January Voting Registration Turns Deadly

On Monday, January 17th citizens gathered to register to vote in upcoming elections in Jos, Nigeria, a city known for debilitating clashes and tensions between Muslims and Christians. Youths protesting against the fact that Muslims were conducting the voter registration became the catalyst of violence. According the witnesses, soldiers opened fire among the crowd causing the death of a university graduate volunteer followed by two other bystanders. General Hassan Umaru, a leading military commander, continues to deny that the soldiers ever were ordered to or used lethal force. The country continues to attempt to register some 70 million eligible voters in the upcoming two weeks so that they will be able to participate in April elections in the violence-torn region despite the fact that 500 people were killed last year in Jos alone.



This tragic story demonstrates how challenging efforts to democratize and liberalize the country of Nigeria has become, and, unfortunately, most likely will continue for some time. Consistently, the violence can be attributed to the coinciding cleavages that rip the country apart caused by the incredible tensions between the predominately Muslim north and Christian south. This religious division polarizes the country into two separate identities, making it increasingly difficult to unify Nigeria as a whole and create a new healthy sense of nationalism. This story is encouraging though because it, at the least, shows some level of political participation and an effort to democratize the country in structure and function.