Y2015 ≠ X
Nigeria @ 53: Redefining the
governing-governed relationship through the perception of political power
Last week, the focus of my maiden
article in this Y2015
≠X series was
to bring to fore the impact of diversionary and lightweight narratives dominant
in Nigerian’s mindspace that gives the impression that our destiny is in the
hands of a few. See the full article
here
This week, my sub focus is on an
enlightened citizenry taking advantage of the widespread availability of
information in this internet age in order to improve the governing –governed relationship
across the country.
One of the challenges we
currently have in Nigeria is our relationship with power and those to whom we
choose to assign it in trust for a period of time. I guess our perception of the power that is
derived collectively from us and given to the men and women who we entrust to
use it as a tool for governance is the root of most of our problems.
The Origins:
Pre-Nigeria, many of the groups
that currently make up Nigeria were members of different kingdoms or governing
areas where political power in addition to other forms of power was derived
from the ultimate traditional ruler (be it King, Oba, Sultan, ruling heads etc),
hence the view of power of both the governed and the governing was through
these lenses. The governed saw power through its own lenses and its field of
view displayed power as unquestionable, absolute and revered. It also transferred
these attributes to the leader in whose hands power was vested. The person in
power was viewed as power itself; hence the reverence assigned to power in the
eyes of the governing was transferred to the leader. This was also re-enforced
by dominant narratives of the day as well as instruments and guardians of such power
such as the laws, the paraphernalia and the armed forces /security services of
that day. On the other side of the lens
were the governing; a class of one or many persons, who saw power through a
different lens; in their view, power was a means to protect their interests,
control all privilege and patronage and enforce their will on the governed. In
some cases, their people were satisfied with their leadership, but discussions
of their performance are not in scope of this write-up. There was no question
of good governance then as whatever the rulership did that the people deemed
favorable, they appreciated. The leader could give and withdraw patronage at a
whim, had personal control of all security services personnel and infrastructure
to enforce his/her rule across the domain where he/she was sovereign. In some of these models of governance,
transitions may have been “orderly” but competition for power was restricted to
the fixed set of governing class members, who continuously schemed overtly or
covertly to position themselves within the reach of such absolute power and the
privileges that come with it. This short
burrow into history is meant to help establish in your minds the two sides of power
(governing and governed) separated by the lens through which they view it and
the evolution of political power and these two sides into what we have in
present day Nigeria @ 53, how it relates to the myriad of challenges we face today
and possibly as a framework to resolving them.
The evolution in summary:
As pre-Nigeria transitioned into Nigeria, absolute
political power first changed hands from traditional rulers to the British colonial
government. The nature of political power remained relatively the same in that
the British acquired absolute power over Nigerians and the lens with which the
governing Brits saw power in the Nigerian context was the same as before, to
protect their interests and enforce their will, basically, the master-servant
governing model. As such they built institutions oriented around this
governance model as well as the political narrative that seals this model on
the minds ensuring the lens with which the governed viewed power remained the
same. Luckily for Nigeria at that time, there were some progressives amongst
the governed across the confederation that sort political power be restored to
Nigerians and derived from the will Nigerians. “Independence” was granted, the
first republic emerged as a parliamentary democracy and for the first time,
power was derived from Nigerians. it did appear that a new dawn might emerge
and as the country was newly birthed, it provided an opportunity for a new
relationship created and a new lens established with which the governing and
the governed viewed political power. However events of those days skewed this
evolution and a military state emerged, political power was acquired by the
military and entrenched in the hands of its leaders, and it was absolute and
with all the privileges and patronage thereof. The lens with which the new governing class
viewed power was no different than in Pre-Nigerian kingdoms except that now,
access to power was limited to the new military governing class who, actually a
subset of them who could muster up support of other key officers to attempt
power acquisition. The governed were certainly not participants per se besides
those issued patronage by the governing class at their whim. Luckily again, the very many progressives
amongst the governed, many of whom gave their lives as well as those within the
military, along with friendly nations worked covertly and overtly to ensure democracy
was restored, albeit in a way many believe was not derived from people’s will.
It was however welcomed.
As you can imagine, the
institutions of state had not been built to support political power derived from
the will of the people; our security and intelligence services, civil service
organizations and even corporations, but the latter is not relevant to my
discourse. However, the most critical component that needed change was the
perception of political power in the eyes of both the governed and the
governing. It appears that even though political power evolved and the
governing class evolved or rather expanded, they governing and the governed
still view political power through then lenses of the way it was when kingdoms,
the Brits and the military held sway. Ironically,
it seems the governing want it that way in order to entrench themselves and the
governed seem not to know any better. Perhaps the governing are also ignorant;
however that is debatable. What is factual is that they project political power
in a military-esque way ignoring the fact that the powers they may imagine to
have may not the power given to them by the constitution (which certainly also
needs some evolution to fully support and empower political power derived from
the people); in addition, there are conditions that have to be met before some
of the power they project can even be projected or used but they seem ignorant
to this obvious fact. The institutions which uphold the nation state are evolving
but they too need to evolve faster to support political power derived from its
people. The political power “divide” i.e. the governing and the governed must
be enlightened to understand their roles in the assignment of political power,
the assignment, distribution and execution. From the perspective of the
governed, they have to realize that when it comes to political power, they hold
the aces, irrespective of what the governing influenced media chooses to
project. The true lens is the constitution, which itself may not be perfect,
but is a starting point of reference to understand the borders of political
power of a governing party and what defects exists that require to be worked
on.
I’ve heard many say we need a
revolution, indeed we do, but not a revolution of blood but of enlightenment of
the governing and the governed. As a revolution of blood will only destroy
people with the same problem and replace them with people with the same
problem.
To my first point, this internet
age provides us the opportunity to access information at a click, hence should
speed up the transformation of the view for political power in the eyes of the
governed and governing. Nigeria will certainly be better tomorrow than it is
today, if we begin now.
See more
on my blog
