'Nigeria: the context for violence' (2006-2013)

[Dayuhan]

What then is the raison d'etre for AFRICOM if not intervention? What is the purpose of the numerous war games the US plays with respect to the Nigeria?

The question was whether anyone has seriously proposed intervention in Nigeria, not in Africa. Has there been any such proposal, on even the most hypothetical level? I haven't heard one, but I might have missed something.

Hard to suggest, really, that the raison d'etre of AFRICOM is intervention. The US has these commands for every part of the world, but that doesn't mean they're planning worldwide intervention... they are just administrative divisions. The actual force structure and resources of AFRICOM suggest strongly that intervention is not the intention: how much intervention are you going to do on a continent the size of Africa with 2000 people based in Stuttgart?

Probably, Filipinos are more docile, less violent and have an escape valve (11 million Filipinos in the diaspora). Nigerians are a very violent people and anyone who doesn't take that into account over the next thirty years is playing with fire.

Actually we have two of the most intractable insurgencies in the world... all kinds of people are violent. I'd agree, though, that the potential for violence in Nigeria seems very high. I do not, however, think there;s anything much any outside power can or should try to do about it. The solution, if there is to be one, has to be internal.

I'm not too old (I am in my thirties), but I really fear the generation behind me (late teens and twenties). They are much less respectful of authority and more willing to challenge the status quo than were are. They (especially those of them from the Muslim North) have been inspired by the Arab Spring.

For a full thirty-five years after independence, it was unheard of for Nigerians to take up arms and challenge (a) the Nigerian Police Force and (b) the Nigerian Army. The Niger Delta changed everything, and today Nigerian security services are being challenged all over Nigeria (Niger Delta, Middle Belt, North-East Nigeria).

Sometimes somebody has to challenge the status quo - the people who benefit from the status quo aren't going to give up their privileges unless they're forced to - and if nobody listens to peaceful challenges, the next ones will be violent. Maybe that next generation will force some changes, though the process isn't likely to be pretty, especially if those who benefit from the status quo dig in and fight.

Nigeria's has a rapidly growing population (2% per annum) - which means that by 2050, our population might reach 300 million. We are a single commodity economy (we depend only on Oil and Gas) and our petroleum reserves will dwindle rapidly mid century. Within the next few decades, the pressure to diversify the economy will increase exponentially and politicians will be under immense pressure to make that happen (remember that the Philippines is a much more diversified economy than Nigeria). Enlightened self-interest will take over.

Yes, we're a diversified economic basket case . One hopes that enlightened self-interest will take over someday in both places, rather than the decidedly unenlightened self-interest that prevails today. In Nigeria's case one hopes it happens before oil runs out, as it's easier to diversify if you have some capital to invest!

These differences were pointed out by the former Central Bank Governor in 2008: (Before Carter Ham and the US National Security establishment frantically started for looking for links between Boko Haram and Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb)

Are they really looking? It's quite possible that they might, and it wouldn't be the first time... but there's been very little political interest in boots-on-ground military intervention in Africa since the 1993 mess in Mogadishu, and I doubt that it's something anyone on the US side really wants to do.