Let us pull ourselves together each to each, here, as brothers with brother, pooled.
Take past events as the repentant woman's past, always forgotten and always retold.
—Pol Ndu, Ibo poet (1971)
Slowly and somewhat painfully, the Federal Republic of Nigeria, Africa's richest, most powerful and most populous nation (about 60 million), is pulling itself together after the devastating civil war that ended two years ago. A reconciliation of sorts has taken place between the federal government, headed by General Yakubu Gowon, and the secessionist republic of Biafra, now Nigeria's East Central state. The scars of war, physical as well as psychological, have mostly faded. The sole reminders of the airstrip at Uli—Biafra's only gateway to the outside world during the long federal siege—are the rusting hulks of five relief planes that missed the runway in the darkness; the strip itself is a highway once more.
All Nigeria is full of boom talk, and the country has enormous economic potential. It is rich in cash crops —cocoa, peanuts, palm oil, coal and iron ore. Most important is oil, which was discovered there in 1956. With a current output of 1,700,000 bbl. a day, Nigeria has passed Iraq and Canada to become the world's ninth largest oil producer. The government's share of the profits is expected to surpass $1 billion this year and $1.25 billion next year.
Prosperity, however, has been accompanied by the paradoxical growing pains that so often affect industrializing nations. The country is suffering from high unemployment (an estimated 1,000,000 are jobless in the East Central state alone). Most basic services —roads, telephones, water and power —are in chaos and disrepair; the luxurious Ikoyi Hotel outside of Lagos, for instance, is often waterless for days at a time. Goods rot on their way to market because of highway snarls, and according to a recent survey, the chances of completing a telephone call in Lagos are only 1 in 10.
Return of Dash. What's wrong? Bureaucratic bottlenecks account for some of the trouble; officials of Nigeria's twelve states claim they have yet to see development money supposedly appropriated by the federal government. Another factor is massive corruption—known as "dash"—which once again is a fact of Nigerian life. "When we ask what's happened to our money," says one state development official, "Lagos tells us it's on the way—that it's been put into the 'development pipeline.' But it never comes out. Either the pipeline is blocked or the pipeline is porous."
General Gowon, 37, a popular and honest leader who still lives in a rundown military barrack, has vowed to return the government to civilian hands in 1976. In the meantime, his army —which accounts for an exorbitant 34% of the $1.1 billion federal budget —is enjoying the perquisites of power. Staff officers ride through the capital in chauffeur-driven Mercedes sedans, just as civilian politicians used to do. In the expensive suburbs of Lagos, there are scores of new homes and apartment buildings whose owners are officers and gentlemen. Many Nigerians believe that corruption is worse in Lagos today than it was in 1966, when the army seized power.