What does 25 years of democracy mean for Nigerians?

On the morning of June 7, 1998, there were few certainties in the country—General Sani Abacha was the man in charge of Nigeria, and no one was in doubt about that, and there would most likely be 10 more years of President Abacha as soon as the “transition programme” was executed.

But in the vicissitude of life, Abacha did not live past June 8, and today, as impossible as it seemed that day in 1998, we are marking 25 years of uninterrupted democracy.

When General Abdulsalam Abubakar, shortly after General Abacha’s sudden death, announced a nine-month transition programme to return the country to democratic rule, not many Nigerians believed him.

His predecessors had seduced Nigerians with similar promises with elaborate timetables and caused Nigerians to invest hope in those projects. General Gowon strung Nigerians on for nine years with the same promises and in the end, was ousted by his colleagues who lost faith in his project. General Babangida toyed with Nigerians for eight years and finally annulled one of the freest and fairest elections the country has had in its history. We have not had a satisfactory explanation for that decision and today, we mark June 12 in commemoration of that failed promised.

So, Abdulsalami’s nine months seemed unfeasible, a ploy designed to fail so he too could draw out his days in office.

The fact that that promise held through stumped many Nigerians. On May 29, 1999, democracy was restored at great cost to the country—nearly the entirety of our foreign reserves—we are told.

An expensive democracy would cost us more in the years that followed. In the first few years, the word “nascent democracy” became a mantra and an excuse—an apologia for the excesses of our politicians, for the maladministration that we witnessed, for the shockingly high salaries and allowances they apportioned to themselves to the extent that a councilor was paid more than a professor. It was used when democracy claimed its first high-profile victim—Salisu Buhari—the young, eloquent man who impressed Nigerians as the Speaker of the House of Representatives for weeks before it was discovered that he had falsified both his age and credentials. His excesses were dismissed as a test for “our nascent democracy.”

In the years since that excuse ran its course and was worn out. Reluctantly, the political class had to admit that nascent was no longer a viable excuse because even nascent withered and perished from overuse.

Our democracy did not have the best foundations. It was a fire brigade democracy, one that was hastily conceived in uncertainty and ushered into existence in the space of months. And in the last 25 years, Nigeria has been learning democracy on the job. Most times, it hasn’t been pretty. The cost of governance is ridiculously high and the dividends for Nigerians have been abysmal.

We have had dreadful elections, like the one in 2007, in which the winner himself, Umaru Yar’adua, admitted was massively flawed. Jonathan too benefitted from these flawed elections in 2011 but still went ahead with electoral reforms that have significantly improved elections in the country. The 2015 elections were a milestone. A true test of our democracy that made it possible to vote out an incumbent president.

Thanks to the civility—and some would say docility—of President Jonathan, who had the grace to concede defeat. Except those elections did not give us a better president as many Nigerians hoped.

Today we no longer talk of the dividends of democracy as we did all those years ago. It is either we have realised that those dividends are imaginary carrots dangled before our eyes to keep us hoping and dreaming considering the worsening crisis of cost of living we are facing.

In these 25 years, politicians have presided over the looting of the country’s resources, just as their predecessors, the military did. The Abacha loot was recovered and relooted by public officers. Billions of naira developed the penchant of walking out of the public treasury and disappearing into the nights of public officers’ pockets. Even state governors, like Yahya Bello have developed the gumption to disappear N80 billion, allegedly, and evade arrest for weeks.

In the end, we come to the sad realisation that the only thing that cost Nigeria more than democracy in terms of lootocracy is military rule. So, we end up with an Animal Farm scenario in which at the end, the other animals look through the window and can’t tell the difference between their new masters the pigs, and their old masters the humans.

Is there a positive takeaway from this journey? Of course. We have had a generation of Nigerians who have no idea what martial music on the radio means, who have grown up with the relative stability and the vagaries of elections every four years in which they can participate to a reasonable extent and choose the people who will govern them. That is a significant development. That there is a generation of Nigerians who have never experienced dictatorship.

The last 25 years have not been ideal. But democracy cannot be compromised and it is my hope that the days of an unknown voice announcing the imposition of unknown generals as our new leaders are behind us forever.

Flawed as it is, this democracy is the system in which we are participants, in which the electorate and the elected are parties in a learning curve.

As much as the politicians are learning to govern better, it is hoped, the electorate will someday learn to vote better. That is the choice we would not have under the tyranny of military rule.

So have the last 25 years been worth it? Truth be told, they have been very difficult years. Too much blood has been shed, too many lives lost— both high prices we have had to pay to vote. Perhaps the years haven’t been worth it in those terms and that is why we need to start now to make them count by being better Nigerians, by being better electorate, by voting smarter and wiser, by putting Nigeria first instead of the petty sentiments that have aided in our division and subjugation. Better people make better democrats. In a way, we are all at fault for the failings of this systems, as much as we will all be parties in its success.