Given its assets, Nigeria should be one of the more progressive, forward-looking nations in Africa. It has significant oil reserves and other natural resources. Its farms and factories are highly productive. Indeed, Nigeria regularly earns a high ranking among nations in those categories. All that is window dressing, though. Many Nigerians remain desperately poor, unable to benefit from the nation's many assets.
Nigeria, beneath the surface, is beset by religious, ethnic and culture differences and plagued by political corruption. The result is readily apparent in crumbling infrastructure, near paralysis in governance and an increasingly frayed social fabric. A current national strike prompted by new rules governing a fuel subsidy is a case in point.
Nigeria, the fifth largest oil exporter to the United States, does not have the capacity to process the crude. It must, in fact, import a high percentage of the refined petroleum products it consumes. That makes the price of the product like gasoline prohibitive for ordinary Nigerians, most of whom live on less than $2 a day. What's kept the political situation relatively calm in recent years was a national subsidy that kept the cost of gasoline low so the poor could afford it.
Removal of the subsidy the first of the year doubled the cost of gas, prompted the strike and raised the possibility of a shutdown of the nation's oil and gas production. The administration of President Goodluck Jonathan says it is sympathetic to the strikers, but says that the nation no longer could afford the subsidy. Most Nigerians, save the wealthiest, disagree.
There is widespread belief in Nigeria that the subsidy would be sustainable if government corruption and cronyism ended. Indeed, there's little question that government is extraordinarily corrupt. Many outsider observers, in fact, say the question is not if corruption is present, but how many billions have been stolen over the years. The national strike and threat of an oil and gas production shutdown is a very direct demand for accountability and for a more equitable distribution of the nation's wealth.
So far, the strike has remained relatively peaceful. The unrest, though, has intensified rivalries between tribal groups and between Christians and Muslims. It's the same sort of hostility that prompted the ruinous Nigerian civil war -- remember Biafra? -- in the 1960s. The animosity of that time lingers. The hatreds demonstrated then remain a divisive and often deadly part of Nigerian society.
So far, there's no hint that the subsidy will be reinstated. Officials say the money once used to reduce fuel costs now will go for roads, schools and other public projects. Most Nigerians don't believe it. Rather, they expect most of it to be pocketed by politicians and the well-connected. Until hundreds of thousands of strikers can be convinced otherwise, Nigeria will continue to reel, and disruptions in world petroleum markets and concomitant increases in the price of oil will be increasingly likely.