Abacha’s Ghost & Nigeria’s Broken Democracy
As economic pain and insecurity intensify under successive civilian governments, a controversial narrative is emerging that portrays the Abacha era as a period of stronger governance and national discipline.
The Return of an Uncomfortable Argument
FEW statements provoke stronger reactions in Nigeria than any suggestion that Sani Abacha performed better than democratic leaders who came after him.
Yet such arguments are becoming increasingly common in conversations across social media, marketplaces, university campuses, and political circles.
The reasoning is rooted less in admiration for military dictatorship and more in disappointment with what democracy has produced.
Nigeria today faces crushing inflation, widening inequality, worsening insecurity, energy instability, unemployment, and deep public distrust in governance. Against this backdrop, some Nigerians are revisiting the Abacha years not through the lens of human rights or democratic ideals, but through memories of state authority and economic order.
The comparison has become especially sharp regarding former President Muhammadu Buhari and President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, whose administrations critics accuse of presiding over severe national decline.
Democracy Without Relief
For many citizens, the promise of civilian rule was simple: better living conditions, accountable leadership, stronger institutions, and greater prosperity.
Instead, millions believe they inherited a political class more interested in elections, appointments, and elite bargaining than governance itself.
Fuel prices have soared. Food inflation continues to stretch household incomes beyond breaking point. The naira has weakened dramatically. Businesses struggle under rising costs. Young Nigerians increasingly view migration as their best hope for survival.
To frustrated citizens, democracy appears expensive but ineffective.
This frustration explains why comparisons with military eras, once politically taboo, now surface more openly.
Some Nigerians argue that under Abacha, whatever restrictions existed politically, ordinary people could still travel safely, feed their families more easily, and predict economic conditions with greater certainty than today.
That sentiment reflects despair as much as nostalgia.
The Security Collapse
Nothing fuels the comparison more than insecurity.
Nigeria’s current security architecture faces pressure on nearly every front. Terrorism, separatist violence, banditry, kidnapping, and communal conflicts continue to destabilise large sections of the country.
Entire communities have been displaced. Farmers abandon farmlands. Highways have become zones of fear.
For critics of present leadership, the inability of the state to decisively confront these threats symbolizes institutional weakness.
In contrast, Abacha’s government is remembered by supporters as uncompromising and forceful.
They argue that the military ruler maintained tighter state control and projected an image of authority that discouraged open armed rebellion.
Whether historically complete or not, that perception has become politically powerful.
The Elite Question
Another reason for Abacha’s growing rehabilitation in some circles lies in widespread anger toward Nigeria’s political elite.
Those advancing pro-Abacha arguments increasingly portray the late ruler’s opponents as beneficiaries of the same system Nigerians now blame for corruption and national decay.
In this narrative, many figures who fought military rule eventually became influential power brokers in democratic Nigeria, only to reproduce the same culture of patronage, impunity, and inequality they once condemned.
The result is a bitter public conclusion: the “struggle for democracy” may have been less about rescuing ordinary Nigerians and more about redistributing access to power.
This belief fuels the claim that the real “termites and boll weevils” were never removed from the system. According to this viewpoint, they simply became stronger, wealthier, and more sophisticated under civilian rule.
The Risks of Romanticising Power
Still, political analysts warn that frustration with democracy should not erase the darker realities of military rule.
Abacha’s government faced serious accusations of repression, media censorship, intimidation of critics, and political persecution. Nigeria experienced diplomatic isolation during parts of his administration, particularly after the execution of Ken Saro-Wiwa and fellow Ogoni activists.
Critics insist that authoritarian stability often comes at enormous democratic and human costs.
They warn that societies under pressure sometimes develop selective memory, remembering cheaper prices and public order while overlooking fear, repression, and restricted freedoms.
Yet even these warnings do not fully erase the deeper issue driving the debate.
The fact that many Nigerians are now willing to openly compare democracy unfavourably with military rule reveals the scale of public disappointment with the country’s political direction.
Nigeria’s Moment of Reckoning
The renewed Abacha debate is ultimately less about one former ruler and more about Nigeria’s unresolved crisis of governance.
It reflects a country where millions feel abandoned by leaders, alienated from institutions, and unconvinced that democracy has improved their lives.
When citizens begin questioning whether authoritarian eras were more functional than democratic governments, it signals a dangerous erosion of faith in the political system itself.
Nigeria now faces a difficult challenge: proving that democratic governance can still deliver security, economic stability, accountability, and national cohesion better than the authoritarian alternatives many believed were buried in the past.
Until that happens, the ghosts of former strongmen will continue to haunt public discourse — not because history has changed, but because present realities have made old memories appear less frightening than current suffering.
