₦airaland Forum

Nigeria is drifting toward political violence that may result in disputed February elections and authorities need to take action to avert such an outcome, International Crisis Group said.

An Islamist insurgency and a polarizing campaign for the presidency pitting candidates from the mainly Muslim north against an incumbent from the largely Christian south point to “a very perilous contest whose results may also be disputed,” the Brussels-based group said today in an e-mailed report.

“Boko Haram’s insurgency makes these elections particularly fraught, but it is only a microcosm of the country’s deepening political, religious and ethnic divides,” Nnamdi Obasi, ICG’s senior analyst for West Africa, said in the report. “With only three months to the polls, mitigating bloodshed requires urgent improvements in security and electoral arrangements, as well as in political mind-sets.”

President Goodluck Jonathan, a Christian from the southern oil region, has said he wants to be the ruling-party candidate to seek re-election in the Feb. 14 vote. Former military ruler Muhammadu Buhari and former Vice President Atiku Abubakar are both vying for the opposition All Progressive Congress ticket. The People’s Democratic Party, in charge of the country since the military relinquished power in 1999, is facing its strongest challenge yet from the APC, formed through the merger of three leading opposition parties.

Africa’s biggest economy and most populous country of more than 170 million is almost evenly split between Christians and Muslims.

A victory for Jonathan may spark protests and clashes in the north, while a loss would increase the risk of violence in the oil-rich Niger River delta, his home region, according to ICG.

To contact the reporter on this story: Dulue Mbachu in Abuja at dmbachu@bloomberg.net


http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-11-21/nigeria-campaign-tone-signals-violent-vote-crisis-group-says

It's the End of the World as We Know It

atlwireles:
It's the End of the World as We Know It

Sometimes am almost forced to accept that democratic governance isn't good for the black race

ogbronx:
Sometimes am almost forced to accept that democratic governance isn't good for the black race

I hope you are speaking for yourself.