My “Unpopular” Propositions by Edwin Madunagu By
Edwin Madunagu conumah@hotmail.com
Several times in the last ten years, I have compelled myself to
discontinue public exploration, and application to Nigeria, of the
concepts of “power bloc” and “popular-democratic restructuring”.
These are concepts in which another concept – “the national
question” or “ethnic nationality question” – plays an important,
though neither dominant nor decisive role. I was, in fact, at a
point, considering classifying these concepts and closely related
ones as “unpopular” in a spirit that reminds me of Bertrand
Russell’s “Unpopular Essays”. However, whereas Bertrand Russell, in
labeling his 1950 collection of essays “unpopular”, was
condescending, abusive and cynical, I am honest and respectful to a
host of my comrades in the Nigerian Left and many of my other
readers in considering describing their reception of my employment
of these concepts as “unpopular.”
But
suppose a young Leftist directly asks why I should repeatedly compel
myself to discontinue the exploration of important concepts like
“power bloc” and “popular-democratic restructuring”? Or, why I
should even now, be dodging a frontal encounter with these concepts?
And why, on the other hand, I am not inclined to abandon them
altogether and permanently? The answer to the first two questions is
that my exploration of these concepts had been widely and grossly
misunderstood – in different directions – and was, in fact,
threatening to poison my relationship with some close comrades,
compatriots, collaborators and friends. I will then look at the
young Leftist and ask, rhetorically, if that was not enough reason
to discontinue the exercise.
The
answer to the hypothetical Leftist’s last question is that I feel,
very strongly, that a conscious permanent abandonment of my
engagement with the twin-subjects of Nigeria’s “power blocs” and
“popular-democratic restructuring” in Nigeria at this conjuncture in
Nigeria’s history will be tantamount to abandoning the Marxist and
Leninist dialectical method of investigation, analysis and
organization in our struggle for popular democracy and socialism in
Nigeria. This will turn me to a traitor not only to Marxism but also
to the revolution of the Nigerian people and to the Nigerian Left
whose product I am – in a profound sense.
My
argument with myself at this juncture is, therefore, this: Since I
am convinced – and have been so convinced since I became a Marxist –
that only the Nigerian Left can consistently fight for and guarantee
the genuine unity of this country, and since I am ever more
convinced that my central propositions on Nigeria’s “power blocs”
and “popular-democratic restructuring” are correct, and point to
correct routes out of the current multiple tragedies in Nigeria and
towards people’s revolution and socialism; but since it is
untenable, undesirable and unacceptable that such a large fragment
of my core comrades could be wrong on these same questions, it is my
responsibility to try more strenuously to convince, or be convinced
by, or to reach a dialectical understanding with more and more of my
“dissenting” comrades on the “controversial” questions.
So,
what do I do now? As the need for diligent elaboration and correct
application of the concepts of “power bloc” and “popular-democratic
restructuring” in the current multiple crises becomes stronger,
clearer, and more urgent, how do I resume my exploration? I decided
a couple of weeks ago to proceed along the historical track: going
back to the beginnings of my actual engagement with “socialism and
the national question in Nigeria.” I feel very strongly that moving
along this track the reason or reasons for the unpopularity of my
public enquiry on my twin subjects will be uncovered. And I am not
afraid that in doing this the language or lexicon of my existing
formulations may change or undergo revisions. Is that not a test of
the Marxist method, that it must be applicable, with equal force, to
Marxism itself?
In
the next section of this piece, I shall attempt a sweeping
historical review of my engagement with “the national question,” and
“problems of national unity” and identify either consistency or
where and why a shift or expansion in focus occurred, or both. But
let me preface this entire effort with a brief statement of my
central and dominant premise. That premise is this: Nigeria is a
capitalist society. By this I mean, specifically, that Nigeria’s
ruling class is a capitalist class, the economy is a capitalist
economy, and the social formation is a capitalist social formation.
But this does mean that every strand of Nigeria’s economy is
capitalist, that every stratum of the class is capitalist and that
every level of the social formation is capitalist. What it means is
that capitalism exercises dominance and hegemony in the economy and
social formation and directs the mode of reproduction of the society
as a whole.
That
is the first part of my premise. The second part, anchored on the
first, is this: Nigeria’s capitalist ruling class is not
homogeneous. It is divided by many things, just as it is united by
several things. But the unifying component is dominant. This
unifying component is capitalist accumulation and profit. From the
heterogeneity of the capitalist ruling class emerges entities that
exercise political dominance and control over the entire ruling
class and, hence, over society as a whole. These entities I call
“power blocs.” For about 30 years I have identified two power blocs
in Nigeria’s ruling class and some fractions of the class struggling
to reach accommodation with the “big two”. These struggling entities
I designate as “political forces.” Power-blocs are political forces,
but not all political forces are power-blocs. Big or small, all of
them are forces in Nigeria’s capitalist ruling class.
We
may now turn to the promised “historical sweep.” In late 1979,
shortly after Nigeria’s return to civil constitutional rule, I wrote
a sharp and angry article criticizing the bourgeois or ruling class
politicians over their bitter and noisy quarrel over state creation.
The article was originally published in the “Nigerian Chronicle,”
the Cross River State government-owned daily newspaper. Later, the
article, now under the caption, “A comment on national unity in
Nigeria,” was included as Appendix to my 1982 book, “Problems of
Socialism: the Nigerian Challenge.” Below are relevant excerpts from
the 1979 article. Because of the historical and strategic importance
of the article for my present “case,” I plead that the excerpts will
be long:
“One
of the characteristics of our social life, and one which is at the
same time the main source of the apparent strength and resilience of
the present social order, is the fact that the formulation of our
national problems is completely dominated by the bourgeoisie (those
who rule over us), the government (those who govern us on behalf of
the bourgeoisie) and their official and unofficial representatives,
spokesmen, thugs, militants, theoreticians (or seers) and
ideologists. The result is that, since the needs and interests of
the bourgeoisie are, in most cases, quite distinct from popular
needs and interests, and since bourgeois views are reflections of
these perverted needs and interests, our national problems are
frequently misrepresented, distorted, emptied of all content and
meaning, and finally integrated into bourgeois discourse.”
The
1979 article continued: “Thus when the bourgeoisie say the public or
the nation, they mean themselves: they are the public and the
nation. When they say the security of the nation, they mean the
security of their wealth and the social structure by which this
wealth is accumulated. When they talk of subversion, they mean a
threat to the conditions of their own dominance and perfidy. When
they talk of national unity, they mean the unity of the bourgeois
class, or a greater fraction of it, over the people, and when they
talk of peace they mean the peace of the graveyard, where the poor
and the neglected can suffer and die in silence.”
The
article continued: “The struggle for, and against, the creation of
yet more states is essentially a struggle between the different
factions of the bourgeoisie. Those who are more favoured in the
present scheme of things and whose sphere of influence and
exploitation will only diminish with the creation of more states
will naturally oppose state creation. On the other hand, those who
see the creation of still more states as the only solution to their
marginalization will naturally fight for state creation. In this
struggle, the common people – the masses – are mere recipients of
loaded prejudices, they are mere instruments of bourgeois struggles,
mere victims of bourgeois manipulation. In the struggle for, and
against, state creation, the agitators are not seeking promotion of
the interests of the masses, but their own interests. The various
factions claim to be speaking in the name of their people while, in
reality, they are merely looking for, or defending, exclusive
domains of exploitation and theft.”
And
it continued: “There is no objective conflict between an Efik worker
and an Ibibio worker, between an Ogoja market woman and an Annang
market woman, between an Oron peasant and an Ibibio peasant, or
indeed between “night-soilmen” of different ethnic groups! But their
self-appointed leaders say there are differences, and go further to
mobilise them in defence of these false differences, whereas the
only fundamental social difference is that existing between the
masses (from all ethnic groups) and their exploiters.”
The
relevant excerpts of the 1979 article ended: “We are not saying that
there are no minority ethnic groups in Nigeria; neither are we
saying that there is no ethnic-based oppression. What we are saying
is that the bourgeoisie cannot lead the struggle for genuine ethnic
equality precisely because their interests conflict with popular
interests.” End of excerpts.
Thus, the central position taken in my 1979 article on “national
unity” and the “national question” in Nigeria was that the ruling
class was not capable of resolving the issues on account of its
class interest and class practices, including its bitter intra-class
struggle for primitive (primary) capitalist accumulation. This
position remained essentially unchanged until I went into the
Political Bureau in January 1986. Here we may recall that the
17-member body, in which I was mysteriously included was asked by
General Babangida to organize and conduct public political debates
across the nation and, on the basis of the outcome of this national
debate, prescribe a new “social order” for the country.
It
will also be recalled that the Bureau came out 15 months later with
a prescription of Socialism. My own “Minority Report” was also that
Nigerians chose Socialism as a new Social Order. The difference
between my “Minority Report” and the Main/Majority Report was that
mine was more categorical and included the introduction of
Collective Presidency and reports on debates and crises within the
Bureau itself, including how we arrived at the “Verdict” of
Socialism. It was also very clear to all of us – Right, Left and
Centre – that only the cases for the creation of Akwa Ibom State and
Katsina State were irrefutable. And the two states were created by
General Babangida in September 1987, raising the number of states
from 19 to 21. However, at a personal political level, the impact of
the Bureau on me was that it made me go from mere ideological
criticism of the ruling class and its governments to now include
concrete demands and prescriptions on several issues in politics and
governance. These concrete demands and prescriptions included those
on the resolution of the “national question” and the question of
“national unity.”
Let
us now make a 31-year leap from my “Minority Report” on the National
Political Debate of 1986/1987 to April 12, 2018 when my article
“Restructuring: propositions summarized” appeared in The
Guardian and several other media. I shall reproduce a large part of
the article because it embodies what is in the 31-year period. I
request readers to follow the following excerpts from the April 2018
article:
“The
aim here is to summarise my current position on the question of
geopolitical restructuring of Nigeria. I say “current” because as
far as I can remember, I started thinking seriously – and then
debating and writing – about restructuring from 1986 as a member of
the Political Bureau. Today, 32 years later, I am still thinking and
writing on the subject. The present piece is implicitly a draft memo
on this important political subject to the Nigerian Left.
“What I consider my current aggregate position on restructuring of
Nigeria is constituted by several propositions articulated and
refined over a fairly long period of time. For the purpose of this
piece, the propositions can be grouped under the following five
broad headings: the impossibility of purely ethnic separation;
redeployment and redistribution of national resources; levels of
exercise of power and responsibility; principles of triple
balancing; and popular-democratic restructuring at a glance. The
propositions are not of the same status. Some of them are issues
which the Nigerian Left should struggle to have inserted in the
Constitution of Nigeria and others are those that the Left should
insert in its programmes, manifestoes and occasional platforms. I
shall now take the groups of propositions one after the other.
“First cluster of propositions:
A little over 20 years ago, on December 3, 1997, when General Sani
Abacha was still in power, I attended and contributed to a seminar
organized in Calabar by the Cross River State Council of the Nigeria
Union of Journalists (NUJ). The seminar was one of NUJ’s
contributions to Abacha’s transition programme after the collapse of
Babangida’s experiment. I was asked to speak on the topic, “The
ethnicity syndrome: How it affects the development of Cross River
State.” But I enlarged the topic to “The national question, the
power blocs and popular-democratic transformation of Nigeria,”
explaining to the organisers that this would put the subject in a
historical and national perspective.
“In
the preamble to my contribution I said: “If a 100kg bag of beans and
a 100kg bag of rice are mixed, it will be possible, with patience
and perseverance, for a schoolboy or schoolgirl to separate the
grains.” I then went on to say that it would be easier for that
unfortunate young person to perform the feat than for any political
authority or forces to separate Nigeria into pure ethnic components!
Two years later, on November 4, 1999, my piece, Impossibility
of (pure) ethnic separation appeared in my column in
The Guardian. The article was essentially a review of the
late Chief Anthony Enahoro’s proposition on restructuring the
federation. But simultaneously the article appeared as a
re-statement of my December 3, 1997, proposition.
“I
am not saying that Nigeria cannot disintegrate. Of course, the
country can disintegrate if it pushes itself or is allowed to be
pushed beyond certain limits by those who have the means and the
power. Nigeria can disintegrate in a manner worse than that of the
former Soviet Union, the former Yugoslavia, the former
Czechoslovakia, the Greater Ethiopia (before Eritrea broke off), the
Greater Somalia (before the current catastrophe), and Yemen, a
bleeding country which has seen separation and unification several
times. All I am saying is that if Nigeria disintegrates – as it can
disintegrate if the Nigerian Left does not step in – it will not be
along ethnic lines. If Nigeria disintegrates the more powerful war
juntas will simply carve up the country – with each component
reproducing Nigeria, that is, recreating majorities and minorities,
the dominating and the dominated.
“The
second cluster of propositions
relates to class-to-class redeployment and redistribution of
national resources or, simply, the restructuring of class
appropriations. By this I mean the massive movement of resources
from Nigeria’s ruling class and its blocs and forces to the popular
masses through people-oriented radical reforms in employment, wages,
education, health, housing, transportation, taxation and levies,
etc. Class appropriations, by the way, include not only the monies,
properties and businesses recovered from “looters” but also proceeds
of state and class robberies which may have been covered by
obnoxious legalities. The class-to-class redeployment is the
sociological and logical complement of horizontal, state-to-state
distribution which - as it is now – is essentially a distribution
within the ruling class and its blocs and various segments.
“The
third cluster of propositions
is the principle of triple balancing in Nigeria’s geopolitical
restructuring. The picture is like this: split each of the
Southsouth and Northcentral geopolitical zones into two. This
raises the number of geopolitical zones from six to eight. Now, go
to Nigeria’s pre-independence geopolitical structure: the three
regions – West (plus Lagos), East and North – where the first two
regions (plus Lagos) were also regarded as the South. With the new
eight – zone structure, the former North and the former South will
have four each; the former East and former West (plus Lagos) will
have two zones each; the Southsouth and Northcentral will, together,
have four zones while the “big” groups – the Southwest, the
Southeast, the Northeast and the Northwest – will together have four
zones. So, the North balances the South; the East balances the West;
and the historical “Minorities” balances the historical
“Majorities.”
“The
fourth cluster of propositions
relates to the levels of responsibility and exercise of power or, in
more familiar language, tiers of government. Here we move from the
current three tiers to five tiers of government as follows:
federal, zonal (between federal and state), state, local
government and community (below the local government).
Each zone will be constituted by a number of states while a local
government ward will be constituted into one or more communities. At
the federal level, the president will be replaced by a presidential
council of 8 equal members – a member representing a zone – with
rotational headship within a presidential council term of four
years. The zone may or may not be a “government” as such, but
minimally it will be a unit for some strategic appointments and
location of some strategic industries, state institutions and
infrastructures. The communities will be the domain of direct mass
involvement in development, social welfare and security.
“So,
what will this type of restructuring – which we have called
“popular-democratic restructuring” – look like when it has been
constructed and set in motion? This question summons the fifth
cluster of propositions. The answer here is that the picture is
fragmentary and tentative. Only discussions can refine it. But the
clear features include: Nigeria will remain a federal republic; the
current principles of citizenship, fundamental human, political,
occupational and civil rights, as well as principles of state policy
will be enhanced; the federal government will give up a substantial
fraction of its current responsibility and appropriation to the
states and local governments. The states, in turn, will finance the
zones and the local governments will finance the communities.
Finally, and this is the “magic” of popular democracy – the “cost of
governance”, both in relative and absolute terms, will be much less
than what it is at present.” End of excerpts.
A
short description for the structure I am proposing could be: A
republican, secular and popular-democratic federal system under a
collective presidency with rotational headship. It is
necessary to emphasize that although I have drawn from several
sources to sketch this structure, in the final analysis, the
construction has been informed by the Nigerian political history,
the set of premises earlier articulated, current realities and
debates, the need to preserve the unity of the country – which is
the conscious ideological and political choice of the Nigerian Left:
in particular, the need to resolve the quarrel over the location and
movement of the presidency and prevent Nigeria’s ruling class from
plunging the nation into another civil war; and, above all, the need
and prospects of advancing the interests of the popular masses in
three directions: political empowerment at the grassroots,
substantive and substantial amelioration of their material condition
and expansion of the national democratic space. Unstated here is how
the Nigerian Left can use this structure to advance the struggle of
the working, toiling and poor masses of Nigeria.
For
the avoidance of doubt, “national unity,” the “conscious ideological
and political choice of the Nigerian Left” is not an idle or
class-collaborationist or Bonapartist choice. Nor is it a compromise
with, or surrender to neofascism. It is an independent and
responsible choice premised uncompromisingly on socialist vision of
the future, permanent revolutionary struggle for popular democracy
and socialism in Nigeria, and revolutionary internationalism.
Fighters against ethnic oppression in Nigeria should make or be
assisted by the Nigerian Left to make a distinction, as Rosa
Luxemburg did at the beginning of the 20th century,
between “the right to be free from ethnic oppression” and “the
right to national or ethnic self-determination” (which
historically – and for Marxists - has included the right to
secession). In the Nigerian context the former is a
popular-democratic aspiration; it is legitimate; it is correct, and
it can and will be realized. The latter is unrealizable, even
through war. Ethnic nationality fighters should expand their
attention to a particular root cause of our current national
calamity. This is, on the one hand, the exploitative socio-economic
foundation of the Nigerian nation – that is Capitalism, the
guarantor of all causes – and, on the other hand, the severely
limited definition of democracy, freedom and citizenship adopted, in
practice, by Nigeria’s rulers.
Nigerian Marxists and Leftists should also come to terms with the
fact that there is no real contradiction between their categorically
upholding the right to self-determination (up to and including the
right to secession) and their campaigning against exercising that
right in a given historical context. Our ideology and our history
have abundantly taught us that. What looks like a contradiction will
be swept away by the victory of socialism globally.
In
conclusion,
I would like to identify three statements recounted in this essay as
statements of three main, definitive, and successive moments in the
development of my thoughts on the question of National Unity in
Nigeria. These are my 1979 article in the Nigerian Chronicle,
Calabar, reproduced in my 1982 book, “Problems of Socialism: the
Nigerian Challenge” and titled, “A comment on National Unity”; my
contribution to the December 3, 1997 Seminar on “Ethnicity and
National Unity” organized by the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ),
Cross River State Council, Calabar, and titled, “The National
Question, Power Blocs and Popular-Democratic Transformation of
Nigeria” and my essay: “Restructuring: Propositions summarized”,
which appeared in The Guardian of Thursday, April 12, 2018.
I
re-affirm the main propositions in the three statements, and propose
that they are consistent and reflect, on the one hand, the
historical development of the country, and, on the other hand, the
historical development of the Nigerian Left and of myself. I affirm
that the only rupture in the development was the leap from
“criticism” to “criticism plus manifesto” by a movement and one of
its products that have grown to see political power as not only a
realistic and realizable political objective but also an immediate
one. I am however prepared, and indeed inclined to consign to our
archives the term “Restructuring” which I started using in my column
and in the press long before many of the current professional
politicians became politically conscious. In the place of
“popular-democratic restructuring”, I may revive my 1997
formulation: “popular-democratic transformation.”
However, the concept, “power bloc,” the way I have described it in
this essay, with inspiration from aspects of Nicos Poulanzas’
“Political Power and Social Classes,” is a Marxist category and
cannot be so easily consigned to the archives. As a last word, I
would request young Nigerian Marxists and Leftists to do a search of
our national newspapers of late 1980s to early 1990s and my
Guardian column of that period and determine the emergence and
employment of the following terms: Sovereign National Conference (SNC),
Geopolitical Restructuring, Power Blocs, Neofascism and Bonapartism.
They all developed during the fight against the Babangida
dictatorship.
Madunagu, mathematician and journalist, writes from Calabar, Cross
River State, Nigeria.
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