8 - Double Standards or Different Lenses? Comparing US Approaches to the Buhari and Abacha Governments

Summary

In June 1998, Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Susan Rice testified before Congress, telling lawmakers the reasons why US-Nigeria relations had soured over the previous five years:

It is no secret that there have been serious strains in U.S.-Nigerian relations in recent times … Misguided policies, mismanagement and corruption have stifled Nigeria's economy. Basic human rights, including freedom of speech and assembly, have been trampled upon … Moreover, the Nigerian Government detained pro-democracy leaders and political figures who were critical of the government … human rights activists and journalists. Military tribunals denied due process to political and other prisoners, prompting both the United Nations General Assembly and the U.N. Human Rights Commission to condemn the Nigerian government and call upon it to respect fundamental human rights and restore civilian rule.

(Rice 1998: 11)

More than two decades later, Rice's assessment of Nigerian state behaviours during Sani Abacha's military regime (1993–1998) is all too familiar. Under the civilian government of President Muhammadu Buhari (2015–2023), ‘misguided policies, mismanagement and corruption’ remained the norm. Although nominally a democracy, Nigerian elections have become exercises in competitive rigging, and government efforts to stifle free speech and target its critics have intensified. Like the Abacha regime, the Buhari government has not hesitated to infringe on Nigerians’ constitutionally protected freedoms, and commits gross human rights violations with impunity, as its violent crackdown on the 2020 #EndSARS protests illustrates.

Yet despite these parallels, Nigeria's relations with the international community generally – and the United States specifically – remain relatively unperturbed. Under Buhari, state abuses and norm-breaking have not sparked the same degree of international outcry nor attracted the sanctions they did during the Abacha period. Indeed, the United States has hosted Buhari at the White House twice, approved controversial arms sales to his government and shied away from criticizing its governance failures, democratic backsliding, and human rights abuses.

Structured in three sections, this chapter seeks to explain this apparent inconsistency in US foreign policy approaches to Nigeria. In the first section, it argues that the conduct of the Buhari government and the Abacha regime is very much analogous in three areas traditionally prioritized by US foreign policy makers: democracy, human rights, and corruption.