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

Abstract
The state of insecurity has increased in Nigeria since the wake of the Fourth Republic in 1999. 
The heightened state of insecurity in the country could be blamed partly on increased 
protestations across the country. Various parts of Nigeria are saddled with the problem of 
terrorism, insurgency, militarization, secession, herdsmen attack, cattle/farmers rustling, 
banditry, kidnapping and other sectional and religious agitations. All the enumerated 
problems could probably be linked to bad governance which in turn has given rise to youth 
restiveness as a result of unemployment, poor infrastructure, poor policies and corruption. 
Violence and insecurity constitute a major challenge to planning for economic development 
and nation-building. They contribute immensely to the waste of the scarce resources in 
Nigeria. They are harbingers of destruction of lives and property. This paperhas therefore for 
its objective to explore the challenges posed by violence and insecurity on economic 
development and nation-building in Nigeria and their effect on the psyche of the people. 
Normative method approach and failed state theory are used to dissect the happenings caused 
by violence and insecurity in Nigeria since Fourth Republic (1999-2020) and to analyse its 
implications for economic development and nation-building.The paper made use of data 
collected mainly from secondary sources such as books, journals and internet reports. The 
findings reveal that violence and insecurity have indeed constituted serious impediment to 
economic growth and nation-building within the period covered by this work.

Keywords: Violence, Insecurity, Economic Development, Nation-Building, Nigeria's Fourth 
Republic.

Introduction 
The politics of Fourth Republic in Nigeria (1999-2020) has been volatile as it is related with 
violence and insecurity and various conflicts of different scope and dimensions. Notable 
conflicts and killings included but not limited to Odua Progress Congress (OPC) verses Hausa 
settlers conflict in Lagos in July 18,1999; OPC versus Ibo traders at Alaba International 
Market Lagos, July 13, 1999; OPC versus Ijaw Youths, October 28, 1999; OPC versus Hausa 
yam traders in Lagos, Nov 25, 1999; Igbo versus Hausa in Aba and Owerri, February 2000; Jos 
conflicts between Muslims and Christians Sept 11, 2001 and 2004; Fulani versus Zakibiam  in 
Benue State and Taraba States October 2001; Tarok versus  Hausa Conflict in Wase Local 
Government Area Plateau State, 2002 and 2005 (Ezeogidi 2013). Others include the numerous 
Fulani herdsmen attacks in Kaduna in Adamawa state, August 2016 (TVC News online Aug 2, 

CYNADO C.N.O. EZEOGIDI Ph.D
OZIOMA VICTORIA OKEZIE

ESTHER CHIAMAKA OKEZIE
Department of History and International Studies

Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu University, Igbariam, Nigeria

VIOLENCE AND INSECURITY: 
A CHALLENGE TO ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT AND NATION-BUILDING

 IN NIGERIA'S FOURTH  REPUBLIC 1999-2020



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2016), Fulani herdsmen attack in Belon in Benue State, May, 2018 (TVC News online 
February 20, 2020),  Fulani Headsmen attack in Uwheru Community in Delta State, February 
2020 and Fulani herdsmen attack in Mbanyiar community in Guma Local Government Area in 
Benue State on March 8, 2020 (Al Jazeera news online May 7, 2020).These conflicts have 
posed serious challenges to the country's economic development and inevitably slow down the 
country's nation-building process. 

Prior to the Fourth Republic, there were certainly pockets of insecurity in Nigeria 
which were more spread out in the Niger Delta area. Nwuba (1997:204) opines there was 
unpleasant and inevitable restiveness in the region because it appears that the “blessing of the 
Nigerian nation and the world in general is turning to a curse or woes”. Explaining further, 
Nwuba writes: 
From the earliest time in recent history, the Niger Delta region of Nigeria has never been 
incorrigibly insular nor irrationally imperious to internal and external restiveness. Armed 
conflicts and traditional restiveness have become part of their custom or culture.

The above statement refers to the period when, activists like Ken Saro-Wiwa and 
company were considered threats to Nigeria State under Gen Sani Abacha whose regime tried 
and summarily executed them. Violence is however increasingly becoming more widespread 
in nearly all parts of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. From the southern forest region to the 
Mambilla plateau, down to the savannah regions of the North, insecurity, violence and 
conflicts have infested the many parts our country as people witness increasing conflicts 
especially in Jos and its surroundings. Jos conflicts, Tarok versus Hausa conflicts mentioned 
above and others serve as classical example. Militarisation, secession, Herdsmen and Boko 
Haram attacks, kidnapping, armed banditry have become the order of the day. Every 
geographical region in Nigeria has its peculiarity.

In the East, it is secession as championed by the Independent People of Biafra (IPOB) 
and other similar bodies; in the far North, it is the Boko Haram attacks; in the North West, it is 
the kidnappers, armed bandits and cattle rustlers; in the North Central, it is the Fulani 
herdsmen; in the South West, the same herdsmen and kidnappers, and in the Niger Delta, it is 
the militarisation of the Youth. All these pose some major challenges to the economic 
development of Nigeria and constitute severe impediment to the country's nation building 
process in this Fourth Republic. If we take Mittee (2011:91-97) logic into consideration, it 
will be evident to us here that these acts of violence and insecurity take some negative tolls on 
Nigeria's economy. Mittee gave a practical example that between 2006 and 2008, kidnappers 
and hostage takers pocked ransoms of over $100 million (about N 15 billion). Also about 
680,000 barrels per day (bpd) of oil was lost to oil theft, whilst 1.3 million bpd was shut in for 
six months in 2009.

This paper therefore investigates what violence and insecurity have done to the 
economic development of Nigeria in her nation-building process in the Fourth Republic. What 
are the implications in terms of human beings sacrificed, able-bodied youths maimed, 
manpower lost and millions of people dislocated from their homes? How have successive 
regimes handled the situation? Are there better options? These and more are some of the 
questions that guide the study.

State and Nature of Violence and Insecurity in Nigeria
Bala Usman once theorised that: 

The most primary of the fabrics binding all human communities, throughout 



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

the world, from the earliest Stone Age hunting and gathering bands, up to today, 
has been the provision, on a sustained basis, of the security of life, and of the 
means of life, to the members of the community.

In Nigeria, even before the coming of Europeans, there had been pockets of violence and 
conflicts, the climax of which was the 30-month Nigeria-Biafra war that led to an estimated 
death of three million Biafrians. According to Wikipedia, “during the two and half years of the 
war, there were about 100,000 overall military casualties while about  500,000 and three 
million Biafrans died of starvation.” Ezeh, 2012() also asserted that “the failure of political and 
diplomatic agreement led to the economic blockade of the south-eastern region mostly 
dominated by the Christian Igbo community… during which millions of Igbo people faced 

”  
death by starvation and disease. However, the conflicts of the past three decades seem to be 
more sophisticated, deadly and confusing. Every part of Nigeria is affected, unlike during the 
Nigeria-Biafra war when attack was mainly focused on the Biafran enclave. Usman 
enumerated 33 internecine conflicts in Nigeria from 1980 to 2004, the cost of which was 
mostly land struggle for farming and other purposes. 

The intensity and volatility of conflicts and violence in Nigeria seem to be on the upsurge with 
the terrorist activities of Boko Haram insurgency in the North Eastern Nigeria. The activities of 
Boko Haram have left no one in doubt that they are terrorists' organisation operating in 
Nigeria. Their acts of violence have impinged on the security of Nigeria for a good numbers of 
years in this Fourth Republic. Shinkeiye (2004) defines security as the totality of actions and 
measures as well as legislative and operational procedures taken to ensure peace, stability and 
the overall well-being of a nation and its people. Francis on his part sees security as a feeling of 
safety from harm or danger and the defence, protection and preservations of core values. It 
simply has to do with survival and human existence. The above definitions are the direct 
opposite of insecurity characterised by violence that various parts of Nigeria are experiencing 
which has left much to be desired. 
Osakwe (2011:1-24.) noted that “there had been records of deadly game of “kidnap and 
ransom” with increasing incidents of violent criminality. He laments on the prevalence of 
arching lawlessness and insecurity in the land” In his words:

Many parts of Nigeria show evidence, approximating this Hobbesian 
description. Whatever the proximate and remote causes, effective government 
must act to stop the impunity of violent criminality and the cycle of ethnic and 
religious butchery. When this condition is achieved that is the emergence from 
this degenerative “state of nature”, and then the work of constructing the 
modern state can begin, through the application of laws, and the 
implementation of rational policies and regulation.

Nation-building cannot be achieved in a state of insecurity because as Osakwe postulates, it is 
one of the biggest “non-tariff barriers to trade and investment. Insecurity will countervail and 
undermine all policies for growth, poverty reduction and development.” Nigerians are worried 
and in protestation to the prevailing state of insecurity in the country. 

Achebe (2012:250) blamed the rise of terrorism in Nigeria on economic deprivation 
and corruption which in his words “produce and exacerbate financial and social inequities in a 
population, which in turn fuel political instability.” For Achebe, in the face of this scenario, 
“extremists of all kinds, particularly religious zealots and other political mischief makers, find 
a foothold to recruit supporters and sympathisers to help them launch terrorist attacks and 
wreak havoc in the lives of ordinary citizens”. In a nutshell, a major catalyst to insurgencies, 



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kidnappings, armed banditry, militarisation, secessionist agitations, riots and other violent 
behaviour in Nigeria is unemployment occasioned by bad leadership and unbridled 
corruption. 

Implications of insecurity and violence in Nigeria
Arowosegbe (2005:25) has isolated insecurity of lives and property as some of the key 
challenges facing Nigeria in this Fourth Republic, especially from 1999-2014.Odey and Agba 
(2011:147-165) are also of the opinion that “insecurity is a cause for poverty in that it disrupts 
the socio-economic order in the society thereby keeping people out of their productive 
ventures hence poverty.”Orhero (2015) has argued that “expenditures on security are essential 
components of the development process.” If the resources that would have been put in the 
socio-economic development in terms of infrastructure, health, education and other projects 
have not been diverted to quantifiably out of ratio fund to quell violence and insecurity and 
provide for Internally Displaced Persons' Camps (IDP), more structures would have been 
developed. Orhero also noted that “insecurity is a drain on national resources at the expense of 
people's well-being”.

Boko Haram as, an insurgent organization, has indeed grossly depleted the economy of 
the North and the rest of the nation. Its continued violence has affected every sector of the 
economy in the country. The plunging of the economy into recession in 2016 could be said to 
have had some linkage to the violence and insecurity perpetrated by the activities of Boko 
Haram. Indeed, in Human Right Watch (HRW), Okereocha (2014) observed that the world 
investment report of the United Nation conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) 
estimated that Nigeria lost a huge sum of N1.33 trillion Foreign Direct Investments (FDI) due 
to the nefarious activity of Boko Haram. Similarly, the United Nations Humanitarian and 
Resident Co-ordinator in Nigeria, Kallon asserted that Boko Haram insurgency has claimed 
over 27,000 civilian lives since its beginning in 2009.He also noted that it was still raging and 
called for a prioritisation of prevention mechanism in terms of possible developments and 
humanitarian actions.

The implication of violence and insecurity in Nigeria are indeed many and varied. 
Dissecting it is dependent on the intellectual prism one looks at. To begin with, the people have 
been demoralised and their psyche bastardized. This does not augur well for nation building. 
Since violence has taken over the place of dialogue and negotiation, and statements of threats 
have been preferred to discussions and diplomacy, mistrust, suspicion and volatility have 
therefore become the order of the day. Consequently, fear, religious fanaticism and the 
destruction of lives property have overtaken every sector of the society especially in the North 
East. In addition, the Fulani Herdsmen attack mostly the Christian population of Central and 
Eastern Nigeria. Lamenting on the great loss suffered by Christians due to such attacks 
between 2018 and 2019, Mailafia (2019) stated: 

The church of Christ in Nigeria is among the most persecuted in the world. In 
the North-East, some 2000 churches have been destroyed and more than 400 
clergy killed. During the past year, 11 Catholic priests have been killed by 
faceless armed herdsmen militias in Enugu State. The latest victim is Father 
Paul Offu, who was gunned down on Thursday, August 1, 2019. … Last week 
five pastors belonging to the Redeemed Church of Christ were abducted by 
kidnappers along the Sagamu-Benin-Ore Road on their way to a church 
conference in Mowe, Ogun state (Mailafia, 2019:31).



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

Who then is safe? The answer is that no one is safe. Open Door, an international Non-
governmental Organisation (NGO) that documents the persecution of Christians around the 
world, claims that six thousand Christians were killed during the first half of 2018 in Nigeria 
alone. A greater number of this figure fled as refugees from the attacked zones and ultimately 
ended up as Internally Displayed Persons (IDPs) in the different camps scattered all over 
Nigeria. According to Mailafia (2019:31) “people who do such things are not only shameless 
cowards; they are strangers to both God and humanity. Their aim is to brutalize the society and 
to create an atmosphere of fear. Fear in its turn will generate bitter hatred. Bitterness and hatred 
bottled over a long period, will sooner or later, explode into widespread violence of all against 
all.” Furthermore, Aribisala (2019:40) has warned that, “there is a revolution already 
underway in Nigeria: the revolutionaries are armed–robbers, pen-robbers, “area-boys,” 
“yahoo–yahoo boys,” herdsmen, kidnappers and 419 scammers.” The people of Nigeria live 
and move indeed in constant fear of insecurity. Hence Aribisala (2019:40) further noted: “This 
revolutionary criminality has found its most profound expression in armed robbery and 
kidnappings. Everyone is now wary of travelling inter-city for fear of being kidnapped. If you 
fall into the trap of these hoodlums, the going rate is 5 million naira.”

The nature of the violence and security has also become widespread. Kidnapping, which 
used to be localised in certain areas of Eastern Nigeria, has become a national phenomenon. 
The Fulani herdsmen menace which operated mostly in Northern Nigeria has turned its 
direction southward. Gangsters and criminals are operating with carefree lance in almost all 
sectors of the federation. The Churches in the North-East have become death-trap as Boko 
Haram insurgence launches frequent attacks in these places of worship, claiming the lives of 
innocent people and destroying their property.

Resource Mismanagement and the Escalation of Violence in Nigeria since 1999
One of the major factors that escalate violence is government's inability to allocate resources 
equitably. The rich-get-richer and the poor-get-poorer syndrome seem to promote such poor 
allocation of resources and it is a big threat to nation-building in Nigeria. It fuels 
disequilibrium which is a catalyst for tension and violence in the country. Lakefema (2019:31) 
has submitted that “Nigeria has built a society where a handful have cornered the wealth of the 
country and privatised its resources. Where a Senator nets N14 million ($38,356) monthly, and 

 .
the worker on the National Minimum Wage earns N18,000 ($50.57) monthly” How can there 
be peace and security in such state of disequilibrium and inequality? 

The country's oil wealth could ordinarily provide adequate for all the children in Nigeria in 
standard schools even with free lunch meals, but the reverse is the case. 13.2 million Nigerian 
school children are out of school, and the standard of existing schools is grossly inadequate. 
The classrooms are over-crowded and some schools have no provision for what could be called 
classrooms. Indeed Lakemfa (2019:31) asks: “what magic will be done to make the children 
from this background not to be violent when they grow up? More so, with little or no means of 
legitimate livelihood!” It would therefore not out of place for one to agree also with Lakemfa 
(2019:31) that “Nigeria through conflict and violence has witnessed some depopulation 
beginning with its three year civil war from 1967 with an estimated two million soul. In the last 
decade, the Boko Haram terrorists have killed over 27,000 with an estimated two million 
displaced.”

The money spent by the Nigerian government in handling insecurity problem is indeed 
enormous. In the first six months of 2018 alone, not less than 1,300 Nigerians lost their lives 



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with over 300,000 people dislocated and lodged in the various IDP camps. These became 
dependent on the Nigerian government for their daily maintenance. Opukri and Etekpe, 
(2019:31) contend that in the 2012 budget, the federal government mapped out 21.91 per cent, 
that is, US $5.58 billion to security agencies alone, while other pressing issues of governance 
like health and education were neglected. It is therefore not out of place for one to align with 
the view of Lakemfa that “due to mismanagement especially of its human and natural 
resources, poverty and hunger has grown so much in Nigeria that it has infamously become the 
world's poverty capital with 87 million living below $2 a day.” Furthermore, Igbuozor writes 
that according to Global Peace Index, between 2011 and 2012, there was a notable fall in peace 
as Nigeria dropped four places 146 out of 150 countries in global peace ranking. This marked 
Nigeria as one of the least peaceful countries in West Africa.

Conclusion
Violence and insecurity have thrived in Nigeria for twenty one years without interruption in 
the Fourth Republic. However, it is not without skirmishes of probable disintegration 
orchestrated by agents and promoters of failed state theory as exemplified by terrorists and 
separate state agitators. But still the country has continued to survive. The resilience of the 
citizen in the face of such unabated violence and insecurity points to the fact that Nigeria could 
be a better place ifonly government would put in place positive mechanisms to address the 
situation. Equity in the allocation of the nation's wealth could be considered a major factor to 
be addressed to boost economic development and enhance nation-building. If the education 
and health sectors receive adequate funding by the government, this would also go a long way 
to promote quality education, healthy living and create more jobs to take the hoodlums out of 
street, thereby reducing violence and insecurity to the barestminimum. As this study has 
exposed, violence and insecurity have indeed posed enormous challenges and constituted 
grave impediment to the economic development and nation-building in Nigeria within the first 
two decades of the Fourth Republic. The solution to the problem may however call for a 
rethink of the present system of operation of governance which seems to have failed the 
people. It is for this reason that the paper makes the following recommendations.

Recommendations
The paper recommends that for violence and insecurity to be reduced and eventually 
eliminated in Nigeria, Nigeria needs to be restructured in order to have strong institutions with 
independence from the presidency. The National Assembly which is the legislative arm of 
government should be independent of the executive. Also, the judiciary should be independent 
of the two other arms of government. On this note, the paper is advocating for strong practice 
of separation of powers. And there should be constitutionalism and Rule of Law. The law of the 
land must be respected by all, irrespective of position or authority. There should not be 
impunity in legal process of the nation. Also, the law enforcement agents must not be selective 
in the application of laws. If offenders are brought to book accordingly, violence and 
insecurity would have been nipped in the bud. 



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