The current leadership of the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs (NIIA) deserves commendation for being alive to its responsibilities in catalysing discussions on issues of global relevance to Nigeria. Precisely on July 13, it hosted a seminar, most appropriately themed, “Nigeria’s Foreign Policy under President Bola Tinubu: Which way forward?” It was my privilege to speak, albeit virtually, on “President Bola Tinubu, Nigerian Foreign Policy and the Expansion of Democracy in Africa,” at the well-attended event. As expected, the directions in which the panelists felt Nigeria should be headed under the Tinubu presidency were fully explored. My interrogation of its outlook on the expansion of democracy, of necessity, touched on some of the factors and forces that combine to challenge the democracy project in Africa. I do not intend to delay us here on this. It thus suffices to reaffirm my thesis that it is basically the failure of (democratic) governance, and the overall dysfunctionality of our governance structures and processes, across the continent, that reproduce democratic backsliding, the most dramatic manifestation of which is the phenomenon of coup d’état. The coups have now occurred in such regularity – since 2020 – to make the West African subregion ‘the coup belt’ of the continent. My focus in this piece is on how Nigeria should approach the evolving fluid but very dangerous situation in Niger Republic.
The situation is made particularly important for Nigeria, not just because Niger Republic is one of our contiguous northern neighbours, but one that is also in the vortex of terrorism and insurgency, administered by sundry armed non-state actors, including Boko Haram and ISWAP. As well, Nigeria has just been appointed as Chairman of the Authority of Heads of State and Government of our regional integration body, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) – the overall budget of which Nigeria is responsible for, to the tune of some 63%. All of these make Nigeria the natural candidate to superintend ECOWAS’ regional action on Niger. This now includes, since the regional body’s 30 July meeting in Abuja, the possibility of armed intervention to flush out the junta, and reinstate deposed President Mohamed Barzoum. The passion with which Tinubu spoke at his July 9 investiture as ECOWAS leader could not be ignored. His determination to defend and expand the frontiers of democracy on the continent is almost palpable, and probably understandable; after all, this is one politician whose political trajectory was forged, as it were, in the anvil of struggles for democracy.
Yet, it is important that Nigeria treads very carefully on the Niger situation, for a number of reasons.
When cast against the backdrop of the very noble interventions of Nigeria to bring back order to Liberia via the ECOWAS Monitoring Group (ECOMOG); in Sierra Leone, to put an end to a military coup, and reinstate the Tejan Kabbar government; or in President Olusegun Obasanjo’s bold engagement of the coup plotters that overthrew the government of Sao Tome and Principe, while the country’s leader, Fradique de Menezes, was visiting Nigeria, one would not but be tempted to see Nigeria replicating some or all of these efforts in Niger Republic. Trust him, Obasanjo even added a dramatic twist to the whole matter in 2003, by personally leading Menezes back to his country, to resume duties as president! Even so, the question remains, is Nigeria in a position to undertake any of these types of foreign policy expeditions today? My answer is in the negative; and the reasons are not farfetched.
My first concern is with the state of the Nigerian military. I monitored a discussion on one of Nigeria’s more notable television networks on Sunday night, in which an analyst repeatedly cited Nigeria’s military as ‘the most powerful on the African continent!’ Such a line obviously sounds good to the ears, if you were a Nigerian; but is this really true? Many credible sources indicate that South Africa, Egypt, and probably Morocco and Algeria too, could indeed be ahead of the Nigerian military in overall capability. Considered here are not just the number of men and women under arms; but also the capacity at local production of weapons of war, of all categories. There is also the factor of access to such munitions produced abroad that a country’s military may need in the event of war. This is defined in multiple and delicate diplomatic contours, such as may make access difficult for a country, even when it has the foreign exchange to pay for the weapons its military needs. This is not to talk of the volume of foreign exchange a country is in a position to deploy for these purchases, even where producers are not citing one reason or the other (including human rights orientations) to deny one access. We should recall that Nigeria had to purchase 13 A-29 Super Tucano fighter jets, for a whopping US$593 million sometime ago, under President Muhammadu Buhari. The first set of the planes – six of them – was delivered only in 2021, four years after all commitments were made. Is Nigeria in any position to readily come up with such funds today, for just 13 units of a fighting device? Your guess is as good as mine!
Of additional importance is the fact that the Nigeria military today seems bogged down, if not overwhelmed, by the extensive nature of its internal security engagements. This is not in any way to underestimate the very heroic efforts of our men and women in uniform, in guarding the commonwealth, in all directions. Rather, it is to underscore the point that the overall (in)security situation in Nigeria is so dire, as to make the military to be involved in one form of operation or the other, against determined and morbidly effective armed non-state actors, in virtually all the states of the federation. What comes to mind from this is, how feasible is it for Nigeria to make a clinical, effective and efficient military intervention in Niger Republic, directed at reinstating President Bazoum to power? I ask this against the backdrop of the critical economic crisis in which the country reels today, and argue that it was possible in the 1980s/1990s to be so deeply involved in Liberia, and make the type of swift military intervention in Sierra Leone, which ECOWAS seems to be suggesting for Niger Republic today, because Nigeria’s economic outlook then was several notches better than what is abroad today. This calls for caution vis-a-vis the ECOWAS ultimatum to the Niger junta, which, if push comes to shove, would be completely left, by the other member-states, in the hands of Nigeria, to execute.
It is doubtful if the state of internal cohesion in Nigeria is good enough for the country to embark upon a foreign expedition, the type envisaged by ECOWAS. The Buhari government unquestionably left a rather abysmal record in the way it managed Nigeria’s diversity. He practically left the country in a cesspool of intense and mutual ethno-religious distrust. The Tinubu government has a duty to carefully negotiate the cleavages that define Nigeria, if the existential challenge posed by his predecessor’s arrant lack of capacity, and negative attitude on same, is to be rested. Associated with this is the very acrimonious 2023 election, the outcome of which is still in hot contestation at the courts.
There is a place for the Diversionary Theory of foreign policy in the scholarship on International Relations. This essentially speaks to a situation in which a government, going through the type of stress underway in the Nigeria of today, latches onto risky foreign policy acts, with a view to diverting attention away. Such foreign policy engagement is also made the basis for mobilisation of support for the government. It is, however, not in all cases that such high-stake gambles come out in the desirable or desired manner. In the situation in which Nigeria has found itself today, defined by gargantuan economic challenges, tough nation-building hurdles to cross, deeply conflicting perspectives on the direction of social policies, etc., it may be too risky to embark upon a foreign military adventure, the outcome of which is not easily predictable. Nobody needs to be reminded of how seriously the American political process convulsed by reason of the Vietnam quagmire. None should be tasked to recall how the Afghanistan debacle was a precipitating factor in the collapse of the former Soviet Union. US President Joe Biden’s withdrawal of American forces from Afghanistan soon after he got into office could be regarded as precipitate, but it arguably remains his smartest foreign policy decision thus far, given the volume of blood, number of limbs, and quantum of dollars his country had lost in the treacherous terrain of Afghanistan!
I note also that everything that we have seen thus far suggests that the coup in Niger is very popular with the citizens of the country. Granted that the Nigeriens could be making the mistake of their lives, in assuming that the military junta is going to govern their country better than the fledgling civilian government it sacked, the coup is nevertheless popular. This accords with what we have seen in other francophone countries in the region, where a chain of wrong public policies, especially the vacation of fixed presidential tenures in their constitution, had left the populace exasperated, thereby making military coups feel like refreshing experiences. To send in a military expedition to flush out such a government as the one digging in, in Niger today, may not be a piece of cake, especially when such is going to be led by a country, which is itself practically bogged down by a bouquet of nation-building challenges.
Our Borno State is contiguous with Niger Republic. What would be the implication of an armed expedition to the country, which could be long drawn out, on the security situation in the state, where Governor Babagana Zulum’s creative, non-kinetic and patriotic interventions, which are bringing peace back to the state, may be completely dismantled? It is hardly defensible, from the point of view of the long-suffering populations that border Niger Republic, for Nigeria to go into such a dangerous intervention in our northern neighbour.
Many commentaries would seem to have carefully avoided weighing in on the geopolitics of the evolving situation in Niger. One wonders in this regard whether the ECOWAS leaders factored into their projections the possibility that the Wagner group of mercenaries could be in Niger, even before the expiration of their one-week deadline. It is obvious that this unusual non-state actor remains an effective foreign policy tool in the hands of Moscow, and remains so in spite of the embarrassment its armed protestation meant for the highly strategic President Vladimir Putin a few weeks ago. That Wagner is already deeply involved in Mali, Burkina Faso, and Guinea – all in the Sahel with Niger Republic – makes this projection quite plausible. Meanwhile, in the light of the challenges faced by France in the region, deriving from extant hostility to it from the juntas running these countries, the ousted Bazoum government in Niger was, to all intents and purposes, the last outpost of the West in the Sahel. What this implies is the possibility of projection of the growing tension between Russia and the West onto Niger, with grave consequences for whichever countries in the region allow themselves to be used as canon fodders, to fight an inevitable proxy war in the African country. This doesn’t look like a pleasant place for Nigeria to be.
Deriving from the foregoing is the need for Nigeria to be properly advised on the situation in Niger. No doubt, it is distasteful to have yet another coup in the West African sub-region, especially only a few days after Tinubu declared the phenomenon unacceptable on the continent. The lesson here is that government, especially in foreign policy matters, should be very circumspect in issuing whatever looks like ultimatums, or taking positions which have not been carefully thought through, and subjected to critical, nay, brutal examination vis-a-vis what capability the country possesses to deliver upon such. Secondly, it is my view that Nigeria’s focus now should be on encouraging African countries that are yet to fall under the threatening cloud of miliary coups to begin to prioritise the interests of their masses; desist from sabotaging their own constitutions; and strive at building inclusive systems, where no one is left behind from the entire political economy. This is the most important antidote to what Antonio Guterres, the UN chief, has now most aptly characterised as the coup epidemic sweeping through (West) Africa.
France obviously has the capacity to make an impactful intervention in Niger, including an armed one. In 2012 to 2013, it made such a clinical intervention in Mali, via Operation Barkhane, and saved Bamako from an impending jihadist onslaught. That Paris already has a standing force in Niger works to its advantage. Additionally, France has considerable strategic interests in Niger that are often marginalised in analysis. Niger is the fourth largest producer of uranium in the world. The industry is largely controlled by the French company, Areva (now Orano), and no less than 50% of the uranium produced in Niger ends up in France, providing some one-third of what powers the latter’s nuclear reactors. As one pundit puts it, graphically, every three out of four bulbs lighted in France, is through the grace of uranium imported from Niger. The Americans also maintain a drone base in the Sahelian country that could be in jeopardy as things unfold.
In the circumstances, it is in order for Nigeria to continue giving leadership to ECOWAS on the strong position it holds on Niger, including sustenance of the sanction regime already imposed, to wit ‘all measures necessary to restore constitutional order.’ It should, however, tread with caution on the subject of ‘the use of force’ directed at sacking the coup plotters. Ultimately, it would be safer for Nigeria to encourage French intervention in the incipient Niger conundrum, to flush out the junta and restore constitutional order, with Abuja offering only strong diplomatic backing to such an effort. By so doing, Nigeria would be able to achieve its specific objectives in Niger without having to risk further damage to its own internal processes, and global standing. Sending Nigerian troops into Niger Republic at these times, is, in my considered opinion, fraught with much danger. It should be avoided.
