Jan. 20 (AFP) -- Nigeria, Africa’s top oil producer, is paralyzed by a power vacuum that threatens efforts to pacify the oil-rich Niger River delta and derail key economic moves as its president lies bed-ridden in a hospital in Saudi Arabia.
Africa’s most populous nation has been effectively without a president for almost two months since Umaru Yar’Adua, 58, flew to Saudi Arabia for treatment of a heart ailment. Because he didn’t temporarily hand authority to Vice President Goodluck Jonathan, his deputy can’t exercise full presidential powers.
Since Yar’Adua left, a Nigerian was charged with trying to bomb a Detroit-bound Northwest Airlines plane, and Muslims have fought troops in the northern city of Bauchi and Christians in the central city of Jos.
There are also strains in the peace process Yar’Adua started in the Niger delta, where companies such as Royal Dutch Shell Plc and Exxon Mobil Corp. pump the crude that makes Nigeria the fifth-biggest source of U.S. oil imports.
“Our concern is that we’re slipping into a constitutional crisis,” Rotimi Akeredolu, president of the Nigerian Bar Association, said in an interview in Abuja, the capital. “It’s dangerous because of our past experience of coups.”
Army officers grabbed power six times since Nigeria gained independence from the U.K. in 1960, once sparking a civil war.
The uncertainty created by Yar’Adua’s absence is beginning to damage Africa’s second-biggest economy, Bismarck Rewane, chief executive of Financial Derivatives Co. Ltd., a Lagos-based investment advisory company, said by phone. “Investors are delaying investment decisions because of his absence.”
Delayed Decisions
Economic decisions including the ending of fuel subsidies, a new oil industry bill and getting the 2010 budget through parliament are awaiting action by the president.
Dan Abutu, chief justice of the Federal High Court in Abuja, said he will rule on Jan. 22 on a lawsuit seeking to declare Yar’Adua incapable of performing his duties. That would pave the way for Jonathan to take over.
“The non-delegation of authority has led to stalling on several important decisions and some degree of paralysis in the administration,” said Nnamdi Obasi, the Abuja-based West Africa analyst for the International Crisis Group.
Opposition and civic groups led by Nobel literature prize winner Wole Soyinka marched in Abuja last week to demand that Yar’Adua relinquish office. “Enough Is Enough” and “Umaru Where Are You?” read some of the signs borne by the marchers.
The protest took place a day after Yar’Adua spoke to the British Broadcasting Corp. to dispel rumors that he was dead or incapacitated.
Violence
With more than 140 million people and 250 ethnic groups, Nigeria is roughly divided between a mainly Muslim north and largely Christian south. Violent eruptions linked to political, ethnic and sectarian divisions are common.
Human Rights Watch said in an e-mailed statement today that at least 216 people were killed in three days of violence between Muslims and Christians in Jos, citing “credible reports” from the city.
Yar’Adua, a northern Muslim, won the presidency after a disputed election in 2007. His inauguration marked Nigeria’s first transfer of power from one civilian government to another.
His absence is stirring anxiety that army officers may try to take power again.
“The drift in governance and the public discontent it has created are elements that could tempt ambitious soldiers,” said Obasi of the Brussels-based International Crisis Group.
The situation is threatening to unravel a fragile peace in the Niger delta, the biggest success of his administration.
Amnesty
Yar’Adua’s amnesty for fighters last year and his promise to address the region’s demands for a greater share of the oil wealth sharply reduced armed attacks that had cut a quarter of Nigeria’s crude output over the past three years.
The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta said it carried out a pipeline attack last month as a “warning” against the stalling of peace talks.
Three British nationals and a Colombian working on a Shell project were held for a week after being kidnapped on Jan. 12 near the oil-industry hub of Port Harcourt. It was the first abduction of foreigners since July, compared with an average of one a week at the peak in 2007, Obasi said.
Allowing Vice President Jonathan to replace Yar’Adua may create new strains because of the policy of the ruling People’s Democratic Party to alternate the presidency between the mainly Muslim north and Christian south. The handing of power to Jonathan, a Christian Ijaw from the Niger delta, may fuel tensions because a southerner would be finishing a northerner’s term of office.
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Constitutional crisis
A constitutional crisis is a severe breakdown in the orderly operation of government. Generally speaking, a constitutional crisis is a situation in which separate factions within a government disagree about the extent to which each of these factions hold sovereignty. Most commonly, constitutional crises involve some degree of conflict between different branches of government (e.g., executive, legislature, and/or judiciary), or between different levels of government in a federal system (e.g., state and federal governments).
A constitutional crisis may occur because one or more parties to the dispute willfully chooses to violate a provision of a constitution or an unwritten constitutional convention, or it may occur when the disputants disagree over the interpretation of such a provision or convention. If the dispute arises because some aspect of the constitution is ambiguous or unclear, the ultimate resolution of the crisis often establishes a precedent for the future. For instance, the United States constitution is silent on the question of whether states are allowed to secede from the Union; however, after the secession of several states was forcibly prevented in the American Civil War, it has become generally accepted that states cannot leave the Union.
A constitutional crisis is distinct from a rebellion, which is defined as when factions outside of a government challenge that government's sovereignty, as in a coup or revolution led by the military or civilian protesters.
A constitutional crisis can lead to government paralysis, collapse, or civil war.
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