Nigeria: After the Nightmare

Iyorwuese Hagher. 2011. Nigeria: After the Nightmare. Lanham, MD: University Press of America. 165 pp.

Nigeria, as much as any other country in Africa, has produced a long and impressive lineage of indigenous thinkers. They have been among the most eloquent and incisive commentators on the dysfunctions of the colonial state, the resource curse, corruption, and the other dilemmas of postcolonialism including both domestic and Western sources. Throughout Nigeria: After the Nightmare Iyorwuese Hagher praises this proud intellectual history-indeed, allusions to figures like Wole Soyinka, Chinua Achebe, and Ken Saro-Wiwa constitute one of the book's dominant strains. What makes After the Nightmare so disappointing is its failure to honor in form the legacy to which it often refers. Hagher's work lacks clarity, consistency, rigor, and creativity. Thus, Hagher never manages to accomplish the audacious task he sets for himself in this book-to apply the lessons of Nigeria's recent history to the challenge of shaping a Nigerian democratic renaissance.

Hagher fails in this attempt due to, for lack of a better word, sloppiness. Nigeria: After the Nightmare is divided into three clearly defined parts which suggest an obvious logical progression: "The Brink Scenario," "Nightmare Scenario," and "Revival Scenario." From the start, though, the purpose and thesis of the book are unclear. In the introduction, Hagher states that it is chiefly about the lost decades of military dictatorship between 1966 and 1999. But in the first chapter, Hagher is preoccupied by events since 1999, and especially since Christmas 2009 when Umar Farouk Abdulmuttalab smuggled an explosive device onto an American airplane. Hagher spends...