ABSTRACT
No other African country has tried two such sharply divergent forms of competitive electoral democracy as has Nigeria. This chapter undertakes an evaluation of the role of elections and electoral democracy in Nigeria. It first looks at the short and unhappy life of the First Republic which was relatively brief and quite unsuccessful. However, it would be wrong indeed to say that the first democratic episode was insignificant in the overall pattern of Nigerian history. In the years immediately following the deposition of General Yakubu Gowon (July 1975), Nigeria moved to create a new system of wide-open democracy in which virtually everything was subject to the results of the electoral game. This was the constitutional system of what would be the "Second Republic." But in December 1983 the military intervened, deposed the Shehu Shagari government, and reestablished military rule. Nigeria illustrates the theme of continuity in the electoral process, despite the obvious sharp discontinuity in institutional formats.
