Back to the barracks?

By Gamal Nkrumah

On Sunday, US President Bill Clinton's special envoy to Africa, Reverend Jesse Jackson, met representatives of the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP) on the third anniversary of the execution of writer and environmental activist Ken Saro-Wiwa at the hands of Nigeria's former military ruler, the late General Sani Abacha.

Supporters of Saro-Wiwa staged demonstrations in Lagos and Port Harcourt to mark the anniversary of his execution, the first such event tolerated by the Nigerian military government.

The American civil rights campaigner also met Nigeria's new, reform-minded military ruler, General Abdul-Salam Abubakr. Since Abubakr came to power after Abacha's death in June, MOSOP and other environmentalist and ethnic-based groups have been allowed to operate more freely.

The Delta is the hub of Nigeria's oil industry, producing two million barrels of crude a day. However, the region has suffered decades of deprivation as a neglected and peripheral backwater. Many marginalised ethnic groups in the oil-producing areas believe the wealth of their region is being squandered on development projects in other areas of the country. Meanwhile, the groups are fighting each other for control of a larger share of the oil revenues. They are also battling the Nigerian government and the multinational corporations. Thousands of Ogoni people languish in refugee camps in the neighbouring Benin Republic.

It is in this context that visits by such high-profile personalities as the Reverend Jesse Jackson assumes greater significance for Nigeria, which is gearing up for next year's presidential elections and the return to civilian administration. Jackson is the highest profile US official to visit the country since Abubakr took office and relations between the two countries began to warm.

Despite this, Jackson was caught up in the controversy surrounding multinational corporations and oil politics in Nigeria. The Anglo-Dutch multinational Shell stopped its operations in the Niger River Delta area, amid growing protests by environmental and human rights groups. "Since 1958, Shell has poisoned our soil, polluted our water and punished the Ogoni people for demanding our human rights," said MOSOP leader Ledum Mitee, who returned to Nigeria two weeks ago from exile in London. "There must be no more human tragedies of the kind Shell has created in Ogoniland. On the anniversary of the murder of nine of our leaders, MOSOP presents Shell with a simple choice: clean up the mess you have made by Ogoni Day, 4 January 2000, or clear out once and for all."

On Tuesday, ethnic conflict flared up in the Delta's Omadino and Obodo villages. Omadino is a key site for the US oil multinational Chevron, while Obodo is the site of a terminal for Elf, the French multinational. The local residents charge the multinationals with exploiting the natural resources of the area, causing widespread environmental destruction. They argue that the locals receive next to nothing of the vast revenues accrued by the Western corporations. The oil companies are also accused of playing one ethnic group off against another, fanning the flames of ethnic unrest in the process.

To coincide with Jackson's visit, the Nigerian government announced that it had recovered $625 million and £75 million stolen from public funds by the family and hangers-on of Abacha. The late military strongman's Finance Minister Anthony Ani is under investigation and Abacha's widow Maryam was prevented from fleeing the country with 38 suitcases stuffed with cash in July.

Many Nigerians are suspicious of wealthy retired generals, such as former President General Ibrahim Babangida, who are bankrolling the new political parties. Nigerians have not forgotten Babangida's half-hearted and cavalier transition in 1992/93 from military to civilian rule. Many fear the new political parties represent new ways for the country's traditional elite to acquire power. Then there is the horde of tribal-based professional politicians who either kept quiet or actively collaborated for most of the 15 years of military rule and who now masquerade as born-again democrats.

Another dark horse is the internationally acclaimed retired General Olushegun Obasanjo, who is being sponsored by a group of military, ethnic and regional power mongers to be a "consensus candidate" for the weakened presidency. Obasanjo supporters claim he is the only southern presidential hopeful the northern military clique will accept as president. But where was this special charm when Obasanjo was languishing for three years in Abacha's prisons?

Another former Nigerian military ruler, General Yakubu Gowon (1966-1975), has also expressed a desire to run for the presidency.

Fela Kuti, son of the late Fela Anikulapo Kuti, one of Nigeria's best-known musicians, added his voice to those who oppose Obasanjo's bid for the presidency. "[Obasanjo's] government was one of the worst in the country," Kuti told a press conference in Lagos on Monday, adding that during his rule, soldiers burned-down markets and brutalised students. Chief Abraham Adesanya, deputy chairman of the Lagos-based National Democratic Coalition, also opposed Obasanjo's bid, saying that, "either in uniform or out of uniform, no military officer should be supported."

The 61-year-old retired general is fighting another old- guard rival, the 1979 Vice-President Alex Ekwueme, for the candidacy of the People's Democratic Party, the largest party to emerge since Abacha died.

There are growing concerns that the presidency might prove to be an anti-climax. A constitutional joker might yet be played to substitute the hitherto strong executive presidency by a more powerful prime ministership. In such an eventuality, the weakened president will be no more than a figure-head. His ethnic background would not be such a contentious issue.

Meanwhile, a long list of presidential hopefuls has emerged in the southern, and especially southwestern region of Nigeria -- home to the Yoruba people who make up 25 per cent of Nigeria's 120 million people. To the chagrin of many non-Yoruba southerners, the prospects for a "southern presidency" have become synonymous with Yoruba leadership.

Nigeria's post-independence civilian government operated smoothly between 1960 and 1966, but was cut short by a military coup in January 1966. Except for four years of elected civilian administration between 1979 and 1983, the military has ruled Nigeria virtually without interruption since independence. The military collaborated with key civilian politicians -- the baban riga (big gowns), or political big-wigs. Nigerians are wary of the baban riga. Consequently, the military, and the oligarchy of which the military is the armed wing, still wield enormous power.

Military governments suspended key parts of the Nigerian constitution which impeded their ability to run the government at will, and replaced them with decrees that included ouster clauses, backdates and the criminalisation of currently legal acts in an attempt to entrap political opponents. The military rulers even ignored those parts of the constitution that had not been suspended. "When they decide to bow out of politics, they invoke constitution-framing arrangements which are the antithesis of a people's constitution. This amounts to picking and choosing constitution-framers and putting an unconstitutional seal of approval on a document that quickly becomes a bone of contention. That arrangement must be done away with. The constitution must flow from discussions between the people and must be approved by the people, after which it must bind them until amended by the people or their freely-chosen representatives," said Mobolaji Aluko, a Nigerian political commentator living in exile in the US.

"The very character of military rule requires unitary command. This is the antithesis of rule in a diverse, multi-ethnic, multi-religious country such as Nigeria. We still have to build a nation from our country. However, we must first return to the pre-1966 regional arrangement, with each region having its own constitution. Each one must be allowed to determine its smaller unit of governance, whether state, province and/or local government, and accord due recognition to the nationalities within its borders," Aluko told the Weekly. Aluko said there are also outstanding questions of revenue allocation, access to foreign capital by the regions, land ownership and use, a bill of individual citizen's rights, and the formation and registration of political parties. All of these need to be ironed out before a truly federal system can be instituted.