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This chapter on elections and electoral systems in Nigeria follows the same format as all the other country chapters in the book. The first section is introductory and contains a historical overview, discussion of the evolution of electoral provisions, an account of the current electoral provisions (the Constitution was abolished and elections annulled in 1993, although state legislature elections took place in 1997 and national parliament elections in 1998; no information was available for these) and a comment on the electoral statistics. The second section consists of ten tables. These are: 2.1 Dates of National Elections, Referendums, and Coups d’Etat (there have been no referendums); 2.2 Electoral Body 1959–1993 (data on population size, registered voters, and votes cast); 2.3 Abbreviations (abbreviations and full names of political parties and alliances used in tables 2.6, 2.7, and 2.9); 2.4 Electoral Participation of Parties and Alliances 1959–1993 (participation of political parties and alliances in chronological order and including the years and number of contested elections); 2.5 Referendums (none held); 2.6 Elections for Constitutional Assembly 1977 and 1994 (no data available); 2.7 Parliamentary Elections 1959–1962 (details of registered voters and votes cast nationally and regionally); 2.8 Composition of Parliament 1959–1992 (nationally and regionally); 2.9 Presidential Elections 1979–1993 (details of registered voters and votes cast nationally and regionally); and 2.10 List of Power Holders 1960–1998.

Explores six topics for which Nigerian politics offer rich material for analysis: the relative impacts of democratic constitutionalism and military authoritarianism on inter‐ethnic relations; the relationship between the form and character of federalism on the one hand, and success or failure in the management of ethnic conflict on the other; the relative auspiciousness of presidential and parliamentary government for deeply divided developing countries; the latent tensions between integrative and accommodative (consociational) solutions to the dilemmas of national unity; the duality and complementarity of formal and informal practices for the management of ethnic conflict; and the possible elements of a reform agenda for promoting stable, peaceful, and democratic management of ethnic conflict.

This chapter surveys various groups in western and central Africa that self-proclaimed a Jewish identity. These include the Zakhor Jews of Timbuktu, Mali; the Igbo of Nigeria; the House of Israel of Ghana; the The Tutsi-Hebrews of Havilah; and the Cape Verde-Israel Friendship Society.

This chapter expands our view to include music produced in other countries. A preliminary survey of the popular music of countries with widely differing political economies, music cultures, and levels of development revealed that the four genre forms (avant-garde, scene-based, industry-based, and traditionalist) do exist to greater or lesser degrees across the globe. However, there proved to be another widely distributed form that was not found in the U.S. sample: the government-purposed genre. Musics in this genre receive substantial financial support from the government or oppositional groups with a direct interest in the ideological content of popular music. There are two major types: those sponsored directly by governments, which benefit from national distribution and legal protections, and an antistate type supported by an opposition party or constituency. The chapter examines four nation-cases to advance the argument: the People's Republic of China, Chile, Serbia, and Nigeria.

This chapter discusses a reworking of Antigone by Nigerian playwright Fémi Òsófisan: Tègònni: An African Antigone (1994). Focusing on the politics of adaptation, Van Weyenberg considers Òsófisan's decision to draw on Sophocles within the context of Nigeria, and analyses Antigone's representative value within her ‘new’ surroundings. The emphasis then shifts to the (meta)theatrical aesthetics that characterizes Antigone's cultural translocation and to the related political implications for Antigone's status as a Western canonical figure. In viewing Òsófisan's adaptation as a work of ‘canonical counter‐discourse’, Van Weyenberg argues that it is not so much the canonical text itself at which Òsófisan's attention is directed, but rather the Eurocentric tradition that has claimed Antigone, and Greek tragedy in general, as its point of origin. Òsófisan's metatheatrical translocation of Antigone to Nigeria allows him to effectively demand shared ownership: Antigone no longer exclusively belongs to Europe.

Modern Nigeria was cobbled together in the nineteenth century from over 350 ethnic and linguistic groups, including sizable Muslim populations, especially in the country's north. Formative early figures like Uthman Dan Fodio and the scholar‐jurist Mohammad Bello were important in establishing Islam among the Hausa and Fulani populations, from which it spread elsewhere. Today, Nigeria's Muslim community is divided, and the extent to which Sharia law should be implemented has proved a contentious battleground both within the Islamic community and with other Nigerians. Islam in Nigeria seeks a competitive edge in the struggle with a nearly numerically equal Christian community.

Compares characteristics associated with women's status commonly used in demographic surveys with women's status, matsayi mace, as it is defined by a group of Hausa Moslem women in the northern Nigerian town of Zaria. Their assessments of appropriate gender roles and what constitutes ‘women's status’, which include the importance of respectability, mutunci, and seclusion, suggest that while distinctive cultural ideas and religious beliefs are essential in framing these definitions, there is no necessary congruence with the conventional ‘social indicators’, such as women's education and work, used in standardized surveys.

Several slang glossaries were produced in Australia during this period, addressing some of the same concerns as the British glossaries about immigration and equality. Dictionaries of New Zealand and Canadian slang concern themselves with identifying a national slang, distinctive from that used by Australia and the United States. Dictionaries of Nigerian slang attempt to document linguistic creativity and to create a unifying non-standard language.

This chapter looks at how the international politics of the coming decades are likely to revolve around interfaith conflict, above all, the clash between Christianity and Islam. Across the regions that will be the most populous in the twenty-first century there are already vast religious conflicts and contests in progress, although they impinge very little on Western opinion makers and the parochialism of Western public opinion is striking. Demographic projections suggest that these religious feuds will not only continue but become worse, although it is pointed out that, for various reasons, it is very difficult to obtain and project accurate numbers of the people belonging to different religions in any particular country. Nevertheless, of the world’s twenty-five largest nations, by the mid-twentieth-first century, if the current religious balance continues, nine are likely to be wholly or predominantly Muslim, eight wholly or predominantly Christian and three deeply divided between the two; it is suggested that by 2050 there could be ten of the largest nations profoundly divided between these two religions and, therefore, subject to instability as a result of inter-religious violence. The last part of the chapter considers some of the main fronts of religious conflicts, with discussion of Sudan, Egypt, Nigeria, Asia (as represented by Pakistan, Indonesia, the Philippines) and Europe, the cycles of violence in Christian–Muslim conflicts, the place of Judaism in Christian–Muslim relations, conflicts between Hinduism and Buddhism, and various possible future scenarios based on religious conflict in different countries.

This chapter describes the changing terms upon which the Longuda people of northeast Nigeria engage their beliefs about witchcraft. Lutheran and other forms of Christianity have wide influence in the region, but despite missionaries’ dismissals, belief in witchcraft persists. Using the tools of theology, comparative religions, and anthropology, the author shows how Longuda Christians are adapting and synthesizing a traditional worldview and Christian doctrines to make sense of the forces they encounter. Vanden Berg shows that anthropological and theological assumptions about syncretism, non-negotiable worldviews, and truth claims need revising in the face of the Longuda people’s Christian embrace of a spiritually animated world.