IS NIGERIA DESTINED TO BREAK UP?

While every Constitution of Nigeria since the 1967 – 1970 civil war has proclaimed Nigeria a united and indivisible country, everything else happening in Nigeria points in the opposite direction. If Nigeria disintegrates as is now very likely, it will be a classic affirmation that when it comes to building a united nation, action speaks louder than slogans.

The real threat to Nigerian unity is not the types of Nnamdi Kanu and his neoBiafran agitation, nor the dramatic rhetorics of Asari Dokubo, nor the frustration of Ohaneze. In the end, what will take the credit will be the rampant corruption, the gross abuse of human rights, the government facilitated inequities and injustice and the instabilities they jointly created in this country. No enduring nation in history has ever been erected on a heap of injustice, as those who proclaim the unity and indivisibility of Nigeria seem to want.

The Break Up Seems Now A Fait Accompli.

The Boko Haram and the Islamic State of West Africa have joined forces and have successfully carved out a caliphate around the Lake Chad region, but mainly within the Nigerian territory. Nigerian army cannot evict them and cannot stop them when they may decide to take more territories from Nigeria. And if they are able to mobilize the seemingly already armed herdsmen, who are already present in every corner of Nigeria, the entire country will be overwhelmed easily.

Apparently, the army of the new caliphate are better motivated than Nigerian army. They have better battlefield experience, as many of their fighters saw battle in Syria, Iraq and Libya. They are better equipped. Nigerian soldiers have been considerably weakened by their unregulated dealings with civilian population – the mounting atrocities.

Any army that could easily go and terrorize its civilian population as the Nigerian soldiers do cannot fight a war against any well disciplined army. They are demoralized. The ramblings among the military commanders further accentuates the crisis.

The caliphate army has huge arms supplied from Libya and the Libyan civil war helps them in many ways. The vast expanse of space through the desert makes it so easy for them in the absence of airpower to move unhindered and to advance significantly. Algeria and Egypt are potential sources of arms too.

Ethnic and religious sentiments coupled with endemic corruption in the system will not allow Nigeria to modernize its military forces. So, the army will collapse relatively easily.

The Nigerian troops are fighting a defensive war within Nigerian territory. The ultimate outcome is that as the caliphate army wages territorial war against Nigeria, the Nigerian army could be on a confused retreat. And as the other ethnic groups in Nigeria realize that the Nigerian army cannot defend them, they will be forced to take their own defense into their hands, which also means asserting their sovereign status and redrawing the map of Nigeria.

That could be the bitter end of Nigeria, and the emergence of new smaller states in place of the current Nigerian State. Ironically, it will be a tale of how the Nigerian governments helped break up Nigeria.