Rescuing Nigeria from Internal Colonisation

The main problem of the Nigerian state is essentially the faceoff between Egalitarianism/Republicanism and Feudalism/Jihadism. It is the logical outcome of bringing two different worlds together. Having taken the upper hand, the Feudalists and Jihadists have since foisted internal colonisation on the country as well as changed the tone of politics in Nigeria. At Independence in 1960 we adopted or inherited a federal structure whose political dynamics was based on liberal democracy. Indeed, the federal structure was adopted in a series of constitutional conferences representative of all Nigerians! But what we have now is a centralized state with power concentrated at the top and whose political dynamics is that of prebendal feudalism. Prebendal politics is anti-democracy and that is what is alienating virtually all the Nigerian peoples or ethnic nationalities as well as keeping Nigeria extremely corrupt, backward and underdeveloped. The sporadic blood-letting by marauding hordes in Central Nigeria and parts of Southern Nigeria is part of the impact of feudalism/jihadism; ditto the separatist movement in the Southeast, the restiveness in the South-South; the banditry in the Northwest; and the insurgency in the Northeast. Feudalism and jihadism have indeed nationalised marginalisation and oppression to the extent that most Nigerians, in both the North and South, are now asking for equality, fairness, equity, rule of law and freedom as well as the restructuring of the country. This book is about these problems and the task of freeing Nigeria from internal colonisation, more so now that the third Nigerian 'Mahdi' seems to have arrived. It specifically aims at redirecting the energies of Nigerian youths and the consolidation of the understanding between the Southeast, Southwest, South-South, the Middle Belt and sane voices from the Far-North that support the restructuring of the country; ditto the revival of the UPGA, in one guise or another, and the quaint NEPU spirit in the Far-North.