Dear Jibrin Okutepa SAN
There’s a particular kind of frustration that only proximity can produce. Not the distant outrage of the observer, but the weary, intimate disillusionment of someone who has sat at the table, argued the briefs, and watched the machinery of politics grind in real time. When you have stood as lead advocate, defending positions, shaping narratives, and navigating the theatre of public accountability, you earn a vantage point that few can genuinely contest.
So no, your perception is not in doubt.
What is in question, however, is the conclusion drawn from it.
There is a growing temptation among politically conscious Nigerians, especially those closest to the system, to arrive at a stark, almost nihilistic endpoint: that the structure itself is irredeemable. That the rot is so deep, so systemic, that the only logical response is to discard the entire enterprise. Tear it down. Start again.
It is an understandable instinct. But it is also, in many ways, the wrong one.
Because what we are witnessing in Nigeria is not an isolated pathology. It is not some uniquely Nigerian affliction, nor an exclusively African defect. Strip away the accents, the attire, and the institutional veneers, and what remains is something far more universal: the persistent human struggle between power and restraint, greed and governance.
Recent global political developments have made that painfully clear. The excesses, the populism, the opportunistic bending of institutions, these are not confined to emerging democracies. They are present in mature systems too, often dressed in more sophisticated language but driven by the same impulses.
This is not to excuse the failings of Nigerian politics. Far from it. It is to contextualise them.
The danger in misdiagnosing the problem as uniquely Nigerian is that it leads to fatalism. And fatalism is politically paralysing. If the system is inherently broken beyond repair, then effort becomes futile. Reform becomes naïve. Engagement becomes a waste of time.
But that is not where we are.
What we have is not a system that must be abandoned, but one that must be disciplined.
There is a difference.
The thrust of our political journey, democratic governance, electoral participation, institutional development, is not the problem. The excesses are. The distortions. The opportunism that exploits weak guardrails. The culture of impunity that thrives where accountability is inconsistent.
And those are things that can be trimmed.
Not overnight. Not within a single electoral cycle. And certainly not within the impatient timelines of modern political discourse.
But they can be trimmed.
History, inconvenient as it may be, teaches us that political systems evolve slowly. Often frustratingly so. The democracies we now hold up as benchmarks were not born clean. They were contested, corrupted, recalibrated, and refined over generations. Progress was uneven. Reforms were resisted. Mistakes were made—repeatedly.
Nigeria is not exempt from that arc.
In fact, the very frustration being expressed, the ability to identify flaws, critique leadership, and demand better, is itself evidence of democratic function. You cannot solve a problem you refuse to acknowledge. And in that sense, the current wave of political introspection is not a sign of failure; it is a sign of maturation.
The real risk lies elsewhere.
It lies in allowing that frustration to curdle into abandonment. In discarding not just the dirty bathwater of political excess, but the baby of democratic possibility with it.
Because the alternative to democracy is not a cleaner system. It is simply a different set of problems, often more severe, less accountable, and harder to reverse.
As the old, overused but still accurate line goes: democracy is the worst form of government, until you try the others.
So where does that leave us?
It leaves us in the uncomfortable but necessary space of patience and persistence.
It requires a recognition that systemic change is iterative. That economic growth, civic awareness, and institutional strengthening gradually create resistance to excess. That political culture is not rewritten by outrage alone, but by sustained engagement.
And perhaps most importantly, it requires protecting the very voices that are currently expressing discontent.
There is a certain “pristine” quality to principled frustration, the kind that is rooted in a desire for improvement rather than destruction. That must not be polluted. It must be preserved, amplified, and, where possible, translated into constructive pressure.
Because systems do not evolve in silence. They evolve under scrutiny.
Nigeria will not solve its political challenges in two or three generations. That is an uncomfortable truth, but a necessary one. What it can do, what it must do, is give its democratic framework the time and space to adjust, to absorb criticism, and to gradually align with the aspirations of its people.
That is not a passive process. It is an active, often exhausting one.
But it is the only path that leads forward without burning everything behind us.
Yours faithfully
Lawson Akhigbe
Centre for Nigeria Progress 