TABLE OF CONTENTS
Title Page i
Approval Page ii
Dedication iii
Acknowledgments iv
List of Tables v
Table of Contents vi
Abstract viii
CHAPTER ONE: Introduction 1
- The Background to the Study 1
1.2 Statement of the Problem 5
1.3 Objectives of the Study 8
1.4 The Significance of the Study 8
1.5 The Historical Background of Ethnicity in Nigeria and Ghana 9
CHAPTER TWO: Literature Review 31
2.1 Literature Review 31
CHAPTER THREE: Methodology 53
3.1 Theoretical Framework 53
3.2 Research Design 56
3.3 Hypotheses 57
3.4 Method Data Collection 58
3.5 Method of Data Analysis 58
3.6 The Logical framework 59
CHAPTER FOUR: Ethnicity and Voting Behaviour in Ghana and Nigeria 60
The 2007-2011 Nigerian Election Results 60
4.1 2007 Nigerian Presidential Elections 60
4.2 2011 Nigerian Presidential Elections (final) 64
Ghana 2008-2012 General Election Results 69
4.3 Ghana 2008 General Election Results 69
4.4 Ghana Presidential Elections 2012 Results 71
CHAPTER FIVE: Ethnic Distribution of Government Appointments and
Voting Behaviour In Nigeria And Ghana 75
5.1 Ethnicity Representation in Key Offices in Ghana and Nigeria 75
5.2 Geo-political Representation of Federal Bureaucracies in Nigeria, 1996-2005 in % 79
CHAPTER SIX: Summary Conclusion and Recommendations 81
6.1 Summary 81
6.2 Conclusion 85
6.3 Recommendations 90
REFERENCES 93
ABSTRACT
This study
examines a paramount factor in the politics of Nigeria
and Ghana,
that is, the politicization of ethnicity and voting behaviour form 2007-2012 in
both countries presidential elections. It traced the incidence to the
pre-independence era in both countries and explains its place in the formation
of political parties and electoral processes. This study draws attention to how
competition for national resources among the various ethnic groups and regions
has led to power struggle. Although previous scholars have made immense and
insightful contribution on the subject matter, none of these scholars did a
comparative study on the politicization of ethnicity and voting behaviour of Ghana and Nigeria within the period
specified. A gap was located in the literature which necessitated this research
questions: Did ethnic factor affect the voting behaviour of Ghanaian and
Nigerian from 2007-2012 presidential elections? Moreover, we anchored our study
on the system theory as our theoretical framework of analysis. We adopted the qualitative
method as our, method of data collection, while descriptive analysis was also
adopted.
CHAPTER ONE: Introduction
- Background to the Study
Ethnicity appears to have permeated every spheres of the socio-economic and political activities of Ghana and Nigeria. it seems to dominate and transcend every other social-force one can utilize to attain his goals in a body-politic, which means that ethnicity has appeared to have played and is still playing manifest and latent roles in determining who manned and who will man key positions in the body-politic of Ghana and Nigeria. With respect to this, it seems that ethnicity has been politicized and has become the only hitch-free accessible tool which the elite in the Ghanaian and Nigerian societies could employ to influence the voting behaviors of the electorate, to be successful in the various elections and get hold of state power.
However, it is due to the immense effects of ethnicity on the voting behaviour of the electorate in Africa over and against the manifestoes of political parties that prompted some scholar like Nnoli (1989) to see ethnicity as a social phenomenon associated with interactions among members of different ethnic groups. In the same vain Osaghae (1995) underscored the effect of ethnicity in the politics of Africa by conceptualizing ethnicity as the employment and mobilization of ethnic identity and differences to gain advantage in situation of competition, conflict or cooperation.
Briefly speaking, ethnicity was politicized in Ghana politics from the time of Dr. Kmame Nkrumah who turned the country politics into the affairs of the Akan ethnic group of Ashanti region. He ruled the country with one political party the CPP from 1964-1966 when he was overthrown by Kofi Busiar. In the same vain in Nigeria first Republic, ethnicity was instrumental to the death of the first republic and the killing of most Northern politicians, because the voting in the federal election of 1965 was smeared with ethnic violence by the ethnic party gladiators who wanted their regional political parties like NCNC, AG. NPC to control the seats both in the regional and federal legislatures, the coup of 1966 in Nigeria was seen as the southern coup against the Northern politicians; this sowed the seed of ethnic politics in the military, Dudley (1973).
As the second Republics in both countries were drawing closer; the issue of ethnicity and its determinant factor in politics and political parties formation in Nigeria and Ghana was reviewed by the members of the Constitution Drafting Committee, and it came out in the Nigerian constitution of 1979, section 202 prohibiliting the formation of political parties with ethic or religious connotation, but in spite of that constitutional injunction against forming political parties along ethnic lines the emergent political parties in Nigeria in the second republic were formed along ethnic lines e,g are the National party of Nigeria with the flag-bear, Alhaji Shehu Shagari from North, NPP- Nigeria People’s Party with the flag-bear Dr. Azikiwe from South-East Nigeria, and the third major political party, UPN-Unity Party of Nigeria was formed by Western (Yoruba) veteran Politician, Chief Obafemi Awolowo. The leaders of those political parties in the second Republic appealed for votes along ethnic lines where they came from and in the general election, they won their overwhelming votes from their ethnic regions of origin. In the same way, Ghana in the third republic of 1979, which the military government of the half-bred Ghanaian/Scotland flight lieutenant Jerry Rawlings headed, who was an Ewe-speaking man from the volta region came into politics with ethnic inclination against the Akan people of the Ashante Kingdom where Nkrumah and General Frederick Akuffo came from. He, Rawlings hated the domineering power of the Akan-speaking people of the Ashante ethnic group in the South-Ghana, he executed General Akuffo in 1978 and in September, 1979 handed over to the man from the upper-west region, an affiliate of the Northern region. Rawlings Politicized ethnicity in the present day Ghana between the south and north, believing that the southern predominant ethnic group of Akan-speaking people in the Ashante region where the first prime-minister Nkrumah and Akuffo came were marginalizing the North (Tordoff, 1984).
On the contrary, the so-called constitutional injunction in the 1979 constitution in Nigeria could not stop the ethnic chanting in the minds of the voters who could not stand the view of seeing another candidate from another political party other than their own to head the country’s highest political position, the presidency, resorted into violence in 1983 general election, which saw to the ousting of Alhaji Shehu Shagari in 31 December, 1983 by General Buhari from North. In politics of Nigeria, ethnicity determined who won the election in the presidency. The Nigerian military has been politicized along ethnic lines since 1966 by the ‘January majors’ who were predominantly Southerners. Politics becomes a war on ethnic lines between the south and northern regions/states in Nigeria. Political appointments were still made on ethnic lines instead of merits. The elite tried in 1979 and invented the federal character principle for equal representation of all states in the federal Bureaucracy, but the same elite still violet the principle by putting their cronies, brothers, sisters and girl friends there, Ibanu (2012).
In their third republic in Nigeria, politics was equally played along ethnic lines between the North and the South. The 1989 constitution repeated the same order instructing the emerging political parties to bear National out-look, ensuring that its members cut-across the entire states/ethnic groups of the Nation-Nigeria, but the military government of General Babangida that teleguided the transition brought out two political parties: The Social Democratic Party (SDP), and National Republican Convention (NRC) of which the flag-bears were Chief Abiola and Tofa respectively. The acclaimed winner of the election Chief Abiola of the SDP was from Yoruba, part of the southern region while Tofa was from the North, the military president so hesitant to hand power to the South annulled the victory of chief M. K.O Abiola the winner of June 12, 1993 presidential election in Nigeria.
In the present fourth republic in both Ghana and Nigeria, constitutional measures have been adopted to end the call of ethnicity in soliciting for voting by the political parties’ flag-bears, but the tune of ethnicity on the voting behaviour is still high in determining electoral victory by the political parties in the countries under study.
As time progressed, ethnicity played down a little in the politics of 1999, which was the beginning of fourth republic in Nigeria. The ruling people’s democracy party which Chief Olusegun Obasanjo came out as the successful president-elect appeared to have towed the National outlook as instructed by the section 221 of the 1999 constitution. In the same vain, in Ghana first Republic, the political parties law Act 574 (2000) also make similar provisions, prohibiting religious and ethnically based political parties in the country which could not go along way in making the political leaders in Ghana think of one united Ghana first (Useh, 2011).
Again, in the both countries the issue of unequal representation by the different ethnic groups in the federal bureaucracy has been playing both countries politics and has been directing the voting behaviours of the citizenry towards ethnically-based party candidates, instead of voting in lines with the political parties programmes. In support of this claim, John Dramani Mahama (2012) stated in build-up to December 2012 general election in Ghana that the Northerners should vote for him because since 1979 a person from Northern Ghana had not ruled Ghana.
Nonetheless, the above statement reflected the kind of political behaviour of the political leaders in Ghana and Nigerian which has been a serious bane on democratization process, for their campaign strategies in wining elections only scale through in the polls when coloured with ethnic sentiments. So, this necessitated this study which is geared towards knowing the effects of ethnicity and voters’ behaviour: A comparative study of Ghana and Nigerian presidential elections from 2007-2012.
- Statement of the Problem
