Panel discussion on the Nigerian elections at The Graduate Center, CUNY
On Friday, March 13 the Advanced Research Collaborative at The Graduate Center, CUNY sponsored a panel discussion on the 2015 Nigerian elections. We were privileged to have the following distinguished scholars on the panel:
- Olufemi
O. Vaughan, Geoffrey Canada Professor of Africana Studies
and History, Bowdoin College, Maine
- Cyril Obi, Program
Director, African Peacebuilding Network, Social Science Research
Council
- Okey Ndibe Writer,
Public Intellectual
- Godwin Onuoha – PIIRS, Princeton
University
- Mojúbàolú Olufúnké Okome Professor of
Political Science, Brooklyn College, CUNY moderated the panel
discussion
Nigeria should have
had the general elections on February 14. On the eve of the elections,
the Federal Government of Nigeria abruptly imposed a 6 week postponement, justifying its puzzling
action by a never before expressed passionate desire to fight Boko Haram.
The move smacks of deep, cynical manipulation of the plight of Nigerian
citizens as part of the electioneering strategies of the ruling party.
However, astute analysts and scholars of Nigerian politics attribute the
disorderly and untidy postponement to a fear that the long reign of the PDP
over Nigeria was threatened by the Buhari-Osinbajo APC team.
I had our abducted
girls, women, boys and men on my mind. I had the devastated communities
in Northeastern Nigeria on my mind. I had our Internally Displaced People
(IDPs) and refugees on my mind. I had the well being of Nigeria and its
elevation to a country where the citizens truly enjoy the dividends of
democracy on my mind. These connections are made even more inevitable by the
rationale offered for the postponement of the elections--the restoration of
peace and security to the states in the Northeast that are embattled by Boko
Haram.
Our panelists gave
sophisticated, thoughtful, pithy analyses of Nigerian politics. They make
me proud to be Nigerian and also make me wonder about our dear country's
proclivity to squander its wealth of human resources, since these are all
brilliant intellectuals who are in Diaspora, and none is seriously consulted on
matters concerning Nigerian politics, while we consult every Tom, Dick and
Harry who seem to our political class to be "enlightened".
Enlightenment in Nigeria is often conflated with white skin, and or determined
by the most cynical cronyism imaginable.
The webcast of the
panel discussion will be featured online only for a limited time. Please
view from the 26 minute mark, as we were unable to begin on time, due to travel
challenges experienced by some of our panelists and audience. We also
went over time--discussions lasted until way beyond 5 pm.
Abstracts
2015 Nigerian Presidential Election: Post-Election Challenges
The 2015 Nigerian
presidential election will take place against the backdrop of the most serious
security threat (the Boko Haram insurgency) in Nigerian history since the
Nigerian Civil War of 1967-70. Focusing on Nigeria's prevailing geo-political
power configuration, my talk will explore the implications of the Boko Haram
insurgency for Nigeria after the election. With the apparent failure of the
current administration to tackle this growing militant Islamist threat, I will
argue that the post-election politics in Nigeria will inevitably be consumed
with this crisis for several years to come.
"When Siamese Twins Feud: Ideology and Cash in a Political
Season".
Nigeria’s
forthcoming general elections have shaped up as a contest primarily between the
ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and the All Progressives Congress (APC).
My presentation will argue that this amounts to a contest of ideological
Siamese twins, and that both parties have far more in common, in terms of their
vision of government (as a tool for a few to rob the resources of the state)
and the fact that the latter party has drawn some of its most prominent members
from the ranks of the former. Given this significant context, I will argue that
the elections will be determined by such factors as cash (where the PDP enjoys
a decisive advantage) and a broad misperception regarding both parties’
ideological identities (where the APC will benefit both from widespread public
disaffection with incumbent President Goodluck Jonathan and the party’s
seductive rhetoric of “change”). I will propose that the outcome of the
elections will depend on the interplay between the power of cash politics, the
appeal of “change,” and the extent to which the reality of the two main parties’
conjoined identities is erased. I will also contend that the striking failure
by Nigeria’s progressive political actors, workers and intellectuals to
recognize and seize a historic opportunity to define a potent third way is
bound to haunt the country for at least the next four years, and even beyond.
Reflecting on Elections in Nigeria: Lessons Learned and Future
Scenarios
After
fifteen years into Nigeria’s Fourth Republic, the 2015 General
Elections presents yet another platform
to engage with historical and contemporaneous issues in Nigerian
politics. This presentation critically examines the nature of political
developments in the country following the emergence of a viable opposition to
the ruling party, and if these developments constitute the potential for a
sustainable transformation of democracy. The presentation is divided into three
parts. The first addresses issues arising from previous elections in Nigeria.
This includes the nature of presidential power, how political elites construct
their agenda, and relationship between power blocs and office-holders. The
second deals with a critique of elections. Even when they are democratic, free
and fair do not resolve the all the crises of political legitimacy, authority
and confidence. Hence, democratic, free and fair election is not the solution
to power struggle. Finally, the foregoing is subjected to a critical analysis
that seeks to bring out the risks and opportunities embedded in the on-going
developments and what these may mean for the prospects of a sustainable
transformation of democracy in Africa’s most populous country.
Cyril Obi, Social Science
Research Council
Another “do-or-die”
election: Whose preference prevails, where, how, and at what political costs?
As Nigeria’s 2015 general
elections draw closer, the news coming out of Africa’s most populous country
and largest economy continues to fuel anticipation and anxiety within and
outside the country about the likely outcome. This is hardly surprising in a
context where “politics is everything,” and political actors are willing to go
to any length to win power in the high-stake competition for power; where the
winner-takes-all, and the loser-suffers-all. Nigeria, Africa, and the world are
faced with contrasting bleak or pleasant possibilities depending on the verdict
delivered by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
This presentation goes
beyond the 2015 elections as an event, to interrogate its nature as part of
Nigeria’s political culture, structure and process for exercising choice over
who legitimately holds (in trust) and exercises power on behalf of the people.
Using Nigeria’s chequered electoral history as a backdrop, it critically
examines the rather extreme tactics being resorted to by the dominant political
parties within a highly charged and over-politicized political space, and what
this trend means, both for the integrity and legitimacy of the coming
elections, and its aftermath. Can the will of Nigerians prevail? Will it
matter? If not, can Nigeria bear the likely political costs?
Olufemi
O. Vaughan, Geoffrey Canada Professor of Africana Studies and
History, Bowdoin College, Maine
Olufemi Vaughan is
the Geoffrey Canada Professor for Africana Studies & History at Bowdoin
College, Brunswick, Maine. He was also Director of the Africana Studies Program
at Bowdoin. Vaughan came to Bowdoin College from Stony Brook
University where he was a professor of Africana Studies & History, Associate
Dean of the Graduate School, and associate provost. He is the author and editor
of eight books, including the award-winning book Nigerian Chiefs: Traditional
Power in Modern Politics, 1890s-1990s (2000), forty scholarly articles, and
many reviews. He has been awarded several major professional awards, including
a Woodrow Wilson fellowship, SUNY Chancellor's Award for Excellence in
Teaching, and the Distinguished Scholar's Award from the Association of Third
World Studies.
Cyril Obi, Program Director, African
Peacebuilding Network, Social Science Research Council
Cyril Obi is
currently a Program Director at the Social Science Research Council (SSRC) and
leads the African Peacebuilding Network (APN) program, bringing his extensive
research, networking and publishing experience on African peace, security and
development to the Council. From January 2005-2011 he was a Senior Researcher
and leader of the Research Cluster on Conflict, Displacement and Transformation
at the Nordic Africa Institute (NAI) in Uppsala, Sweden. He also managed the
highly regarded joint African Security Lecture Series for researchers and
practitioners in Swedish public, peace and security organizations, organized by
NAI in cooperation with the Swedish Defense Research Agency (FOI).
Okey Ndibe Writer,
Public Intellectual
Okey Ndibe is the author
of the widely acclaimed novels Foreign Gods, Inc. and Arrows
of Rain, and co-editor (with Zimbabwean writer, Chenjerai Hove) of Writers
Writing on Conflicts and Wars in Africa. He earned MFA and PhD degrees from
the University of Massachusetts at Amherst and has taught at Connecticut
College, Bard College, Trinity College, Brown University, and the University of
Lagos (as a Fulbright scholar). He served as the founding editor of African
Commentary, a US-based international magazine published by the late
novelist Chinua Achebe. Ndibe also worked on the editorial board
of Hartford Courant, the oldest continuously published
newspaper in the US, where his essays won national and state awards. He writes
for numerous international and Nigerian publications, including the New
York Times, BBC online, Financial Times, and the
(Nigerian) Daily Sun. He is currently working on a book
titled Going Dutch and other American Mis/Adventures, a series
of essay vignettes based on his life in the US.
Godwin Onuoha – PIIRS, Princeton
University
Godwin Onuoha is
an African Humanities Post-Doctoral Research Associate at the Princeton
Institute for International and Regional Studies (PIIRS), Princeton University.
Before joining PIIRS he was an African Research Fellow and Senior Research
Specialist at Human Sciences Research Council, South Africa. He is the author
of Challenging the State in Africa: MASSOB and the Crisis of
Self-Determination in Nigeria (LIT Verlag, Munster 2011), and his articles
have appeared in Nationalism and Ethnic Politics, African Studies,
Ethnic and Racial Studies, and Review of African Political
Economy. He is on the editorial board of Democratic Theory: An
Interdisciplinary Journal.
Mojúbàolú Olufúnké Okome Professor of
Political Science, Brooklyn College, CUNY
founded
#BringBackOurGirlsNYC after consulting with the founders of the movement in
Nigeria. She is an International Political Economist whose regional
specialization is on the African continent. Educated at the University of
Ibadan, Nigeria, Long Island University, New York, and Columbia University, New
York, she’s a Professor of Political Science at Brooklyn College, CUNY; past
Women’s Studies Program Director and past Deputy Chair for Graduate Studies in
the Department of Political Science at Brooklyn College. Born in Nigeria,
she has worked on international development issues as a consultant for clients
including the United Nations and Commonwealth. Her teaching interests
include a focus on the meanings of inclusive, equitable citizenship in the
context of the interplay between globalization, democratization and economic
development. Her research interests include: Effects of globalization,
post-colonialism, and post-modernity on economic and political transformation;
Gender, democracy and citizenship in Africa and African Diaspora Studies.
She has published extensively on these issues. Her most recent
publications are: two edited books published in 2013 by
Palgrave-Macmillan: State Fragility, State Formation, and Human
Security in Nigeria; and Contesting the Nigerian State: Civil
Society and the Contradictions of Self-Organization; and one book co-edited
with Afia Serwaa Zakiya published by Bookbuilders, Ibadan, Nigeria: Women's
Political and Legislative Participation in Nigeria: Perspectives From the 2007
Elections. She founded and edits: Ìrìnkèrindò: a Journal of African
Migration, and was co-founder and one of three co-editors from 2000 to
Spring 2010 of Jenda: Journal of African Culture and Women Studies
The event was
sponsored by the Advanced Research Collaborative (ARC)
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