Nigeria, the United States’ most important strategic partner in West Africa, is in grave trouble. While Nigerians often claim they are masters of dancing on the brink without falling off, the disastrous administration of President Goodluck Jonathan, the radical Islamic insurrection Boko Haram, and escalating violence in the delta and the north may finally provide the impetus that pushes it into the abyss of state failure. In this thoroughly updated edition, John Campbellexplores Nigeria’s post-colonial history and presents a nuanced explanation of the events and conditions that have carried this complex, dynamic, and very troubled giant to the edge. Central to his analysis are the oil wealth, endemic corruption, and elite competition that have undermined Nigeria’s nascent democratic institutions and alienated an increasingly impoverished population. However, state failure is not inevitable, nor is it in the interest of the United States. Campbell provides concrete new policy options that would not only allow the United States to help Nigeria avoid state failure but also to play a positive role in Nigeria’s political, social, and economic development.

His nineteenth-century cousin, paddled ashore by slaves, twisted the arms of tribal chiefs to sign away their territorial rights in the oil-rich Niger Delta. Sixty years later, his grandfather helped craft Nigeria's constitution and negotiate its independence, the first of its kind in Africa. Four decades later, Peter Cunliffe-Jones arrived as a journalist in the capital, Lagos, just as military rule ended, to face the country his family had a hand in shaping.Part family memoir, part history, My Nigeria is a piercing look at the colonial legacy of an emerging power in Africa. Marshalling his deep knowledge of the nation's economic, political, and historic forces, Cunliffe-Jones surveys its colonial past and explains why British rule led to collapse at independence. He also takes an unflinching look at the complicated country today, from email hoaxes and political corruption to the vast natural resources that make it one of the most powerful African nations; from life in Lagos's virtually unknown and exclusive neighborhoods to the violent conflicts between the numerous tribes that make up this populous African nation. As Nigeria celebrates five decades of independence, this is a timely and personal look at a captivating country that has yet to achieve its great potential.

1993. Houston. Dr. Wale Olufunmi, lunar rock geologist, has a life most Nigerian immigrants would kill for, but then most Nigerians aren't Wale--a great scientific mind in exile with galactic ambitions. Then comes an outlandish order: steal a piece of the moon. With both personal and national glory at stake, Wale manages to pull off the near impossible, setting out on a journey back to Nigeria that leads anywhere but home. Compelled by Wale's impulsive act, Nigerians traces arcs in time and space from Houston to Stockholm, from Cape Town to Bulawayo, picking up on the intersecting lives of a South African abalone smuggler, a freedom fighter's young daughter, and Wale's own ambitious son. Deji Olukotun's debut novel defies categorization, a story of international intrigue that tackles deeper questions about exile, identity, and the need to answer an elusive question: what exactly is brain gain? -- Back cover.

As the "Giant of Africa" Nigeria is home to about twenty percent of the population of Sub-Saharan Africa, serves as Africa's largest producer of oil and natural gas, comprises Africa's largest economy, and represents the cultural center of African literature, film, and music. Yet the country is plagued by problems that keep it from realizing its potential as a world power. Boko Haram, a radical Islamist insurrection centered in the northeast of the country, is an ongoing security challenge, as is the continuous unrest in the Niger Delta, the heartland of Nigeria's petroleum wealth. There is also persistent violence associated with land and water use, ethnicity, and religion. In Nigeria: What Everyone Needs to Know®, John Campbell and Matthew Page provide a rich contemporary overview of this crucial African country. Delving into Nigeria's recent history, politics, and culture, this volume tackles essential questions related to widening inequality, the historic 2015 presidential election, the persistent security threat of Boko Haram, rampant government corruption, human rights concerns, and the continual conflicts that arise in a country that is roughly half Christian and half Muslim. With its continent-wide influence in a host of areas, Nigeria's success as a democracy is in the fundamental interest of its African neighbors, the United States, and the international community. This book will provide interested readers with an accessible, one-of-a-kind overview of the country.

Nigeria, despite being the African country of greatest strategic importance to the U.S., remains poorly understood. John Campbell explains why Nigeria is so important to understand in a world of jihadi extremism, corruption, oil conflict, and communal violence. The revised edition provides updates through the recent presidential election.

Nigeria at 100 is an attempt to document in modest and constructive language Nigeria's journey as a modern nation in the past 100 years, highlighting the landmark events during this period. the book is divided into four parts with a total of 22 chapters. The first part, with seven chapters deals with the historical background starting with the early history and covering the pre-colonial years, independence and the challenges of nationhood, military intervention in politics and governance, the civil war, the return to democracy and the continuing challenges of development. Part 2, which examines the major impediments to nation building, has a total of five chapters covering such important subjects as the leadership problem, the negative problem of ethnicity, the perennial and the disturbing problem of corruption. Part 3 makes a case for healing our national wounds through national reconciliation, transformation and patriotism. This part of the book also makes a case for a united, viable and stable Nigerian nation. Part 4 attempts to answer the question as to which direction Nigeria should be heading as a nation after the centenary celebrations. Since the emphasis in our general theme is change to a better society by way of transformation and reformation, especially in the critical areas identified in this book, this section starts with the role of the family as the unit that lays the foundation and sets the values that influence the character, judgement and behaviour of our young people who will subsequently become important citizens and members of the leadership elite.

THE PARADOXICAL LIFESTYLE OF THE AVERAGE NIGERIAN IS THE SUM OF THIS BOOK... My relentless pursuit of an understanding of the survival abilities of the average Nigerian in a system that is definitely dysfunctional. Some of us complain, some of us protest, some of us go spiritual and still many others go material, and also a few of us turn to the arts for solace-we write, not to cure other people of madness, but to avoid going mad ourselves...

You know, I know, everybody in leadership knows that truth is not enough to win in governance, particularly when you are destined to change the attitude, character and disposition of a legitimate Christianity and Islamic religious mafia, or the established culture of the people and the monarchial establishment that has existed over 5000 years before you are born, an establishment that are more powerful than any elected person to run Nigeria government, because these establishment are rooted in the perpetual legacy of Nigeria imperialist masters whose legacy for Nigeria social and economic advancement are perpetuated by the western media employees who are paid by their boss to use media propaganda as the super power weapon of warfare to put Nigeria and Nigerians down as corrupt. internet scams artists.dishonest and terrorists. And what shall we say then, if the west and Nigeria media is not for us, who shall not be against revolution? but the people of Nigerian, despite the antagonistic posture of some News Editors of major Nigerian Radio, Television and Newspapers who are trained in the school of western media propaganda, negative reporting about this movement of the people, we shall overcome. Despite the fact that all Nigeria political leadership operates under the control of the western media and Nigeria press boys and girls to perpetuate an age long agenda, we shall overcome, despite the fact that the media believe that there is no single Nigerian alive that is not corrupt, we shall overcome, despite the fact that some Nigeria press boys and girls has become a complete idiot in 2010 and are clueless about the imperialist masters codes to rule Nigeria with a remote control using media propaganda as their weapon of welfare to stop Nigeria socio-political and economy advancement, I say again. that we shall overcome.

To understand Africa, one must understand Nigeria, and few Americans understand Nigeria better than Karl Maier. This House Has Fallen is a bracing and disturbing report on the state of Africa's most populous, potentially richest, and most dangerously dysfunctional nation. Each year, with depressing consistency, Nigeria is declared the most corrupt state in the entire world. Though Nigeria is a nation into which billions of dollars of oil money flow, its per capita income has fallen dramatically in the past two decades. Military coup follows military coup. A bellwether for Africa, it is a country of rising ethnic tensions and falling standards of living, very possibly on the verge of utter collapse -- a collapse that could dramatically overshadow even the massacres in Rwanda. A brilliant piece of reportage and travel writing, This House Has Fallenlooks into the Nigerian abyss and comes away with insight, profound conclusions, and even some hope. Updated with a new preface by the author.