THE MACHIAVELLIAN POWER POLITICS: THE NIGERIAN EXPERIENCE.

BY

Gbatar, Lanshima Emmanuel

INTRODUCTION

There is no gainsaying the fact that Niccolo Machiavelli’s political philosophy of untamed quest
for power has had sway in the Nigerian political system, where, when the interest of one (the
Prince) for power is involved the inconvenience of the other is immaterial, and where again, the
pleasure of the ruler is the glory of the nation. Thus, the Nigerian political culture has gone quite
highly ethically relative, as each political actor defines his own morality and acts according to it
in order to gain his own selfish political interests. Many malicious ways are employed to attain
political ascendency, even as much more of such actions are taken to bring about sustenance of
power and fame as acquired. The game of politics in Nigeria today is often dotted with a lot of
maneuverings, slandering, libel and calculated elimination of lives tagged opponents. These all
are ways of breaking grounds in the Nigerian politics. Politics which is supposedly a game of
progressive interest with a decorum that adds flesh to one’s reputation has become overtime a
game that is devoid of peace, truth and deserved dignity. In fact, Nigerian politics is
characteristically averse to the universally respected codes of conduct in its practitioners’ attempt
to make gains.

Hence, this work addresses this phenomenon of political ethical-anarchism as especially sold by
the philosophy of Machiavelli and sees its condemnable traces in the Nigerian political
enterprise, as well as identifies this situation as the bane of Nigerian insecurity. The paper argues
that objectivism in ethical conduct should be upheld even in the Nigerian political system in
order to eschew the malignant subjective shapelessness of ethics in the Nigerian political culture
that has left it a dirty game.

MACHIAVELLI: The New Lexicon Webster’s Dictionary aptly says this of Machiavelli which
summarizes his person in this work, “Niccolo (1469-1527), Florentine statesman, political
theorist and writer. Alarmed by the anarchy of the Italian city-states, he advocated (‘II Principle’,
1513) the establishment and maintenance of authority by any effective means. Evil acts of the
ruler were justified by the evil acts of the ruled.” Accordingly, to be Machiavellian is to be “of
or related to the political theories of Machiavelli [Machiavellianism], characterized by cunning
and duplicity” (595).

WHAT IS POLITICS?

The word politics comes from the Greek word polis, meaning “the State” or “community”. And
it denotes the art and science of the government of a state, as well as the activities of its citizens
in setting up a government for the governance of such a state. Thus, politics connotes
togetherness or oneness. The concept of polis was that of an ideal State, and it came from the
writings of great political thinkers such as Plato and Aristotle. The idea of the ideal State came as
a result of the previous state which was not ideal but corrupt; Plato and Aristotle saw
imperfections in the societies in which they lived. Hence, politics becomes the means of forming
a government for the state that would bring under control the conflicts and other imperfections
inherent in the state. Politics then becomes a game between opponents who struggle for
governmental positions and even so with decorum that is devoid of harm to each other. Thus, the
game of politics like that of football counts as a foul any act among the political actors and the
fans that can lead to extremism.

MACHIAVELLI’S POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY

Machiavelli’s political philosophy is principally centred on the need for rulers and states to strive
for political power and authority by any means possible. The means of acquiring political
domination has to be the one that is most effective in attaining the set goal without any effect of
threat of loss of such authority or state due to the ruler’s actions. Thus, Machiavelli advocated for
braveness and even the use of violence on the part of the ruler in a bid to gain the throne of
leadership and sustain it as well as foster the security and unity of the state, for which purpose he
has the obligation to spare nothing that poses as an obstacle. However, the modesty of the action
of the ruler comes in where he needs to check down on excessive cruelty, even so with just the
fear of the ruler’s possibility of losing out of favour with the people who will give him the ruling
mandate. Thus, the ruler has to be cunning, crafty and full of tact; for it is for such people as this,
that the right to sustainable “throneship” belongs.

Accordingly, Lasky quoted in Mukherjee and Ramaswamy states the basic realities of politics in
the understanding of Machiavelli as consisting in its “lust for power, its admiration of success, its
carefreeness of means, its rejection of medieval bonds, its frank pragmatism, its conviction that
national unity makes for national strength” (cf Mukherjee and Ramaswamy, 143). These basic
realities of politics as understood by Machiavelli sum up his entire political philosophy. As for
the lust for power, every Prince or ruler is identified by his diehard desire for political
ascendency and crave for authoritative relevance. Thus, Mukherjee and Ramaswamy maintain,
“Machiavelli conceived human beings as being basically restless, ambitious, aggressive and
acquisitive, in a state of constant strife and anarchy. They were discontented and dissatisfied, for
human needs were unlimited, but fortune limited their possessions and capacity for enjoyment”
(Mukherjee and Ramaswamy, 143).

As for its admiration for success, it is the noble intention of every prince and indeed all political
actors that their tactics meet with success. Hence, the prince in his attempt to be successful must
not tolerate drawbacks from anybody. Thus, showing the prince one of the ways to be successful,
Machiavelli admonishes:

A prince must, therefore, never lack advice. But he must take it when he
wants to, not when others want him to; indeed, he must discourage
 everyone from tendering advice about anything unless it is asked for. All
the same, he should be questioner, and must listen patiently to the truth
regarding what he has inquired about. Moreover, if he finds that anyone
for some reason holds the truth back he must show his wrath (The Prince,
76).
Machiavelli also understands politics in terms of its carefreeness of means. He believes that
matters of rulership are matters of do or die affairs for the ruler and he has the individual
obligation to employ any means possible to attain political height and acquire the throne of
rulership, where again, he has the duty to spare nothing to ensure the security and unity of his
“principality” (i.e. his territory of governance). Thus, the elimination of lives who pose as
opposition to the noble leadership goal of the ruler, the rigging of elections, giving of fake
promises and whatsoever one may consider as negative are justified of the leader so long as they
prove effective in achieving the ends of the ruler. Thus, for him the ends shall justify the means.

Again, for Machiavelli politics consists in rejection of medieval bonds. In other words, politics
must have nothing to do with religion, and the dynamic and individuated ethics of politics must
not be detected by religious self-imposing morality. Even though Machiavelli never accepted
that religious moral detects should be allowed to influence the ruler’s tact of politics it must be
noted that he was not anti-religion as he believed in the much influence that religion had on not
just the social life of the people but also on the development and serenity of the state, even so
religion was not an end in itself but leadership was. Machiavelli thus, was rather anti-Church and
anti-Cleric.

Machiavelli also understood politics to consist of frank pragmatism. This means that politics is a
game that consists in pursuing anything that is workable and effective for the power seeker and
so long as the means of attaining power for the ruler works effectively for him, he damns the
moral consequence. However, politics must have the end of raising leadership that will
coercively foster unity of the state to the effect of its national strength. Thus, for the ruler to
attract fortune in his reign he must be brave and forceful since fortune is a woman who loves the
young men who are brave and can treat her roughly.

MACHIAVELLIANISM IN THE NIGERIAN POLITICAL SYSTEM

A look at the game of politics in Nigeria reveals that the Nigerian political system is heavily
buffeted by the Machiavellian philosophy of power-politics which encourages and justifies the
villainous actions of a power-seeking desperado. The Machiavellian philosophy of “the end
justifies the means” has become a household clause in the Nigerian politics. And this accounts
for the decline in ethical rectitude to some shapeless ethics in the practice of the Nigerian politics
today, where murders, rigging of elections, slander, libel, bribery among other vices are the order
of the day.

Nigerian practice of politics today lacks a code of conduct that is acceptable to all, as the
definition of this has been individualized. Being rooted on the idea of “the end justifies the
[mischievous] means,” the science of Nigerian politics is carried out on the principle of who gets
what, when, where and how, at whomever’s expense (of life, dignity, right and property). There
is so much of lack of love and commitment to duty on the part of Nigerian politicians, as these
make promises during electioneering campaigns in order just to deceive the people and assume
political positions. This kind of desperation in the politicians often lead to wanton enmity
between opponents as well as destruction of lives and property in order to make it to political
offices for selfish gains. This lack of love and concern for other counterpart and the masses in the
motives of the Nigerian political actors is resultant to a lot of mischief, slander, libel, lies,
reckless elimination of lives, destruction of property, among other political evils that envelop the
Nigerian political atmosphere, making it a dirty game.

EVALUATION/CONCLUSION

In spite of the fact that Machiavelli wrote in emotional response to the ruined fate of his state
Italy which as of the time of his writing was suffering under the tyranny of foreign nations who
invaded it; his philosophy has a lot of implications on morality which has made it unacceptable
in any civil society that seeks peace among others and calls for dignity of the human person even
as the ruled of the state. This however is impossible with the Machiavellian model of leadership
as he advocated for absolute monarchism where the prince or the ruler had absolute powers even
to take the life of the citizens if that was that most effective means to gaining authority,
maintaining the unity of the state and fostering her unity.

It is rather unfortunate that Machiavellianism has had firm sway in the Nigerian game of politics.
Joseph Omoregbe decries this condition thus:

Politics in Nigeria since independence has generally followed the

Machiavellian line of separating politics from morality. We are made to
believe that politics and morality do not go together, that once a person
starts playing politics he must ignore morality. Hence we hear it said that
“politics is a dirty game”, meaning that by its very nature politics
involves the use of immoral means. Thus Nigerian politicians have
followed Machiavelli in removing morality from politics and in thinking
that the best way to be successful in politics is to use immoral means.
They have also believed erroneously with Machiavelli that the ultimate
goal in politics is to grab political power by all means, fair or foul, and
that once one has succeeded in grabbing power, all means…must be used
to retain it (144).

In summary, the Nigerian state has long suffered the lot of excruciating pains of murder, deceit,
slander, libel, corruption and inattention to the socio-economic needs of the populace, from her
politicians. This is easily so due to flexibility in the moral conduct and attitude of the political
leaders, where everybody acts the mischievous way he feels in order to achieve his sole selfish
ends and which often is an amount to total negligence of the ethics of the game of politics.
Hence, the flare of ethical realism replete in the Machiavellian political philosophy as exhibited
in the world of Nigerian politics, which has offered the rich politicians uncontrollable ethical
freedom, is obviously the bane of Nigerian ginormous problems.