Nigeria

SCT is working with a wide range of civil society organisations in Nigeria to develop a national Speakers’ Corner project in Africa’s most populous country. The initiative’s principal aim will be to create new opportunities for public participation in governance by developing a forum for open debate through which citizens can exchange ideas and opinions, develop consensus and avoid conflict, hold their elected representatives and others to account and influence policy-making and decision-taking.

SCT’s role in the early stage of the project will be to consolidate the support already offered by a range of Nigerian, UK and international organisations, promote the initiative among key potential stakeholders, including the Nigerian Government, political parties and civil society organisations and, wherever possible, build practical working relationships.

National Church Abuja

This consultative process will, it is hoped, allow SCT to progress to the second stage of its work, namely to develop the vehicle for a national Speakers’ Corner project ‘owned’, steered and managed in Nigeria by Nigerians and sustainable over the long term. The securing of strong and lasting partnerships is therefore an important priority for SCT and essential for the long term prospects of the project.

In September 2008, SCT undertook a scoping exercise designed to test the viability of the project. Consultees broadly agreed that a Speakers’ Corner project would be particularly timely not least because, as a number suggested, Nigeria has reached an important stage in the development of its democratic and economic process: there are grounds for optimism that it can fulfil its very significant potential but also a danger that, if it does not now do so, recent progress could falter or even be reversed.

A significant number of consultees, including politicians of different parties, regarded the lack of public participation in Nigeria’s political and democratic systems as the principal obstacle to progress. They referred in particular to 

• the lack of opportunity among citizens to participate in their own political processes
• the lack of influence of the majority of Nigerians on policy-making and service delivery
• the lack of accountability in Nigerian politics and public administration
• the lack of national consensus and the potential for conflict.

National Mosque Abuja

The Fragility of Freedom

Several acknowledged that the President, the courts and a growing body of politicians are currently showing a renewed commitment to the democratic process. But they also recognised that, in seeking a new legitimacy, the same politicians and public servants are finding it difficult to create vehicles for the engagement they wish to promote between themselves and the public.

They regarded the creation of a genuinely ‘public space’ in which citizens can meet and debate on equal terms with each other and the decision-takers among them as vital both to the building of a more stable and sustainable democratic process and to the fostering of more cohesive communities.

Millenium Park Abuja

Moreover, they see in the Speakers’ Corner model the prospects for a credible, independent vehicle for public engagement capable of serving the needs of both the public and those in positions of power who are serious about developing a more open and participative democracy.

From July 2009, SCT has been working with its Nigerian partners to develop a sustainable vehicle for the project, gather support for it and plan its launch in Abuja and, in due course, its expansion to Lagos and other parts of the country.

The Speakers' Corner Working Group

That work has been very fruitful with a number of important partnerships and collaborations rapidly developing. ActionAid has pledged to provide office accommodation for the project and the Nigerian Bar Association is offering pro bono legal advice in creating a Nigerian equivalent of Speakers’ Corner Trust. The NBA, ActionAid and the Nigerian Labour Congress have also all undertaken to activate their national networks to support the development of local Speakers’ Corner initiatives when the project’s roll-out begins.

In October 2009, SCT established a Working Group to help develop and guide the project’s progress. Membership includes ActionAid, the NBA and NLC but also features civil society organisations such as Coalitions for Change (C4C), Integrity, the Policy & Advocacy Centre, the Paradigm Initiative and the National Democratic Institute.

Advisory Council Takes Shape As Project Coordinator Appointed

The project took several steps forward over the summer of 2010 with the completion of a Business Plan and the recruitment of several distinguished Nigerians as the founding members of the Advisory Council of the proposed Nigeria Speakers’ Corner Trust, the equivalent body to SCT in the UK. The first members are

• Dr Christopher Kolade – lecturer in Corporate Governance, Lagos Business School; former Nigerian UK High Commissioner; former Director General of the Nigerian Broadcasting Corporation; former Chief Executive and Chairman of Cadbury Nigeria Plc
• Dr Timiebi Koripamo-Agary – Media Coordinator and Liaison Niger Delta Amnesty Programme; Federal Permanent Secretary (Rtd); Member Board of ActionAid Nigeria; Labour Adviser to the Presidential Taskforce on Power; Executive Director, Gender Rights Advancement and Development
• Matthew Hassan Kukah – Catholic priest; author; human rights campaigner
• A.B. Mahmoud – lawyer; Senior Advocate of Nigeria and former Solicitor General, Attorney General and Commissioner of Justice in Kano State
• Clement Nwankwo – Director, Policy & Legal Advocacy Centre; former executive director, Constitutional Rights Project
• Dr Kole Shettima – Director, MacArthur Foundation Africa office; Co-Chair, Higher Education Initiative in Africa; Chair, Centre for Democracy & Development; Member of the Board of Actionaid Nigeria
• Pat Utomi – Professor of Political Economy, Lagos Business School; broadcaster; former Presidential candidate
• Maryam Uwais – lawyer; member of the African Union Committee of Experts on the Rights and Welfare of the Child; member of the Nigerian Presidential Advisory Council.

Ojobo Atuluku

In June, Coalitions for Change awarded a grant which enabled the project to recruit a part-time coordinator and organise its first events in the run-up to the Nigerian elections expected in January 2011.

Ojobo Atuluku, a former deputy director of ActionAid Nigeria, was appointed in August and is now accelerating the project’s development. It is hoped that the new Speakers’ Corner Trust Nigeria (SCTN) can be registered by early 2011 with a national launch in prospect for the first half of 2011.

Citizens’ Deliberation in Tender Vine Park

Dr Timiebi Koripamo-Agary, a member of SCTN's Advisory Council, speaking at the Citizens' Deliberation in Tender Vine Park

With the approach of the Nigerian elections in 2011, SCTN has been keen to demonstrate how the Speakers’ Corner model can provide opportunities and platforms for both civil society organisations and the public at large to engage in the electoral process and contribute to a constructive debate about often controversial issues.

Ojobo Atuluku meets the press at Tender Vine Park

With the aid of a grant from Coalitions for Change, SCTN was able to organise the Citizens’ Deliberation on Free Fair & Credible Elections which took place in Tender Vine Park in Abuja on 7 December 2010. The event brought together a wide range of civil society organisations to debate the key issues for Nigeria’s 2011 elections including topics as diverse as electoral integrity and political accountability, climate change, the rights of people with disabilities and the needs of women and young people.

Maryam Uwais at Tender Vine Park

'Gbenga Sesan makes his point

Their deliberations, which were widely reported by Nigerian TV, radio and press, gave rise to the Tender Vine Declaration. The Declaration is to be widely disseminated via the internet and through a series of radio features and phone-ins to provide encouragement and guidance to local communities wishing to debate their own priorities, develop their own consensus and engage with candidates on their own agenda.

SCTN is currently discussing with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) the possibility of mounting a programme of further pre-election debates in the new year.