Statehood, Citizenship Crisis and the National Question: Interrogating the Legal and Normative Construction of State Membership in Nigeria

Abstract

The peculiarity of the formation, evolution and emerging nature of the post-colonial Nigerian state reflect a contradiction and crisis in forging formal, judicial and political claims to membership of the state. This paper interrogates how ineffective statehood, often occasioned by socio-economic and political exclusion and dominance results in the citizenship crisis in which legal and normative accounts of citizenship are constructed and contested. The paper draws its analysis from the failure of the Nigerian state to address the national question of the indigene-settler dichotomy and how it impinges on the interpretation of citizenship. The paper argues that state domination and control define the boundaries of citizenship in Nigeria on the basis of exclusion or inclusion against its formal precepts, thus, accounting for a citizenship crisis and the national question that needs to be resolved through a re-appraisal of the nature and role of the state in society. Thus, this study recommends that the Nigerian government should strive to practice good governance and adopt the tenets of the rule of law that guarantee equal rights and justice to all citizens irrespective of their affiliations, a greater sense of belonging and pride can be created in Nigerians.