ABSTRACT
The study examines democracy and good governance, a comparative study of the Goodluck Jonathan and Muhammadu Buhari (civilian administrations).
The qualitative method was used. Qualitative data are not statistical. They involve analysis of discourses, utterances, meaningful linguistic items, themes and similar data from sources like textbooks, newspaper articles, journalistic reports, internet materials, seminars and interviews. Data was taking from many of the itemised sources.
The study revealed that; the whole idea of good governance is the same thing with the dividends of democracy; On the comparative findings, Goodluck Jonathan's term in office cannot only be summarised by its failures to address the issue of corruption and insecurity, among others; Buhari administration has been able to forge important diplomatic and economic relations with China, which is a growing economic power house in the global economy.
The study concluded that; the issue of ensuring good governance in Nigeria should be the main focus for all due to its great implications on democracy and vice-versa, because without a participative democratic process, national development becomes a hard feat to achieve. Democracy can be established in Nigeria through good governance, fairness, justice, transparency, accountability.
The study recommended that; the EFCC and ICPC should be made fully autonomous in order to be able to fight corruption without any external interference; the issue of corruption should be given adequate priority; democracy in Nigeria should be participatory; Nigeria’s foreign policy in present-day must be premised solely on national interest with emphasis on national security and welfare, regional and global peace, as well as robust multilateral diplomacy that is tailored along strong strategic partnership with friendly states in the global arena; the government should give adequate attention to the growing rate of unemployment in the country; the federal government of Nigeria needs to set positive mechanisms in place to birth new foreign policies that will contain the crisis of underdevelopment, the challenges of poverty, leadership, political development; free primary and secondary education should be introduced in all states of the federation.
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
1.1. Background to the Study
The relationship between democracy and good governance lies at the heart of this study. Fundamentally, the task of any society is to reconstruct and revitalize itself, build its own capabilities and educate, organize and mobilize the citizens with the view to ensuring that democratic space is expanded; democratic culture is deepened, and democracy itself is consolidated and made to become sustainable and irreversible, (Akindele, 2015). Nourished by the milk of liberal constitutionalism and political imperative, indeed the comfort of human rights, a vibrant democratic structure enhanced by popular sovereignty; placing powers in the hands of the people, men and women, and their popularly elected representatives, and in doing so, creates the very conditions which civil society will blossom and flower, (Akindele, 2017). Sadly, the environmental factor surrounding the Nigerian democracy makes democratic institutions to remain feeble and fragile, thus, becoming vulnerable to collapse when faced with a low level of political stress.
However, it is conceivable that in the euphoria and optimism, one may forget that democracy, though unarguably the best form of government for any country, is as well maybe the most difficult to manage. Democracy, it should be remembered is not a potted plant which can be transplanted into any soil and grown without work or effort, (Adejumobi, 2015). In the peculiar circumstances of Nigeria’s Fourth Republic (1999), as apply observed by Professor Sam Ogovbaire claimed that, the problem of democracy revolves around how to forge a development process which is simultaneously participatory for individual citizens, sensitive to, and protective of individual rights, freedoms and liberty; accommodative of multiple and competitive loyalties; and generative of economic growth and distributive justice, (Ogovbaire, 2015).
The impact of the above is that non-democratic states of Saudi Arabia, Japan, China, etc, are even more stable even though, democracy is not in practice in those countries. It is apparent to ask here whether democracy can be synonymous with good governance. The answer without a doubt, is in the affirmative. Thus, democracy in the developing countries Nigeria inclusive is antagonistic to good governance, (Allen, 2010). For example, the problem of Nigeria is even more perplexed by the tendency, especially election, the 2019 presidential elections. These are all indices of poor political culture, which cannot be the same as good governance.
Uya (2018) observed that, though the successful conduct of free and fair elections is an important basis of democracy and good governance, democratization of a policy involves much more. These include: love of freedom and equality; resentment of autocracy, freedom of dissent, respect for individuality of each individual, creation of fitting environment for individual to free himself from the constraints of poverty, hunger, ill-health, coercion and control; equality of opportunity and access to education, medical attention and work; equality of all, the ruler and the ruled, before the law; the creation of an ordered, stable society which guarantees security of lives and property of individuals; cultivation and inculcation in the citizenry of a democratic temper, an attitude of service and trusteeships, a sense of civic responsibility, a spirit of fair play and tolerance of other people’s opinions and interests; absence of arrogance and arbitrariness and a sense of honest, faithful, selfless, disinterested, impartial and objective service, dedicated, selfless, disciplined, patriotic, honest and highly motivated leadership style, free from social indiscipline, ethnic hatred and jealousies, religious bigotry and the tendency to personalize rulership and power; and a deliberate and determined move towards the creation of a society bound together by shared sentiments and outlook, (Uya, 2018). All of these are basic ingredients of good workable governance.
Osaghae (2016) defined democratization as the process of establishing, strengthening, or extending the principles, mechanism, and institutions that define a democratic regime. Similarly, democratization has been defined as a political movement from less accountable to more accountable government, from less competitive (or nonexistent) elections to fuller and fairer predicted civil and political rights, from weak (or non-existent) autonomous associations to more numerous associations in civil society, (Potter, 2015). On the other hand, good governance, as a concept is a problematic one. For one, it is value loaded and therefore subjective. The meaning attached to it may largely be a function of the intents and purposes of the analyst. Nevertheless, it remains a useful concept for obvious reasons. As Doornbos (2013) rightly posited, the concept of good governance could be used to invite judgment about how the country concerned was being governed: it enabled the raising of evaluative question about proper procedures, transparency, the quality and process of decision making, and other such matters.
According to Eyinla (2015), good governance connotes accountability, security of human rights and civil liberties, devolution of powers and respect for local autonomy, which all constitute a challenge to democratic regimes. Moreover, good governance has been closely linked to the extent which a government is perceived and accepted as legitimate, committed to improving the public welfare and responsive to the needs of its citizens, competent to assure law and order and deliver public services, able to create an enabling policy environment for productive activities; and equitable in its conduct, (Landell-Mill & Seragelden, 2016).
Good governance is a way a government maintains and runs itself; in this way, every sector and sphere of the government is under proper checks and this enables the government to maintain security and uphold peace. According to Udoete (2011), the government and the citizens must be in concordance for the administration to be successful; hence a lot of states in our world in this era have democratic principles as their foundation and are run with those principles. It is a generally accepted claim amongst scholars and political actors that a state cannot develop in all aspects if it lacks the basic principles of democracy. This then necessitates democracy as a core feature of good governance as it helps achieve smooth running of government.
The attempts to understand the link between democracy and good governance have produced divergent views. For instance, World Bank (2015) opined that, democracy is inextricably linked with emphasis on good governance. The centrality of good governance to democracy has been well recognized. Kofi Annan (1998) avers that, the UN has increasingly begun to focus on good governance because no amount of funding, no amount of charity will set the developing world on the part of prosperity. Member states have increasingly recognized that good governance is indispensable for building peaceful, prosperous and democratic societies. According to Bhalla (2017), democracy is strongly associated with greater freedom; whereby greater freedom leads to improved economic growth and development.
The practice of democratic principles is what is known as good governance or governance as the case may be. Sergent (2013) observed that, the following are key elements of democracy which are; citizens’ involvement in decision making, a system of representation, the rule of law, an electoral system- majority rule, some degree of equality among citizens, some degree of liberty retain by citizens and education. The perspective of Sergent (2013) is closer to the World Bank’s line of thought, as cited in Sharma, Sadana and Kaur (2012) who opined that, the parameter of good governance, according to World Bank is political accountability, regular election, participation, rule of law, independent of the judiciary, bureaucratic accountability, freedom of information, transparency, efficient and effective administration, and cooperation between government and civil society.
The above revealed that, democracy and good governance shared similar elements like; rule of law, participation, and electoral system, majority rule and so on. It can then be affirmed that the whole essence of democracy is to ensure good governance. The study concludes that, there is positive correlation between democracy and good governance. The reason is because both concepts are closely interconnected and interwoven. If democratization is about establishing consolidated democracy; the conditions for such attainment are implicitly embedded in good governance.
Comparative Analysis
Under the Jonathan administration in Nigeria, political assassinations were evidently not part of the culture of national politics. In comparative terms, under the incumbent Buhari administration, there were a number of such crimes, suspected to be usually politically motivated. Ogbeh (2013) gave a germane recap of such murder-cases. A further outcome of this positive political development is that freedom of expression which is integral to strong democratic practices was full-blown in the country, under President Jonathan. As a matter of fact, in August 2012, Jonathan described himself as the most criticized president in the world and prophetically added that before leaving office; he would have turned out to be the most praised president. And indeed, Jonathan left office as a very popular man, not in any case, because of his stellar performance in office but by the fact of his conceding defeat as a sitting president in Nigeria, which is the first time in the history of West African state that such an electoral incident would be recorded.
Prior to the completion of collation of results, President Jonathan had called the opposition candidate, Muhammadu Buhari, who was about to emerge victorious, and congratulated him on his yet-to-be-announced election victory. This attitude of Jonathan was undeniably uncommon among African leaders, who usually refused to vacate presidential positions when defeated in elections. They stay put to engender cataclysms in their own countries. Consequently, the 2019 Presidential election witnessed a lot of electoral malpractices such as rigging, snatching of ballot boxes, electoral violence, etc., in order to favour the Buhari ruling party, which was never the case during the Jonathan administration, and as such, electoral violence has remained a common unfortunate feature of the electoral struggle in Nigeria. According to Siollun (2015), previous Nigerian presidents were too cynical to expose themselves to the unpredictable risk of a fair election. The election victories of PDP presidents during the past 16 years and that of the APC in the last 10years especially the 2019 election have been partially “assisted” by electoral malpractice. That changed during the Jonathan administration.
Also, on the aspect of Nigeria’s foreign policy during Goodluck Jonathan 2007-2015, the foreign policy was opened and encourages relations with other countries around the world, and its policy was hinged on citizen diplomacy, (Anyaele, 2017). And, Muhammadu Buhari 2015 till date foreign policy has been able to enhance the economic development of the country in the following areas which includes improving relations with its neighbors so as to jointly fight Boko Haram which assumed a multinational or transnational dimension, partner with US and other world power to support the government in order to fight terrorism by providing needed manpower and intelligence, and more importantly improvement of economy and fighting corruption, improved relations with China in order to foster economic development through provision of needed infrastructure, (Kolawole, 2017). President Muhammadu Buhari made it a cardinal objective of his foreign policy to pursue economic development by maintaining good relations with its neighbouring countries.
Therefore, for a proper extensive academic study, this project will study former President Jonathan’s administration and incumbent President Buhari’s administration in comparison with a view to determining their upholding of democratic principles in reference to good governance.
1.2. Statement of Problem
Good governance is characterized by effectiveness in the administration of sovereignty, legitimacy, justice, respect and trust through the perception and sentiments of those who are governed, (Srinivas, 2012). The administrations of Jonathan lost its legitimacy few years into his administration due to the Boko Haram insurgency (Okereocha, 2016), which was further compounded by issues of corruption cases. The regime of Jonathan was faced with countless of corruptions cases which affected his administration on a lot of counts due to the continuous draining of Federal Reserve’s. On the other hand, the administration of Buhari had been affected with Boko Haram and Fulani Herdsmen insurgency, which has turn out to be so rampant in the present administration and has affected the outcome of good governance in the country. In addition, Buhari administration had been able to partner with foreign agencies to fight against corruption which has become endemic in the country, (Omede, 2015).
Good governance and political stability have turn out to be key concepts in the development of the state in theory and in practice even though the concept of good governance is an evasive one, even though major governments puts promoting good governance as an important part of their agenda, good governance remains elusive in Nigeria, (Bouchat, 2013). Both Goodluck Jonathan and Muhhamudu Buhari administrations have faced several bouts of political instability demonstrating that governments face pressures both internally and externally, these governments must then develop a governance structure that can efficiently sustain the stability and adapt to the dynamic character of the society to cope with issues of political reforms, adapt to ethno political change, social change, economic upheaval.
Besides, the goal of every foreign policy is to establish and maintain a friendly relationship with other nations as well as to attain economic development and build a good image for a nation and meet its national or domestic interest. This invariably implies that, foreign policy is vital in formulating, maintaining and sustaining a nation's development. Nigeria’s foreign policy since independence has been perceived from diverse point of views, (Aluko, 2011; Anyaele, 2017). One of the most prevailing perspectives of Nigeria’s foreign policy is that, it is chameleon in nature, (Anyaele, 2017), a foreign policy constantly in a state of flux as a result of internal and external dynamics inherent in any given administration or regime.
In this light, a study that compares and contrasts these administrations with the aim of exploring how good governance can be impacted in the nation and used to better the nation’s democracy is viable and essential.
1.3. Objectives of the Study
The aim of this research is to examine the relationship between democracy and good governance indicators. This will be done discussing former president Goodluck’s administration and incumbent president Buhari’s administration as case studies. The specific objectives are to:
- assess the Goodluck and Buhari administration’s level of good governance and its effect on corruption in Nigeria
- evaluate the Goodluck and Buhari administration’s level of good governance and its effect on Nigeria’s foreign policy
- ascertain the Goodluck and Buhari administration’s level of good governance and its effect on political stability in Nigeria.
- investigate the Goodluck and Buhari administration’s level of good governance and its effect on insecurity
1.4. Research Questions
These questions will constitute the focus of the research:
- How has Goodluck and Buhari administration’s level of good governance affected corruption in Nigeria?
- To what extent is the effect of Goodluck and Buhari administration’s level of good governance on Nigeria’s foreign policy?
- Is there any significant effect of Goodluck and Buhari administration’s level of good governance on political stability in Nigeria?
- Does Goodluck and Buhari administration’s level of good governance have an effect on insecurity in Nigeria?
1.5. Significance of the Study
It is expected that this study will help to correct the deficiency in good governance in Nigeria and thereby promoting a good democratic process in Nigeria, and to address the incessant and unhealthy problem of bad governance in Nigeria
The findings of this study will enlighten political leaders and policy makers on the need to identify and formulate policies that will aid economy development and the sustenance of democracy in Nigeria.
The findings of this study will help identify the factors leading to the failure of democracy and god governance in Nigeria, and to help proffer solutions that will enhance effective and participatory democracy and good governance in Nigeria.
On the issue of political instability, the findings of this study will help inform party leaders and the general public on the need to put aside ethnicity, and to vote for candidate who understands the value of democracy.
This study will be a good reference for further understanding of and studies on good governance and democracy in Nigeria joining the body of existing literatures and researches on the good governance in democracy in Nigeria.
1.6. Scope of the Study
For feasibility reasons, this study is limited to discussing good governance indicators in Nigeria employing Buhari’s and Goodluck’s administrations as case studies.
1.7. Methodology
The qualitative method will be used. Qualitative data are not statistical. They involve analysis of discourses, utterances, meaningful linguistic items, themes and similar data from sources like textbooks, newspaper articles, journalistic reports, internet materials, seminars and interviews. Data will be taking from many of the itemised sources.
1.8. Definition of Terms
Democracy: is an institutional arrangement for arriving at political decisions in which individuals acquire the power to decide by means of a competitive struggle for the people’s vote.
Governance: is the manner in which authority of government is exercised in mobilizing a society’s social and economic resources, to add the issues of public interest.
Good Governance: good governance is ruling the people well within the tenets of the constitution and other enabling legislation.”
1.9. Organisation of the Study
The presentation of this study is in five chapters. Chapters one has dealt with the introduction and fundamental concepts. Chapter two will be dedicated to reviewing related literatures. Chapter three will discuss good governance and political stability under Goodluck Johnthan’s presidency. Chapter four will discuss the comparative analysis of good governance under Goodluck Jonathan and Muhammadu Buhari’s. Chapter five will be the concluding chapters, it will present the summary, conclusion and proffer recommendations.
