Democracy So Far In Nigeria -By Abdulsalam Toyeeb Opeyemi

Firstly, the definition of the concept ‘democracy’ is very important. According to Abraham Lincoln ” Democracy is the government of the people, by the people and for the people”. However from this definition one might think it is also applicable in Nigeria but alas, we are not practicing democracy but ‘Crazy-Demo’. Democracy was derived from two Greek words ‘Demo’ which means People and ‘Kratos’ which means rule. However to be candid Dagrin was right by calling Nigeria system of government ‘CrazyDemo’. ‘Crazy’ which means insanity or madness and ‘Demo’ which means people. Which means According to Dagrin ‘it is a system which consist of Insane people’.

If not Ajimobi will not face the student and tell them ‘Eight month of what’, if not 2.2 billion dollars would not be embezzled by Sambo Dasuki. If not about 13 billion naira would not have been found in Ikoyi apartment. There are different types of democracy such as America democracy, Nigeria democracy due to resulting effect in each continent by the system giving different interpretation through out the globe. The story begins after independence in 1960 from the Great Britain. But our great nation fell into civil war and military coups in 1966 but since fully restoration on May 29, 1999 when Abdulsalam Abubakar handed over to former president Olusegun Obasanjo. 18 years of stability what is our achievement so far in this great nation Chinua Achebe a philosopher, wrote that”listen to Nigeria leaders and you will frequently hear the phrase ‘this great nation of ours’.

To be frank, Nigeria is not great and what is so great in this nation?. Our democracy has yielded nothing than non-payment of workers salary nationwide, lack of press freedom, Arbitrary arrest and torture due to lack of protection of human Rights, corruption institutionalization at all levels of government, religious and ethnic conflicts by the so called Elite and Unemployment.