NIGERIA STAKEHOLDER-SHIP AND ETHNIC SURVIVAL: EVIDENCE FROM SOUTHERN NIGERIA

Abstract

Nigeria is a national project for all which is supposed to be inclusive commitment for ethnic groups that make up the entity. The amalgamation in 1914 and republican constitutions as revised defined the plural nature of federal state which serves to entrench doctrine of equity and sense of belonging. However, sense of ethnic suspicions and lack of commitment to national unity pervade nook and cranny of the nation. This is evident in the ongoing ethnic strives, ethnic militia and arms in Nigeria. Peoples of the south-south and south-east have persistently raised raucous blistering against configuration of the federal system which plunder their sense of stakeholder in the Nigeria project. Against this backdrop, this study examined perception of stakeholder-ship in Nigeria federalism among indigenous peoples of southern Nigeria. This study adopted qualitative survey design using 120 sample size, determined purposively. Data were collected and analyzed qualitatively using unstructured interviews and thematic analysis. Study population consisted of indigenous residents in south-east and south-south Nigeria. At qualitative measure, indigenous peoples expressed distrust in the current federal government, the perception reinforced by subtle exclusion from mainstream federal projects, infrastructure, resource control and military hierarchy. It was consensus in both south-south and south-east that Buhari presidency depleted sense of stakeholder, a shift in ideological appraisal of Nigeria unity. This significantly whittled down commitment to national unity. The study recommended need to neutralize ethnic tension through reconstruction of federal constitution to address main problem of stakeholder-ship.