Why Is Nigeria 6 Years After Independence

This kind of policy, breeds not only disunity but creates insecurity. This kind of composition of the army among other things also “helped to open up Nigeria for political instability immediately after independence” (Ejiogu 2007, p.106). Since 1966 coup, only 6 years after independence – and the counter coup which started the civil war-, Nigeria has been ruled by different military leaders who conducted both successful and there were some unsuccessful coup d’état too (Kolawole, 2005). A study of Nigeria politics 6 years after independence will deal mostly with the issues raised below one would be justified to argue that Nigeria’s military-led regimes were as unstable as the civilian-led governments they over-threw. Table 1 shows that two military
The essential point is that although European colonialisms involved a variety of techniques and patterns of domination, penetrating deep into some societies and involving a comparatively superficial contact with others, all of them produced the economic imbalance that was necessary for the growth of European capitalism and industry. Thus we could say that colonialism was the midwife that assisted at the birth of European capitalism, or that without colonial expansion the transition to capitalism could not have taken place in Europe. (Loomba 2015, p.22)
The main take away from the above argument is that former colonies are in an unbalanced economic relationship with the West. Does this breed dependency? Sau (1978) (cited in Shaw 1982) argue that an alliance of feudalism, local capitalism and imperialism holds sway over the Third World; and herein lies the root of unequal exchange...the three classes are the joint exploiters of the people of the Third World; and this is what sustains neo-colonialism today.
Which mean even if the colonial enterprise became extinct, a new form of control remained? Chase-Dunn's 1975 then posited three types of economic dependence: the three types are (1) investment dependence: the extent to which the nation is penetrated by direct foreign capital; (2) aid dependence: the public debt that the nation's state has contracted with external agencies; and (3) export partner concentration: the extent to which a nation occupies a restricted potition (sic) in the world trade network. (pp.7-8)
Chase-Dunn's 1975 study further listed other types of indirect dependence -he stated that they were not relevant to his study and that Galtung (1972) and Delacroix (1975) had extensively study on them- as specialization in low-wage production of raw materials, reliance on a high component of processed imports and undiversified exports. These types of indirect dependence listed above are those that have intractably continued to mirror life in Igbo land and in extension Nigeria, coupled with huge public debt and greater reliance on imports. “Nowhere is the paradox of Nigeria’s import and export economy clearer than its production of oil. Despite being Africa’s biggest oil producer, the country still imports the majority