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COOU Journal of Arts and Humanities (CJAH) Vol. 5 No. 3, 2020

Abstract
Democracy has had a chequered history in the Nigerian state. The simple reason for this 
unfortunate situation is to be located in the unfortunate but true fact that there has been series 
of military interventions in the country since she attained her political independence leading 
often to a halt in the nation's march to democratic tranquillity and paradise. The role of the 
military is clearly defined all over the world. It has the traditional duty of guarding the 
territorial integrity of any nation against external invasion and aggression. However, for some 
time in Nigeria, the military has left its traditionally assigned role and dabbled in politics and 
politicking through military interventions. This paper critically analyses why the military 
often intervenes and interrupts the nation's march to democratisation on a very regular basis. 
Military intervention no matter the reason or reasons for its occurrence is an aberration. Since 
the general notion is that the worst democracy is better than any best military government, the 
paper strongly advocates for the enthronement and sustenance of true and abiding democracy 
in the country to make a future military intervention in the nation's democracy unachievable 
and unrealisable.

Keywords: Military, sustenance, democracy, Nigeria, Philosophy, probe.

Introduction
Since she attained political independence in 1960, Nigeria's democracy has been in shambles. 
This is obvious due to incessant military interventions in the polity which has made democracy 
look like an unstable mode of governance to most Nigerians. In all the past military 
interventions, the military has always accused the civilians, nay the politicians of insensitivity 
to the plight of the masses, tribalism, nepotism, corruption and ineptitude in leadership among 
other numerous vices usually given as reasons for taking power from the civilians.

However, the irony of it all is that the military once they take up the mantle of leadership in the 
country usually fall victim to those same vices they accuse the politicians of. This paper 
strongly opines that the military in Nigeria should be subordinate to civil authorities. However, 
it equally postulates that the only way to make this subordination come to fruition is for true 
democracy to be enthroned and sustained in the country to make military intervention 
unfashionable and highly unreasonable. Anything short of this may still bring back the military 
in power sometime, someday and this will be an unwanted development and a serious 
drawback on the nation's democracy.

GODWIN OKANEME, PhD
Department of Philosophy

Faculty of Arts
University of Abuja

Email: godwin.okaneme@uniabuja.edu.ng
G.S.M. 08036775774

THE MILITARY AND SUSTENANCE OF 
DEMOCRACY IN NIGERIA: A PHILOSOPHICAL PROBE



The Military in Nigerian Politics 
One of the most remarkable events in world history during the past three or four decades has 
been the incessant occurrence of military coups in Africa and other Third World countries. 
Nigeria, the self-acclaimed giant of Africa has had more than its fair share of these military 
coups. Okadigbo (1986:30) opines that “military government is the specific form of 
authoritarian government wherein power is held by soldiers or wherein soldiers constitute a 
nominally civilian government”. In this segment of the paper, we shall give a concise history 
of military interventions in Nigerian politics.

According to Gutteridge (1975:5) “it is now statistically justifiable to regard military 
rules as norm rather than a deviance, certainly in comparison with any other satisfactorily 
defined form of government”. This could be said to be true of Nigeria prior to the return of 
democracy in the country in 1999. Since the bulk of African countries had political 
independence in the early sixties to date, military intervention has virtually been on the rise in 
these countries but the preponderance of such interventions in Nigeria has been unprecedented 
and highly disturbing.

The history of military interventions in Nigeria is quite rich, vast and varied. The first 
military coup in the country took place on January 15, 1966. The build-up to that military coup 
could be said to have started in 1964. The election of that year was Nigeria's first major post-
independence election and it had heavy tribal leaning. The various political skirmishes that 
bedevilled the country within this period greatly weakened the bond of trust and friendship 
among the people of the three major tribes in Nigeria. There was general discontent among the 
citizenry. The discontent, acrimony and insecurity made the first military intervention 
desirable for the people then as the politicians had lost grip of political affairs in the country.

The second military coup took place on July 29, 1966, which was barely six months 
after the first coup. This was as a result of the disenchantment of a section of the country 
against the leaders of the first coup. Speaking on the coup, Madiebo (1980:27) stated:

I saw the handwriting on the wall. Indeed no one could have failed to recognise 
the signs of the impending disaster. But to reassure myself, I personally 
forwarded a report to Army headquarters in Lagos attaching texts of some of 
the speeches and publications. I did not expect any reaction from Lagos and 
there was none. 

The third military coup took place on 29th July, 1975 with the overthrow of Gowon's regime in 
a bloodless coup that saw the emergence of General Murtala Mohammed as the next Head of 
state. His rein though short, was very revolutionary in outlook and it brought a lot of positive 
changes to the Nigerian state. He in turn was overthrown by Colonel Dimka in a bloody coup 
during in which the former lost his life. This happened on the 13th of February, 1976. 
However, Mohammed's short regime is to be remembered by Nigerians for the sweeping 
changes it made on the nation's socio-political and economic landscape. With the brutal 
assassination of General Mohammed by Colonel Dimka's coup, the lot of the leadership of the 
country fell on General Olusegun Obasanjo who ruled the country from February 1976 till 
1979 when he handed over the reins of the state to President Shehu Shagari, the first elected 
executive President of Nigeria.

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Under Shagari, the civilians ruled for four uninterrupted years but could not get their 
acts together. Corruption, ethnicism, nepotism, crass opportunism and monumental electoral 
malpractices still characterized the Second Republic culminating in the military seizing power 
again on 31st  December, 1983. Major General Muhammadu Buhari who subsequently 
became the Head of State after that coup was himself toppled in another bloodless coup on 27th 
August, 1985 culminating in General Babangida becoming the next military ruler. He took the 
title of President thus becoming the first military ruler in the country to take such a title. 
Babangida ruled the country till 1994 and his regime plunged the Nigerian state into one of the 
worst political crises in her annals. His regime is to be remembered for annulling the 1993 
presidential election adjudged by both Nigerian and foreign observers as the most free and fair 
election ever conducted in the history of the country. That election was acclaimed to have been 
won by Chief M.K.O Abiola of blessed memory.

With the annulment of the June 12 1993 poll and the attendant political, social and 
economic brouhaha it brought on the country, Babangida stepped aside on August 27, 1993 and 
installed an Interim National Government led by Chief Ernest Shonekan. Such a political 
nomenclature was hitherto unknown in the country's political lexicon. The heat of the 
cancellation of the June 12 1993 election was too much for Shonekan to handle and on 
November 17, 1993, he was effortlessly eased out of office by General Sani Abacha who 
subsequently became the next military Head of State.

Abacha set up his transition programme with the convocation of a Constitutional 
Conference in June, 1994. The conference concluded its assignment a year later and was 
subsequently dissolved. Abacha's penchant for materialism made him one of the most corrupt 
leaders the country has ever produced. His clandestine plan to transform into a civilian 
president through self-succession made him very unpopular among Nigerians. His high-
handedness and dictatorial tendencies earned him the obnoxious sobriquet of Nigeria's 
maximum ruler. His demise on June 8, 1998 brought his deceitful, treacherous and dubious 
transition programme to a natural end and Nigerians were freed from his draconian rule. 

With his demise, the army high command unanimously chose General Abdulasalam 
Abubakar as the next head of state of the country. It was him that midwifed the Fourth Republic 
by conducting elections within so short a time he assumed power and handed over to Obasanjo 
who was duly elected as the second executive president of the country on May, 29th, 1999, thus 
bringing to an end the long and torturous cycle of military rule in the country. 

However, it should be noted that the frequent military coups that had bedevilled the 
country over the years is a pointer to the instability of military regimes for according to Finer 
(1985:16), “only one thing is so far certain. The coups and counter-coups affirm the 
fundamental instability of military governments themselves”.

Why Does the Military Intervene in Nigerian Politics?
According to Dukor (2003:225), “The general concern, regrets, skepticism and cynicism 
about military incursion in African politics is because it is an aberration and against civilized 
conventional practices and democratic norms”. Despite the widely held view, that military 
rule is an aberration, and a deviance, rather than the norm, the military has continued to 
intervene in Nigeria's political affairs. The question then is why is it so? It is a historical fact 
that out of Nigeria's nearly sixty years as an independent nation, she has spent almost three 
decades in military rule.

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The reasons for constant military coups are not far-fetched. One of the greatest 
problems in Nigeria that has aided the flourishing of military rule is ethnicity. According to 
Nzeribe (1986:45):

The central body has been consistently under the control of people with strong 
ethnic bias. Ethnic interests have therefore stood paramount in the activities of 
these individuals. Those ethnic groups whose persons do not occupy important 
positions within the central body become alienated, frustrated and left with the 
crumbs of the national income. This sometimes results in an attempt at 
secession for instance the Biafran war.

According to Ubi (2008:90), “the term ethnicity is the sanitised and politically accepted 
version of the term “tribe” or “tribal” officiation”. Having stated all these, one may naturally 
ask, how has ethnicity been a reason for frequent military interventions and therefore a 
stumbling block to the growth of democracy in Nigeria? The answer may be very obvious and 
perhaps easy to explain. 

Ethnically which is the fanatical love for one's ethnic group has really hampered 
political growth in Nigeria. Many scholars are of the considered view or opinion that the type 
of politics played in the country is mainly “ethnic politics”. This could be seen from the fact 
that many Nigerians still cast their votes during national elections not according to the political 
ability of the candidates vying for elections but according to the ethnic group of the candidates. 
In some past elections, ethnic disturbances have led to a breakdown of law and order in the 
country leading to military coups.

Another reason for constant military interventions in the country is the poor quality of 
leadership being offered to the country by the political class. Bello (2005:48), Amadu 
(2005:95), Okolo (1994:85), Okolo (1985:12), Ekweke (2008:21), Agu (2005:69), Toyo 
(2008:153) and Achebe (1983:1) all agree to the unfortunate reality of ineffectual political 
leadership in the country and its attendant negative consequences.

One other major reason for frequent military interventions in Nigeria is the 
preponderance of corruption among the political class. Corruption normally takes the form of 
both diverting public fund to party and private coffers or of the enrichment of the political 
leaders at the expense of the public good through the illicit award of contracts and other 
deviant behaviours. Allegation of pubic officers demanding 10 per cent 'kick back' is common 
among the political fold and has always been cited by the military top brass as one of the major 
reasons for military interventions in the country. In the words of Akpotor (2003:356):

The society cannot be expected to bring public officers to ridicule for corrupt practices 
with their appeals to moral conscience when the leadership is not a saint. We support 
this position with the popular equity maxim which says 'who come to equity must 
come with clean hands'. It is therefore recommended that corruption can only be 
reduced or eliminated through a combative political will of the leadership and the 
reciprocal social will of the governed. This is so because the society can never be 
watchdog for a government that lacks the political will to neither unveil corrupt 
practices no deal with the culprits.

While allegations of corruption are at times difficult to substantiate, the nagging issue is not 
whether they are true or not but whether people believe them to be true. Although corruption 

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alone should not necessarily be a cogent reason for military intervention, a situation whereby a 
few people that make up the political class live in great affluence and opulence while majority 
of Nigerians wallow in abject and unmitigated poverty is simply unacceptable. A lot of 
Nigerians unwittingly support the military taking over power as a result of disenchantment 
with the style of leadership offered by the political class in the country.   

Finally, it must be stated without equivocation that the unbridled quest for power by the 
military has also contributed immensely to the escalation of military interventions in the 
country in the past. According to Dukor (2003:225):

There is the physical natural law of causation to which everything in space is 
susceptible. It seems therefore that military foray into the body politics of 
African nations must have backgrounds or causes or circumstantial 
environmental or polity that necessitated it. In the history of human thought, 
the military is not totally alien to political struggle.

The truth of the matter is that despite their attraction to power, the military is not trained 
for political leadership but is primarily trained to defend the territorial integrity of the nation 
for according to Ogbinaka (2003:248), “the military is a government of men, not of law. It is to 
this extent a bad system. It is an authoritarian government”.

Sustaining Democracy in Nigeria to Make Military Intervention Unfashionable 
Before delving into the issue of sustaining democracy in Nigeria, we will try and clarify the 
concept of democracy itself. To define democracy is indeed a herculean task or responsibility. 
This view is shared by Elaigwu (2005:281), Adeyemo (2001:86), Jega (2007:11), Omoregbe 
(2007:21) and Michael (2006:73) 

Democracy simply defined is the government of the people, by the people and for the 
people. This is a popular definition of democracy as was enunciated by Abraham Lincoln, an 

th
American statesman and lawyer who served as the 16  president of the United States of 
America. However, democracy is much wider in scope than a special political form, a method 
of running a government. It takes into full account material and spiritual values, culture, the 
standard of living, social and economic relationships. If one follows this line of thought, it can 
be seen that this type of meaning raises democracy above the level of a mere governmental 
system. 

It gives it the power and inspiration to seek for the individual in the society the “good 
life” and the promotion of his well-being. This seems to be the view of Laski (1942:24) when 
he posited that “Democracy has a context in every sphere of life”. Democracy can flourish 
only in a country where democratic ideals like respect for the rule of law, separation of powers, 
freedom of the press and freedom of expression among others are in place. This view tallies 
with that of Odey (2002:14) where he stated:

Abraham Lincoln, the great American President, knew why he defined 
democracy as “a government of the people, by the people and for the people'. 
There in America, where he gave that definition, the government has remained 
for the people. The brains that fashioned the American system of presidential 

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COOU Journal of Arts and Humanities (CJAH) Vol. 5 No. 3, 2020



democracy were men and women who believed in the philosophy of common 
good. That is why Americans cherish Lincoln's definition to date. The man 
believed in the type of democracy he defined and worked on the principles of 
that definition and made America great.

Despite the much taunted advantages of democracy, one cannot in all honesty and sincerity say 
that we have enthroned true and lasting democracy in Nigeria despite two decades of unbroken 
democratic practice in the country. As already stated in this paper, much of the military 
interventions that occurred in this country were as a result of democratic instability in the 
nation's polity. According to Sha (2005:141-142):

The factors that obstruct the consolidation of democracy in Nigeria include the 
ultra-privatization of transition projects, political instability due to recurring 
ethno-religious conflicts, weakening of political institutions, corruption and 
the weakening of the national economy through bad management.

It may therefore not be wrong or out of place to assert that democracy as presently practiced in 
Nigeria is bereft of most if not all the democratic tenets and ethos hence Nigerians are 
gradually losing faith in our present democratic experiment that has almost succeeded in 
relegating the masses to the background in the daily scheme of things in the country. The issue 
of good governance has almost become an unrealizable dream and ideal in our democracy and 
yet true democracy is supposed to engender good governance for according to Yahaya 
(2004:109):

A democratically elected government should be the guarantor of good 
governance. A viable institutional framework must exist to facilitate the 
operation of democratic order. Both state and non-state organisations must 
have sufficient political space to interact and compete for influence. The 
institutional framework that will facilitate the plural democratic process must 
be strong and viable. It must be supported and not undermined by the political 
leaders so that these institutions can play their role in the consolidation of 
democracy through checks and balances and a vibrant press. 

Democracy can never be sustained in the country if all the factors impeding its true and 
enduring enthronement are not eliminated or at least minimized or mitigated. Such negative 
factors include electoral malpractices, especially election rigging, political corruption, 
ethnicity, excessive materialism. Democracy, nay politics is service-oriented in the sense that 
it offers individuals the opportunity to offer selfless service to humanity. However our 
politicians may never offer this type of service when all they have in mind while entering 
politics is embezzlement of public funds. Our politicians should therefore cultivate new and 
enduring value of service to humanity as opposed to the present rat-race to share the national 
cake with reckless abandon, no wonder Okolo (1993:14) asserts that “among Nigerians, the 
dominant values which also characterize the society as a whole are easily discernable. 
Perhaps, the most glaring one is excessive love for money”.

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Again our elections in Nigeria deserve a critical scrutiny. The most recent general elections 
held in Nigeria – the 2003, 2007, 2011, 2015 and 2019 elections left much to be desired. While 
in the elections, Nigerians demonstrated their patriotism towards enthroning democracy, the 
politicians on their own had a different agenda as they were busy manipulating the elections to 
their shameful advantage. Even the 2015 and 2019 general elections were said to have been 
hopelessly rigged to the utter consternation of the people who trouped out in their numbers to 
vote in those elections. It is therefore suggested that our electoral laws should be strengthened 
to deal with election riggers and other electoral vices.

Conclusion
We have all along been discussing issues of the military and sustenance of democracy in 
Nigeria. It must be noted that one of the safest guarantees against military intervention in any 
democracy is good governance. Good governance ensures that democratic tenets are put into 
full use thus making available to the people real dividends of democracy. When that happens, 
the masses themselves will become the real defenders of democracy against military 
intervention. Even the military themselves will become direct beneficiaries of true democratic 
rule in the country. Anything short of good governance in our democracy may still bring back 
the military into the political terrain sometime, someday and this is something millions of 
Nigerians will never desire. Our democracy should therefore be deepened and made people-
oriented to ensure that the welfare of the citizens is always guaranteed. This is perhaps the only 
sure way to make the country's democracy take root and prevent any future military 
intervention in the country.   

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