ABSTRACT
THIS PROJECT IS ON THE EVALUATION OF ETHNICITY AND THE ISSUE OF POLITICAL DEVELOPMENT IN NIGERIA. THE ETHNICITY IS A SOCIAL CONSULT THAT INDICATES IDENTIFICATION WITH A PARTICULAR GROUP. WHICH IS OFTEN DECENDED FROM COMMON ANCESTORS. MEMBERS AS THE GROUP SHARE COMMON CULTURAL TRAITS (SUCH AS LANGUAGE RELIGION AND DRESS) AND ARE ON AN IDENTIFICABLE MINORITY WITHIN THE LARGER NATION – STATE. WHILE POLITICAL DEVELOPMENT IS THE PROGRESSIVE REDUCTION OF ETHNIC CULTURAL AND RELIGION TENSION AND ELEMENTS OF NON-CONTINUITIES IN THE PROCESS OF CREATING A VIRTUALLY HOMOGENOUS CONSTITUTIONAL AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT LEADING TO THE ATTAINMENT OF A VIABLE POLITICAL CULTURE.
THE CHOICE OF THIS TOPIC WAS NECESSITATED BY THE DESTABILIZING TENDENCIES OF THIS PHENOMENON WHICH HAS INFACT THREATENED THE EXISTENCE OF NIGERIA STATE IN A NUMBER OF INSTABLE AND HAS THUS HINDERED MEANINGFUL NATIONAL POLITICAL DEVELOPMENT. THIS WORK IS AN ATTEMPT TO TRACE ITS ORIGIN. THOSE FACTORS THAT PROPAGATE ITS PRESENCE IN NIGERIA POLICIES AND HOLD IT CAN BE ELIMINATED SO AS TO ENHANCE NATIONAL POLITICAL DEVELOPMENT. THOUGH SOLUTIONS HAVE ALWAYS BE OFFERED THEY HAVE NOT YIELDED ANY POSITIVE RESULT HENCE THE NEED TO LOOK FOR A MORE VIABLE OPTION BY LOOKING AT THE DIVISION THAT EXIST IN A PLURALIST SUCH DIFFERENCES. THERE SOLUTION MUST COME FROM POWER SHARING AMONG THE VARIOUS ETHNIC OR OTHER SECTARIAN GROUPS. YET ANOTHER STEP WOULD BE TO INCULCATE RELIGION AUTONOMY AND FEDERATION INTO THE STATE SYSTEM WHICH ENABLE LOCAL AND REGIONAL AUTHORITIES WITH A DEGREE AUTONOMOUS POWER AND AUTHORITY.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE
1.0 INTRODUCTION
1.1 BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY
1.2 PURPOSE OF THE STUDY
1.3 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM
1.4 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY
1.5 RESEARCH QUESTIONS
1.6 SCOPE OF THE STUDY
1.7 DEFINITION OF TERMS
CHAPTER TWO
2.0 LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1 SUMMARY OFF LITERATURE REVIEW
CHAPTER THREE
3.0 METHODOLOGY
BRIEF OUTLINE OF THE STUDY
3.1 DESIGN OF THE STUDY
3.2 AREA OF THE STUDY
3.3 POPULATION OF THE STUDY
3.4 SAMPLE OF THE STUDY
3.5 INSTRUMENT FOR DATA COLLECTION
3.6 VALIDATION OF THE INSTRUMENT
METHOD OF DATA ANALYSIS
CHAPTER FOUR
4.0 DATA PRESENTATION
4.1 DATA ANALYSIS
4.2 FINDINGS
CHAPTER FIVE
SUMMARY OF FINDINGS
RECOMMENDATIONS
CONCLUSION
LIMITATIONS OF THE STUDY
SUGGESTION FOR FURTHER STUDIES
REFERENCES
QUESTIONNAIRE
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
The realm of politic is the field of greatest conflict in the society. This is not surprising since policies are the process whereby society arbitrates over power and allocation or score resource. However in modern western political dictionary political this ability that been seen as characteristic of the developing country or countries in transition in African Latin American and Asia transition in Africa Latin America and Asia .
The political disability in African countries could be attributed to many factors ranging from the frequently from the frequency of militating coup to political violence and civil disorders, which are all as a result of the existence and dominance of social elenge such as religion, regionalism tribalism and most especially ethnicity. Ethnicity in our political life having proved uncontrollable deserves serious attention. It is evident that this Nigeria, which can be seen from the frequent changes of government and coup date in the country. This study is therefore going to concentrate on how the problem of ethnicity has affected the political development of Nigeria.
Nigeria is a nation whose history is replete with numerous and varied existing and political threats to national political development. In colonial era till date, the sad yet unfortunate story has been that of one geo-ethnic group attempting to assert and, in the process, establish her hegemony over the other, perceived as posing a veritable threat to its very existence. Consequent upon this alleged threat of dominance it has become fashionable to see a particular sub national group treating session from the rest of the federation unit on the basis of on from of disaffection or the other. For instance in 1953 the Northern segment of the country called for session in the following year. It was the west, therefore, secession urges became dormant a determines attempt to out of Nigeria to constitute in self into an independent entity. It is necessary to state that these secession attempted his greatly affected the political development of Nigeria. How these various secession attempted has affected political development of Nigeria will be discussed in subsequent chapter.
1.1 BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY
Nigeria by over four hundred ethnic group with each having m it own language and tradition the dominant ethnic groups as we have noted above are the Hausa- Fulani in the North, the Yoruba’s in the and the Igbo’s in the East.
Nigeria was formed by the gradual incorporation of different areas and people into which empire from 1861 onward and took it final shape in 1914 the Amalgam a nation of the Southern and Northern protectorates in 1939 the Southern protectorate was divided into Eastern and Western regions there are yet other force within each of these dominant regions. These were the minorities are those who are shadowed and discriminated against by the three major ethnic groups in the North, there is the middle belt, the west had mid-west and the Calabar Ogoja river (COR) area in the eat.
From above analysis one is led to believe that the claims of separate social group must necessary be incompatible with the demands of the w hole social group this is not usually, the case for instance there are French and English speaking condition in Canada Creak and Shovas in Czecholo Vakia, the French Italian and German in Switzerland
No doubt political instability affect the political as well as economic development of any nation but it consequence are often exaggerated. It has been argued that political instability is inherent in and country but the ability of the political system to certain stress generated within it at any given time determines political instability. While rejecting this argument, it is important to note that the British introduced ethnicity into Nigeria polities during the colonial period and what they did at independence was to create a political system hat was unable to contain the stress generated by this ethnicity
Thus a British colonial governor characterized Nigeria as a collection of Self contained and mutually independent native state. Separated from one mother and tradition and by ethnological racial, tribal political social and religion Barrier’s (Clifford 1920) it is not clamed hat hetegenous cultural background does not affect political stability, the ability to weld the different ethnic groups together is the process of nation building, which is not an easy ask. It involves the transformation of the pre-colonial political entire of the societies with the Nigeria temporary into a virile political culture the would sustain the Nigeria state. When the alien culture of Europe impinged on the existing societies is credited a problem of adjustment which required new technique and ideas to deal with the new order. Incidentally the instability as a result of ethnicity and other social colleagues which permeated the Nigeria political scenes, this has consequently affected the political development of Nigeria.
What made ethnicity to assume an alarming proportion in the polities of Nigeria was that the focus of each of the dominant ethnic group was on equal share of race-course.
The question was who get what, how and by how much. They wanted to maximize their individual security the control of the lion-share of the country source resource
Today the biggest threat to nation political development is that of lack of unity. In the absence of duty of a kind to will became difficult to define common national objective identification of a common economy. The greatest threat to unity today is ethnicity.
This work is therefore throughout a comitial review of the problem of ethnicity and it effect on the political development of Nigeria since independence till date.
MEMORANDUM OF DELTA STATE
Nigeria came into being as a result of the empirical amalgamation in 1914 of the protectorate of Northern Nigeria one the one hand, and of Southern Nigeria and they colony of Lagos on the other hand. This brought together communities of diverse peoples and culture which evolved into an independent sovereign nation in 1960. However, Nigeria continues to face a number of challenge and induced by the Justice, inequity and unfair inherent in this internal socio-political arrangements. For the to develop into a strong nation deliberates efforts must be made to deal with these factors.
Delta state is made up of five major nationalistic, with a combined population of over 4 million people. This figure is an undercount as we shall indicate in a later section under census. The state was created out of the former Bendel state in 1991. it has a geographical area on 17440 square kilometer consisting of dry land wetland creak rivers swamps, extensive existence coastline and continental shelf. Of this geographical area about 60, percent is made of its population live on the swampy river-line parts and their traditional occupation and mainstay s mostly farming and fishing.
In addition to agricultural and solid mineral resources, the state is endowed with enormous oil and gas reserves. Delta state has been the major producer of crude oil and natural gas in Nigeria since 1958 when first well were drilled by the shell petroleum development company. As celebrate n the pamphlet. the story of shell B.P (1972) The discovery of oil in the western Nigeria Delta established Nigeria firmly as a major world producer of oil.
This view of the primary of Delta state in the oil economy is confirmed by the late M.O Feyider, Nigeria former secretary of the organization of petroleum exporting countries (OPEC). During the executive directorship of Dimafume Onoge. Also G.G. Darah Delta state from group captain Luke Ochulor Felix Ibru-To James Ibori. The failure of the 1999 constitution to provide for his this diversity in the nations political structure has become a major source of our current difficulties. As a direct consequence of the concentration of powers and resources in the federal government under 1999 construction. Nigeria has been purged into an unending series of crisis upon crisis since the commencement of the so-called fourth republic on 27th May, 1999. The country is concurrently confronted with:
1. Fierce competition for the capture of power at the center leading to overheating and instability of the polity. Mutual supervision and fears of domination and marginalization between ethnic state leading to the rise of ethnic militias and violet conflict .
on the fifth and last day, the tempo of the festival rises with increased booming of cannon guns and echoes of Joyans Song by some gifted women singer:. Expert tempters blow their thrilling tune in praise of the Obi Okpala-Uku or Diokpa and t he prominent farmers of the land.
On this day large quantities of yams are roasted, cleared and mixed with fresh or fried oil. Everybody partake of it. Some quantities of it are sent to friend well wishers, finances and others, an action which reflects to bond of cordial relationship. On this day two meat of all the goat slaughtered the previous day share among the people. More dancing and merriment continue with boys and girls arranging special get-together to mark the occasion. During the last two days of the festival, the houses of the titles men and women, the Iyase, the Odogwu, the Onu and others are scene of great festivities with several visitor from far. These personalities, by virtues of their special position in the town, bear a great burden of the festival and are often fully stretched to meet the demand of their.
The impart of Iwaji on the people in such that many opinion have been expressed in an attempt to discern the motive of their forefather in evolving the age-ling festival. The social seventies sees the festival as a deconstruction of the people communities of interest. The agriculturist say it was intended to serve as an impetus to woven white shirt dance round the village, some their elephant tusk trumpets. Goats and cock are slaughtered before the family shrine by Ndichhie and Nze.
Libation are poured and the spirit of the dead ancestors are involved to share the joys of new session everywhere the music of wooden group throb in the palaces of Obi’s and other traditional rulers.
Before he ritual ceremonies, the shrine including the god of the farm Ifejioku are purified by young Virgins (Umuada) with eggs and chicken tied on piece of young palm frond and dragged around the premises reciting from shrines and so make them worshipable. After the scarified before the family shrine by Nze food is cooked and all present parake of the pounded yam which must be tested first by the Obi or Diokpa of each family group. This is followed by merriment. Rejoicing and dancing particularly by the young ones, who eat and drink with abandon singing. In beautiful traditional attire and in the case of ladies with headiest, neckless earrings to match. They dance in group round their respective communities according to their age-grades. They provides themselves with various item of respondent, including Kola Nuts soft drinks and local gin, in the evening of this day. Small children hold mock market with several odd things. Including pick of new yams, the means of exchange is the cowry.
CULTURAL PERSPECTIVE
Iwaji (New yam) festival is one of the oldest and most revered traditional festival of the people of Delta North arise of state where farming constitutes the main source f the people live hood.
Although here are slight differences in name and mode of celebration from place to in the area, the festival s essential an occasion of great job and happiness among the people for it. .
Marks the end of the period of famine and the beginning of the season of plenty like many other traditional festivals Iwaji no fixed date. It is however invariably celebrates annually in the first or second week of September. It last for about five days. Great preparation are usually made for the festival and the timing is determined by a council of elder with the Diokpa (Oldest man) or the Obi each town presiding. They are usually guided in their by the phase of the third day the farmer and all members of their families go to the farm to collect new yams, many which are sent as present by husbands to their parent in-law and to their dear ones as a token of friendship.
The actual celebration starts on the fourth day which is usually the native resting day called Eke. On this day guns boom, and the Obi’s and Diokpa clad in traditional increases productivity, the not-too serious minded man in the street does not even associate the any conscious attempt by the ancestors to attain and end, but rather regards it a mere passions or revelry. whatever the various interpretation , the people f this area regard the festival as native reward for hard work and also a reminder f the importance of farming in their lives this no doubt, why the people turn out in fall pomp and pageantry during the