From the 1980 Maitatsine uprising to the 2009 Boko Haram up-rising, Nigeria was bedevilled by ethno-religious conflicts with devastating human and material losses. But the Boko Haram uprising of July 2009 was significant in that it not only set a precedent, but also reinforced the attempts by Islamic conservative elements at imposing a variant of Islamic religious ideology on a secular state. Whereas the religious sensitivity of Nigerians provided fertile ground for the breeding of the Boko Haram sect, the sect's blossoming was also aided by the prevailing economic dislocation in Nigerian society, the advent of party politics (and the associated desperation of politicians for political power), and the ambivalence of some vocal Islamic leaders, who, though they did not actively embark on insurrection, either did nothing to stop it from fomenting, or only feebly condemned it. These internal factors coupled with growing Islamic fundamentalism around the world make a highly volatile Nigerian society prone to violence, as evidenced by the Boko Haram uprising. Given the approach of the Nigerian state to religious conflict, this violence may remain a recurring problem. This paper documents and analyses the Boko Haram uprising, as well as its links with the promotion of Islamic revivalism and the challenges it poses to the secularity of the Nigerian state.
Despite the time gap between the Maitatsine riots and the Boko Haram insurrection, the socio economic conditions that sustained the risings in 1980 are relevant to the Boko Haram situation. Between Maitatsine and Boko Haram: Islamic Fundamentalism and the Response of the Nigerian State Abimbola O. Adesoji Nigeria has a long history of religious conflicts, some of the most virulent being those of the Maitatsine (1980s) and Boko Haram (July 2009). The latter matched the former in intensity, organization, and spread. Given the international attention to global terrorism, there is the likelihood that fundamentalist groups receive motivation, material, and ideological support or influence from a global jihadist movement. Unresolved national issues, including the weak economy, weak security and intelligence apparatuses, and the failure to define what the national culture and identity is, are critical factors. The precedent of Maitatsine and the government's handling of it suggest that government incapacity and lack of political will have served to encourage recurrence and question the state's capacity. This paper discusses the resurgence of violence under the guise of religious revivalism and draws parallels between the Maitatsine uprisings and the Boko Haram uprising. It examines the Nigerian state response to these uprisings. It concludes that unless the state addresses concretely and tackles bravely the conditions that can aid or fuel violent religious revivalism, uprisings may recur.
Beyond playing its major role of informing, educating and entertaining, the press in different contexts, cultures and dispensations remains a major propaganda tool, and hence its use and abuse by proprietors, political and government elites, and people of influence in society. The clamour to establish and sustain a newspaper or a chain of publications becomes understandable even when the challenges are great. Whereas the desire to promote vibrant nationalism, challenge autocracy in different forms, or pursue a cause that the proprietor strongly believes in could be central to the founding of a newspaper, the use to which it is put – which oftentimes could be the hidden motive for its establishment or a manifestation of the derailment of the original purposes – has provoked interest in probing the motives for newspaper ownership. As the oldest surviving privately owned newspaper in Nigeria, the Nigerian Tribune (NT) provides a classic example of how newspapers come to serve a common cause while at the same time projecting the personal ambitions and interests of their founders. This article examines the challenges of private newspaper ownership in Nigeria using the NT as a case study. The article is situated within the context of theories on the political economy of media with emphasis on the propaganda model. It argues that in spite of NT’s contribution to the nationalist struggle and the process of nation-building, the newspaper was a potent political weapon in the hands of its owner. The use to which it was put by the successor-owner lends further credence to this claim. The article concludes that among other factors, a combination of dynamism and ideologically driven partisanship is needed to sustain newspapers and improve their effectiveness.
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