 killed and hundreds of thousands displaced over the past decade,
there's a sense of anxiety about the government's ability to manage the problem.
All this has led many to ask openly whether we should think of Nigeria
not merely as a failing state, but as a failed one.
Indeed, on the most recent Fragile States Index, it came in at 12 out of 179 countries;
just behind Ethiopia, which is in the midst of a brutal civil war, and just ahead of Haiti.
More to the point, there are few signs that things will improve.
While many now pin hopes on the country's 2023 presidential elections
as the best chance of tackling the problems, there are even growing
concerns that the security situation could stop the vote from taking place.
But nevertheless there are huge questions about Nigeria.
While the prospect of the state collapsing entirely may still seem unlikely, the country
nevertheless continues to face an astounding, if not unique, range of security challenges.
Taken all together, and given that there seems to be little obvious way out,
this will inevitably and increasingly call into question the country's future.
If you'd like to learn more about Nigeria and other security issues in Africa,
here's a video and a playlist that you might find interesting.
And I plan to come back to many of these issues in Nigeria
in future videos, so please do consider subscribing if you haven't already.
Thanks so much for watching and see you in the next video.