The Second Republic and Its Fall

The Second Republic and Its Fall

One of many hurdles that Nigeria had to overcome in the attempt to return to civilian rule, and then to have such a new system entrenched, was the fact that competitive politics encouraged recourse to sectional identification. On the one hand, there is need for a understanding of the nature of the dynamics of Nigerian society, especially with regard to the phenomenon of ethnicity. On the other hand, the theoretical formulations which already exist concerning the nature of politics in segmented societies must be confronted so that a closer approximation between such themes and the sociopolitical realities of Nigeria can be achieved (Joseph, 1987:43).

The American-style constitution of the second Republic (1979-1983) was designed for Nigerians type of democracy where natural affairs rather than state are promoted to avoid the pattern of British parliamentary system where the winner-takes-all pattern. The parties in America conform to the Constitution due to their disciplinary disposition. In Nigeria, political parties were following the British style of politics, where “distribution of revenues among the politician and their clients at national, state and local levels”, are the order of the day (Shehu, et al; 1999:34). Bitter conflicts abounded within the political parties in both states and the federal level over the distribution of the spoils; hence, the inability of the politicals to manage the conflicts led to the demise of the democratic government in the Second Republic and the return of the military government.

In the program of transition to the Second Republic, the military leaders’ primary concern was to prevent the recurrence of the mistakes of the First Republic. They believed that if the structures and processed of government and politics that had proved inappropriate in the First Republic could be changed, a stable and effective civilian government was therefore designed to address those fundamental issues, which were historically divisive, and to establish new political institutions, processes, and orientations. The second aspect of the transition involved the making of a new constitution and appropriate institutions. Decree number 25 of 1978 enacted the 1977 Constitution. It differed from the First Republic in 1963, in that, it introduced a United States type presidential system (Nwoked, 199:73). Previo...

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...so was the decline in GDP by and estimated 10 percent.

The repressive strategy of Buhari’s military further engendered deep resentment and bitterness among the people who feel that they had been denied of their personal freedom. In addition, according to Othman, “the military government was increasingly driven by dissension over strategies of economic management, the detention and trials of political detainees and the rising power of Brigadier Tunde Idiagbon, the Chief of staff, supreme headquarters, and the driving force behind the regime’s authoritarian policies, and of the Nigerian Security Organization (NSO)” (Othman, 1999:40). Two factors were instrumental to the final demise of the military regime; one was the risking of what Diamond called “political convulsion”, an attempt to impose a monolithic order on Nigeria’s vigorously polaristic society (Diamond, 1999:443). The second factor was the regime’s declaration in July, 1985, of their intention or plan to return Nigeria to Civilian rule. These actions further isolated Buhari and Idiagbon from their military colleagues , including their arrogance in ignoring critical opinion even among its senior military ranks.