Comparing West Africa: Nigeria vs. The Rest
This is a continuation of our series on Nigeria, but let's bring the Rest of West Africa in it
Nigeria is so big that frankly it’s impossible to write one article on it. If you want to see my first article about Nigeria pre-independence in a 6 min read go here.
The region of West Africa is so unequal politically and economically, that the best way to describe the inequality is to talk more about Nigeria.
How Big is Nigeria?
If you combined all the other West African nations in an economic region and excluded Nigeria, Nigeria would still have a bigger population than that region. (Based on 2021 data, Nigeria’s population is 213M, the rest of West Africa is 205M). If you performed a weighted average on the rest of West Africa’s human development index, GDP, and average income per person, Nigeria would beat that region (see data below). The reason is most West African countries are poorer and less developed than Nigeria with the exception of Ghana, Cape Verde, Ivory Coast, and arguably Mauritania.
As of 2021, Nigeria has average income of $2080 ($5200 adjusted for local living standards) and a similar human development level to Pakistan, a country 13 years older as an independent state than Nigeria. As of 2021, Nigeria's $440B economy is significantly larger than the rest of West Africa’s GDP of $294B, which would have a population similar to Nigeria but a lower human development level similar to Afghanistan.
Inequality in West Africa
As you can see from the 1st table. Out of the 15 West African countries, the region is largely split from lower-middle income nations between which have human development scores (education, income, health) equivalent to South Asian countries like India, Pakistan, or Bangladesh. Meanwhile, low income nations have human development scores similar to war-torn middle eastern countries like Yemen and Afghanistan. You can’t put Africa has a group, and you can’t even put West Africa as a group.
Lower-middle income:
Cape Verde, Ghana, Mauritania, Ivory Coast, Nigeria, Benin and Senegal
Low income that are about to graduate to lower-middle income club:
Guinea & Togo
Low income:
Burkina Faso, Mali, Guinea-Bissau, The Gambia, Liberia, Niger, Sierra Leone
Democracy in West Africa
Based of The Economist’s western standards of “democracy”, Nigeria, Ivory Coast, Mauritania, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Senegal, Gambia, and Benin are “hybrid democratic/autocratic regimes” like Ukraine, Mexico, or Turkey.
A hybrid regime is when substantial irregularities happen in elections that prevent them from being free or fair as we just witnessed in Nigeria. Corruption tends to be widespread and the rule of law is weaker than it should be. Nigeria scored a 5/10 in electoral process & pluralism and a 4 in functioning government, in political participation, political culture, and civil liberties.
Ghana is the only democratic country in the region, albeit it is a “flawed democracy” like America, Israel, Brazil, Argentina, or India. Ghana was founded as an “enlightened autocracy” , by Kwame Nkrumah. Then Ghana struggled with military dictatorships until the World Bank forced military leader Jerry Rawlings to allow multi-party rule in order to get IMF loans. By 2010, Ghana was firmly a democracy. In Ghana, the media are independent and diverse. However, there system of checks and balances could be better. Ghana scores an 8/10 in electoral process and pluralism, a 5 in functioning government, and a 6 in political participation, political culture, and civil liberties.
The Guineas, Mali, Togo, Niger, and Burkina Faso are authoritarian countries like China, Russia, North Korea, Venezuela, and Cuba.
In these states, state political pluralism is absent or heavily restricted. These nations are outright dictatorships or one party states. In these countries formal institutions of democracy exist on paper, but have little substance in practice. Elections, if they do occur, are not free and fair. There is disregard for abuses and infringements of civil liberties and protestors risk their lives to protest, as shown in Guinea. Media are typically state-owned or controlled by groups connected to the ruling regime. There is repression of criticism of the government and pervasive censorship. The judiciary is subservient to the state instead of being independent. These nations are strengthening their ties to Russian & Chinese investment despite Ukraine war.
Inequality in Nigeria
Nigerian annual income of $2080 is an average. The middle class and upper middle class Nigerians earn significantly more, but as of 2022, three-fifths of Nigerians (133M) are in multidimensionally poor. This means over half the population lacks almost every basic amenities you can think of: clean water, healthcare, decent roads, consistent food, consistent power supply, and a decent education. Also, a third of youth are unemployed). Nigeria is a very unequal country nation.
Nigeria’s wealth is very unevenly distributed. Lagos State, in the south west, has 16M people has a GDP of 41.17 trillion naira($90B), giving the average person a $5625 GDP per capita. Lagos alone would be the 7th richest African country and eclipses Iraq, Iran, and Indonesia as well in per capita GDP. Meanwhile, Sokoto State has 5.81M people in the North and has a GDP of 2.85 trillion naira ($6.22B), giving the average person a per capita GDP of $1244, which is slightly poorer than its neighbor Benin.
We will discuss more on Nigeria next time in Part 3.