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Rumors of a Political Capture
Accusations of influence peddling in the heart of its presidency raise the ugly scepter of state capture in Nigeria. Read More
Nigeria’s Formal Economy Looking Up
Nigeria is recovering from the recession of 2016, when GDP growth fell as oil production dropped due to unrest in the oil patch and the persistently low international oil prices. However, international oil prices have now gone up. In an interview with Bloomberg on January 24, Godwin Emefiele, governor of the central bank of Nigeria, struck an optimistic tone. Emefiele commented, “Things are looking up. Nobody ever thought the price of crude would hit $70 in such a short period of time.” He said that interest rates could be cut during the first half of 2018 as inflation eases. In December 2017, inflation was 15.4 percent, a 20-month low, though still above a target band of 6 to 9 percent.
Oil is central to Nigeria’s formal economy. It generates 90 percent of the country’s export earnings and about 70 percent of total government revenue. Yet it is only about 12 percent of GDP. (For a variety of reasons, economic statistics are indicative rather than definitive, as Morten Jerven has shown.)
The budget framework for 2018-2020 presented to parliament is based on a price of $47 per barrel and the production of 2.3 million barrels per day. Economic growth is projected to be 3.5 percent in 2018, 4.5 percent in 2029, and 7 percent in 2020. If international oil prices hold at their present level or increase, and if production levels can be maintained, the economic growth projections are credible. Hostages to fortune are international oil prices, which are largely determined by forces over which Nigeria has little control. While Nigeria ostensibly has more control over security in the oil patch, there is an ongoing, low-level insurgency that has been in effect for years. Nigeria is also entering the 2019 electoral cycle, which is likely to lead to heightened political tensions.
Former President Obasanjo Excoriates Nigeria's Politics, Proposes New Path
Olusegun Obasanjo, Nigeria’s military chief of state from 1976 to 1979 and its civilian president from 1999 to 2007, has published a thirteen-page statement, “The Way Out: A Clarion Call for Coalition for Nigeria Movement” [sic]. He is sharply critical of the politics of Nigeria today, comparing their state to that of lice-infested clothes. Specifically, he identified “poor performance in government—poverty, insecurity, poor economic management, nepotism, gross dereliction of duty, condonation of misdeed—if not outright encouragement of it, lack of progress and hope for the future, lack of national cohesion and poor management of internal political dynamics and widening inequality.” These, according to the former president, “are very much with us today.”
Obasanjo recalls his earlier criticism of President Goodluck Jonathan, and he is highly critical of the current president, Muhammadu Buhari. He urges Buhari not to run for re-election in 2019. He is also critical of Nigeria’s two principal parties, the PDP and the APC, contending that neither “is a worthy horse to ride to lead Nigeria at this crucial and critical time.”
Obasanjo’s suggestion is to break the mold of contemporary Nigerian politics by establishing a Coalition for Nigeria (CN). He envisages it as a movement, not a conventional political party, though he does hold out the possibility that it might run candidates for office. “That Movement must be a coalition for democracy, good governance, social and economic well-being and progress.”
How the CN would exactly function is not clear, but Obasanjo sees it as a means of transforming Nigeria’s political elites and their dysfunctional politics. Much earlier in his career, Obasanjo favored a one-party state; perhaps that could be his model for non-partisan democracy.
Obasanjo’s statement is significant for its apparently clear-eyed assessment of the current state of Nigerian governance, as well as its harsh criticism of his successors, Goodluck Jonathan and Muhammadu Buhari. It is also indicative of the widespread reassessment of Nigeria’s political institutions now underway across the country. However, it is unclear how or in what way this ferment will translate into concrete action.
Easing Zuma Out of the South African Presidency
According to some South African media outlets, the National Executive Committee (NEC) of the African National Congress (ANC) determined over the weekend that President Zuma must resign the South African presidency before the annual state of the nation address, which is scheduled for February 8. If Zuma leaves the presidency, current deputy president and leader of the ANC Cyril Ramaphosa would become acting president until the 2019 national elections. However, it is unlikely that the NEC has made a definitive decision so soon after the December party convention. Indeed, the party’s secretary general and close ally of Zuma, Ace Magashule, is insisting that the NEC has not yet made a decision on Zuma’s departure.
The NEC is the ANC’s highest decision-making body between party conferences. It numbers more than eighty, and usually reaches a decision through consensus, rather than by voting. South African media has been reporting that Cyril Ramaphosa has consolidated his authority within the NEC in the aftermath of his close victory over Zuma’s favored candidate, Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, in the December party leadership race. Media is also reporting that the party’s Top Six, made up of the most senior party officials, has been charged with telling Zuma that he must leave office or that he will be forced out. However, many in the NEC will be reluctant to move quickly against Zuma. They value “party unity,” which implies keeping his supporters under the ANC's big tent. Further, Zuma has made it clear that he will not go quietly. In the past, he has said that he has compromising information on his opponents as well as his friends that he is prepared to use. There will be the temptation to treat him with kid gloves.
Hence, it is unlikely that the NEC has determined that Zuma must go before February 8, though Ramaphosa will attempt to progressively marginalize him. Ramaphosa is attending the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, this week, where he is likely to signal that his government is open to increased foreign investment and is serious about tackling corruption. That message becomes more plausible if Zuma, with his reputation for cronyism and corruption, is on his way out as head of state. Zuma’s departure from the presidency is a matter of when, and when the party leadership communicates to him that he must go, he is likely to resign “voluntarily.” That would preserve his various emoluments of office, including his presidential pension.
Nigeria Security Tracker Weekly Update: January 13 - January 19
Below is a visualization and description of some of the most significant incidents of political violence in Nigeria from January 13 to January 19, 2018. This update also represents violence related to Boko Haram in Cameroon, Chad, and Niger. These incidents will be included in the Nigeria Security Tracker.
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January 13: Herdsmen killed ten in Birnin Gwari, Kaduna.
January 14: Sectarian violence led to four deaths in Khana, Rivers.
January 16: Nigerian troops killed two cultists in Etim Ekpo, Akwa Ibom.
January 16: Boko Haram killed five and abducted "some" (est. at five) in Madagali, Adamawa.
January 16: Sectarian violence led to two deaths in Guma LGA, two deaths in Logo LGA and one death in Okpokwu LGA in Benue.
January 16: Kidnappers killed two policemen and abducted two Canadians and two Americans in Kagarko, Kaduna. The abductees were freed later in the week.
January 17: Four suicide bombers killed themselves and ten others in Maiduguri, Borno. Boko Haram was suspected.
January 17: Seven Nigerien soldiers, one civilian, and four Boko Haram militants died during a clash in Toumour, Niger.
January 17: Gunmen abducted five oil workers in Warri North, Delta.
January 18: Boko Haram killed five in Madagali, Adamawa.
January 19: Kidnappers abducted eight APC chieftans in Munya, Niger
Zuma’s Commission on State Capture: Progress or Politics as Usual?
Tyler McBrien is a research associate for education at the Council on Foreign Relations.
On January 9, President Jacob Zuma announced the appointment of a long awaited judicial commission of inquiry into allegations of state capture. The phrase, plucked from a 2000 World Bank paper and popularized by a 2016 report by South Africa’s then Public Protector Thuli Madonsela, describes a widespread system of political corruption where the powerful Gupta family influences state decision-making through its close ties with President Zuma and his affiliates.
“It is of such serious public concern that any further delay will make the public doubt government’s determination to dismantle all forms of corruption‚ and entrench the public perception that the state has been captured by private interests for nefarious and self-enrichment purposes,” said President Zuma of the allegations in a public statement.
In a swell of optimism and surprise, some in the South African media have labeled President Zuma’s announcement as a concession, a shift in power, or a miraculous reversal of his comments just two months ago that state capture was “all fake and political, just to paint black a particular family and individuals.”
Others have reserved celebration, as the announcement came on the heels of a December 14 court order forcing President Zuma to approve such a commission within 30 days. Skeptics also view this as a signature political parry of the “Teflon president,” pointing to the timing of the announcement, which occurred on the eve of a meeting of high-level African National Congress (ANC) officials widely speculated to be debating President Zuma’s recall. The state capture commission, coupled with his free higher education plan revealed last month, demonstrates President Zuma’s particular skill for throwing water on the fire the very moment before he is engulfed in flames.
Just like the complex nature of state capture itself, with its dizzying web of corruption propped up by esoteric procurement laws, the devil of Zuma’s commission announcement is in the legal details. In the “commission capital of the world,” debate abounds as to whether or not these costly productions actually achieve what they set out to do. Commission findings often take much longer than anticipated, and the state has no obligation to act on them.
Plus, the effectiveness of commissions of inquiry depends upon their terms of reference, or investigative scope. Too narrow, and the commission lacks the authority to investigate widespread wrongdoing. Too broad, and the commission gets bogged down in an excess of information. To reach an effective Goldilocks equilibrium, the terms of reference should draw on the public protector’s recommendations and the suggestions laid out in the impressive work done by researchers and activists in South Africa’s vibrant civil society. However, with President Zuma’s appeal of last month’s court decision still pending, some have argued that he still retains the ability to set the terms of reference, which he would no doubt set in his favor.
This important aspect of the commission has not escaped notice from President Zuma’s enemies. On January 18, members of the Democratic Alliance, one of South Africa’s leading opposition parties, demanded that President Zuma release the terms of reference by Friday and adhere to Public Protector Madonsela’s recommendations, a provision that newly elected ANC President Cyril Ramaphosa has also endorsed.
In the likely event that this commission of inquiry into state capture falls victim to the shortfalls of commissions past, the recent announcement will prove to be just one more deft move in President Zuma’s political dance of survival.
