CIAO DATE: 11/03

Ethnic Militia Groups and the National Question in Nigeria

Said Adejumobi

March 2003

Social Science Research Council

Introduction

The increasing de-nationalization of the state on a global scale has seen the rise of sub-state identities being the fulcrum of group rights and citizenship claims. These groups in the quest for their collective, but particularistic interests adopt all techniques including the use of violence. From Bosnia to Macedonia, from former Yugoslavia to Rwanda, and from Somalia to Indonesia, the resurgence of primordial identities with violent bent has unleashed a high dosage of terror in the name of self-determination or redressing perceived injustices that they are subjected to. Indeed, Ali Mazuri (1999: 5) asserted that the most important developments of the 20th century are at once cultural and dialectical seeking to undermine the nation-state in different forms. Also, for Samuel Huntington (1996), what the world may likely witness in the 21st century is the clash of cultures and values, not of ideology. This is what Huntington refers to as the "clash of civilizations."

In Nigeria, primordial identities of ethnic, communal and religious formations have taken the cenetr stage in social and political interactions. Ethnic socio-political organizations like the Afenifere, Ohaneze, and Arewa are perhaps the most palpable on the political turf, even more profound than the political parties. Indeed, these groups have penetrating networks and profound influence in those parties. The corollary to these groups, especially at the youth level, are the ethnic militias. Yet, the agenda and activities of both groups - the ethnic militias and the pan-ethnic socio-political organizations - may not be necessarily related. The rank of the ethnic militias include, the Oodua Peoples Congress (OPC), Egbesu Boys of Africa (EBA), Movement for the Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB), Niger Delta Volunteer Force, the Chicoco Movement, the Ijaw Youths, Arewa Peoples Congress (APC), and religious militia groups in Northern Nigeria. These groups claim to represent specific ethnic or communal interests, and adopt various tactics including violence in the conduct of their activities.

There are contrasting views on how to tackle the challenge posed by ethnic militias. While some argue that the issue is purely a security question, to which the state must deploy its coercive machinery to control, others contend that ethnic militias are mere manifestations and frustrated expressions of the dysfunctional structure of the Nigerian federation and the character of the Nigerian state. The solution according to this group lies in addressing the national question, which is the basis for the rise of these groups.

The paper examines the phenomenon of ethnic militias in Nigeria: the background, nature, character, and objectives of these groups, and how they relate with the wider issue of the national question in Nigeria. Also, the paper probes into the consequences of the activities of these groups for the nation's civil rule and suggests how to resolve the seeming culture of armed politics in Nigeria.

My arguments in the paper are twofold. Firstly, the rise of ethnic militias is directly related to the political economy of militarism that characterizes the post-independent political culture of the Nigerian state especially in the last two decades. These groups constitute walls of resistance, which unfortunately takes on the shape of the structure against which they rebel. Secondly, resolving the problem of ethnic militias and armed politics in Nigeria will involve addressing the raging issues referred to as the "national question," and deconstructing the culture of violence by the state and the political society.

Ethnic Militias: What Are They?

Ethnic militias are essentially youth based groups formed with the purpose of promoting and protecting the parochial interests of their ethnic groups, and whose activities sometimes involve the use of violence. Ethnic militia groups in Nigeria are not rebel movements. Their aim is not to capture political power, but they serve as social pressure groups that seek to influence the structure of power in the country, and call attention to the deteriorating material condition or political deprivation and perceived marginalization of their group or social environment. Indeed, these groups also perform civil functions of providing physical security for their community and undertaking crime prevention. The violence they exhibit forms part of the reproduction of the culture of militarism implanted by the state, which they often respond to. However, these groups are largely criminalized by the state on which state terror is regularly unleashed. The urge for self-defense and sometimes-proactive force and aggression form part of the profile of those groups.

Ethnic Militia Associations or Groups: Etiology and Morphology

The rise and growth of ethnic militia groups in contemporary Nigeria can be located in the internal contradictions and dialectics of the Nigerian political economy. First is the nature of the Nigerian state that since its inception has been a violent institution, and has sought to maintain control and hegemony in society through the mechanics of violence. This became acute under military rule. As Ken Saro Wiwa noted during his fathom trial by the Abacha junta: "The Nigerian military dictatorship survives on the practice of violence and the control of the means of violence" (Saro Wiwa, 1996: 43). Thus any peaceful agitation by the people and popular movements is often met with official violence and repression. Apart from the state perpetuating the political pedagogy of violence, the tendency for the political society has been to use armed politics as one of the instruments for achieving political ends. Most of the political parties right from the first republic in 1960 have displayed a predilection for violence culture in the pursuit of political power. Edwin Madunagu puts it poignantly:

The nature of politics, whose ultimate form is the struggle for power, compels every political organisation at a certain stage in its development to acquire an armed detachment, or be militarised. Some political organisations, utilising their entrenchment in the state, use national armies, the police and other security forces as armed wings. There should be no hypocrisy or self-righteousness or attempt at falsification of history here. All political formations in our history, which had developed to the point of directly pushing for power as an immediate political project (not as mere distant hope), had been armed or militarised in one form or another... It does not matter what you call the armed group: youth wings, thugs, intelligence officers or bodyguards. (Madunagu, 2000; emphasis added)

The argument being made here is that the militarization of the state and politics in Nigeria was the background and precursor to the militarization of some civil society organizations now called ethnic militia groups. They do not exist in isolation, but are deeply rooted in the internal contradictions of the Nigerian state and its political economy.

Ethnic militia groups emerged in Nigeria in the 1990s when the nation was in the throes of a vicious military dictatorship. Specifically, the context for the rise of those groups was the Babangida and Abacha regimes. The character of those regimes deepened the contradictions and crises of the Nigerian state, which resulted in the rise of ethnic militia groups as one of the consequences of that process. There are three salient features of those regimes that reinforced militarism and promoted primordial loyalties in the country. The first is the phenomenon of personal rule and the high concentration of power perpetuated by those regimes. Evidently, the concentration of power in the hands of an individual entity, whether in a military or civil regime, has a strong potential of promoting ethnic tension in the society, as such individuals usually construct an "ethnic state access map" through which they distribute social goods and scarce resources and create polarization and division amongst ethnic groups in order to perpetuate their rule (Adejumobi, 2000: 123-124). The logic of divide and rule is primary in personalised regimes. This was a marked feature of the Babangida and Abacha regimes. Social differences of ethnic, communal, and religious dimensions were played up by those regimes. It was therefore not by coincidence that inter-ethnic, religious and communal conflicts were unprecedented during those regimes. From the North to the South, communities and religious groups, which had hitherto lived together in harmony, suddenly took up arms against each other. There were no less ten communal and religious riots during the period. It occurred in places such as Ilorin, Kafanchan, Kaduna, Funtua, Kano, Zaria, Ile Ife, Zangon Kataf, while virtually all the oil producing communities of the Niger Delta were the epicenter of communal conflicts. The import of this is that ethnic boundary and consciousness became more profound, with the ferment of ethnic nationalism in ascendance.

The second salient feature of those regimes is the contrivance of the public sphere for social expression and political action. Both the Babangida and Abacha regimes were extremely repressive, and sought to annihilate any group and individual that opposed them. Many critical civil society groups fell victim in this regard. These include the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC), the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), The National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS), The Nigerian Union of Journalists (NUJ), and Human Rights and pro-democracy movements. The implication was that many people reclined into their ethnic cocoons to seek refuge from the onslaught unleashed on pan-Nigerian civil society groups and some others went underground to conduct their activities. It was through the latter process that the OPC emerged.

The final dimension to the rise of ethnic militia groups under the Babangida and Abacha regimes was the issue of marginalization and social deprivation that became rife in the country especially for the ethnic minorities of the Niger Delta region. The politics of oil played a key role in this. While oil, which constitutes the mainstay of the Nigerian economy, is sourced from the Niger Delta, the communities live in squalor and abject poverty, lacking basic social amenities like feeder roads, electricity, pipe-borne water, and cottage industries. The general perception in the area is that their marginlization is related to their minority status in the Nigerian federation; that the dominant ethnic groups use the resources gained from the oil producing areas to develop their own places. The fact that oil producing communities suffer serious ecological and environmental damages in form of water and air pollution, destruction of aquatic life, and land degeneration suggest that the people of the area are confronted with enormous dangers. The sufferings and tribulations of the Niger Delta people have been well documented (Civil Liberties Organization, 1996; Ekine, 2001; Obi, 2002; Human Rights Watch, 1999; and Osaghae, 1995).

The response of the state to the Niger Delta crisis has been to militarize the environment by stationing an "army of occupation" in the oil producing communities that would keep at bay restive youths, individuals and associations through the force of arms in order to ensure the free flow of oil to the Nigerian state. Several environmental, minority rights and human rights activists in the area were regularly hounded, arrested and detained without trial for long periods of time, or murdered by the state. Driven to frustrated heights, some groups in those communities also resorted to armed reaction ostensibly in self-defense. Several militant youth groups emerged, while the existing non-violent groups also established radical youth wings. The objective was to counter the violence of the state, and drive home their point of deprivation and marginalization. The extra-judicial murder of Ken Saro Wiwa in 1996 increased the resolve and conviction of those groups that the Nigerian state preferred the path of violence, and it would require organized counter-violence to protect themselves and their interests. Also, the Niger Delta people reconceived and sharpened their demands from purely social and economic to political. Their demands were refocused on relative autonomy and self-determination for their ethnic areas within the context of the Nigerian federation. This is the only way they felt that the social injustice, neglect and deprivation that they suffer could be effectively redressed. Again, the reaction of the state was to intensify its cycle of violence against those communities and their groups.

It is this context that led to the emergence and proliferation of ethnic militia groups in the Niger Delta region. Between 1990 and 1999, no less than twenty-four ethnic based minority rights groups emerged in the Niger Delta region mostly with radical bent. These include the Egbesu Boys of Africa (EBA), Chikoko, Ijaw National Congress, Ijaw Youth Council (IYC), Ijaw Peace Movement (IPM), Isoko National Youth Movement (INYM), Itsekiri Nationality Patriots, and the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP). None of these groups was established with violent inclinations. Circumstances forced this on them.

The nature and character of the Nigerian state, the failure of political leadership and public institutions, the structure of power and economic relations amongst groups and the orgy of militarism were some of the factors that provided the background for the emergence of ethnic militia groups. These factors prompted cries of social injustice, marginalization, neglect, deprivation and seeming insecurity for the people. However, the specific conjuncture for the rise of each of these groups differs. For example, while the militia groups in the Niger Delta emerged as a result of the peculiar problems in the Niger Delta, of environmental degradation and political insensitivity of the state, the OPC emerged as a consequence of the annulment of the 12 June 1993 presidential election won by a Yorubaman named Moshood Abiola. The perception from the Yoruba ethnic group of the annulment was that it was an ethnic agenda of the Hausa Fulani aristocracy to perpetually control political power in the country and to regard people from other parts of the country as "second class" citizens. Further persecution of some Yoruba elite after the annulment by the Abacha regime reinforced the conviction of the Yoruba ethnic group that the Hausa Fulani oligarchy was out to 'exterminate' them.(1) The resolve was to resist such through all means including formation of underground organizations and possibly an insurgency.

The submissions from this section are twofold. Firstly, the rise of ethnic nationalism and its auxiliary expression of ethnic militia groups is associated with a sense of threat of security concerning the interests, future and self-preservation of a group. These concerns throw up issues of individual and group rights, social justice and fairness in the Nigerian political economy. As Hassan Mathew Kukah noted, ethnic associations provide umbrella of protection to various communities that feel estranged from the alien and hostile state.(2) Secondly, the character of the Nigerian state, of which violence is key to its existence and reproduction, has elicited counter-violence from some ethnic-based civil society groups pejoratively referred to as ethnic militias. In most cases, these groups start on a note of non-violence only to be socialised in the culture of violence by the state. The process of armed violence between the state and the ethnic militia groups is therefore a cyclical one. The irony of the dynamics of violence is that once it starts, it often takes a life of its own, engulfing the entire society as reflected in the phenomenon of inter-ethnic, inter-communal and inter-religious violence that threatens Nigerian's nascent democratic process.

Ethnic Militia Groups and the National Question

The most salient issue among a broad spectrum of the Nigerian society - the political elite, working class, civil society actors, artisans, market women, students, lumpen elements and the unemployed - is the "national question." This "question" is believed to be at the root of the crisis of the Nigerian state and the problem of peaceful co-existence in Nigeria. What then is the national question? The national question as noted elsewhere differs in time and space, and may be viewed from two angles. The first angle is inter-group relations, i.e., the tensions and contradictions that arise from inter-group relations dwelling on the issues of marginalization, domination, inequality, fairness, and justice among ethnic groups. This may be real or imagined. The second angle to the national question is the class dimension, i.e., is the exacerbation of class inequalities and antagonisms in society between the rich and the poor, the affluent and the underclass, or to use the Marxist parlance, the bourgeoisie and the proletariat. The latter sometimes reinforce the former, increasing ethnic conflicts and antagonism in society (Adejumobi, 2002:156). While both perspectives of the national question are quite relevant to the Nigerian situation, the former, i.e., the relationship among ethnic groups, gains currency in the contemporary discourse of the national question in Nigeria. The main issue of the national question in Nigeria is how to structure the Nigerian federation in order to accommodate groups and guarantee access to power and equitable distribution of resources (Osaghae, 1998: 315). The background to it is the perceived domination of some ethnic groups by the others engendered by the structural nature of the Nigerian federation, the heavy lopsidedness in center-state relations, which according to Wole Soyinka is highly "unbalanced, exploitative, and acquisitive"(3) and the growing impoverishment, frustrations and disillusionment of the people, which is viewed as a direct consequence of power structure and ruling class politics in Nigeria (Adejumobi, 2000:126). In the final analysis, as Abubakar Momoh rightly noted, the national question is fundamentally related to the question of rights of nations and peoples particularly in the context of oppression (Momoh, 2002: 2).

he issues involved in the national question revolve around the following:

1. What should be the component units and tiers of government in the Nigerian federation?

2. How should they be constituted, based on ethnic contiguity or administrative expediency?

3. How should political power and administrative responsibilities be shared among the levels and tiers of government?

4. How should the ownership of economic resources be structured in the Nigerian federation?

5. What should be the acceptable formulae for sharing federally collected revenue?

6. What should be the nature of inter-governmental relations in Nigeria? (Adejumobi, 2000: 126)

The fears and demands of the ethnic militia groups have basically revolved around the issues of the national question: marginalization and domination of one group by another. For instance, the concern of MASSOB is the marginalization of the East in the power equation in Nigeria; that of OPC is about "power shift," and restructuring of the Nigerian federation and the quest for self-determination by groups in the Niger Delta region is based on the social injustice, neglect and marginalization that the area suffers in the Nigerian nation. In an important sense, these ethnic militia groups are offshoots of the national question in Nigeria.

Conclusion

The approach adopted by the state to the problem of ethnic militias is to criminalize them by branding them as "disgruntled and misguided elements," or "terrorist" organizations rather than distilling the salient issues that constitute the basis of their emergence and activities. These are issues woven around the national question. Issues of acceptable formulae for the distribution of political power between the center and sub-national units, resource distribution or fiscal federalism, religion and secularism of the Nigerian state, as well as citizenship and social justice are central to the national question in Nigeria. These are issues that the Nigerian state cannot wish away and that have to be tackled in a consensual and procedural manner for peace, stability and security to reign in Nigeria.

Notes:

1. The Abacha regime was perceived to be hostile to the southwestern part of the country and its elite because the area was the hotbed of pro-democracy struggles aimed at validating the June 12 presidential election annulled by the Babangida regime. Some members of the political elite and civil society from the area were hounded, harassed and detained by the regime, while a fathom coup was hatched in 1997 in which the culprits were essentially top military officers from the southwestern part of the country. The general perception of this coup is that it was a plot designed for the self- perpetuation agenda of the Abacha regime, and an attempt to rid the hierarchy of the military officers from the southwest who may pose a threat to his political ambition.

2. Hassan Mathew Kukah cited in Kofi Akosah-Sarpong, "Law, Order and Vigilantes in Nigeria," Federations 2, no.4 (June/July 2002): 5.

3. See Laolu Akande, "Soyinka Faults Sharia, Brings Home Radio Kudirat," The Guardian, November 3 1999.

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Osaghae, E. 1995. The Ogoni Uprising: Oil Politics, Minority Agitation and the Future of the Nigerian State. African Affairs 94: 325-344.

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Said Adejumobi is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Political Science Lagos State University in Nigeria. His areas of research interests include civil-military relations, conflict studies and political economy. He has published widely in these areas. Adejumobi is the recipient of a 2002 GSC Professional Fellowship for research on his project entitled "The Problem of Citizenship in Nigeria: 'Settlers,' Indigenes,' and Inter-group Conflicts."