Pentecostal Republic: Religion and The Struggle for State Power in Nigeria

✍ Scribed by Ebenezer Obadare

• Publisher: Zed Books
• Year: 2018
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 233
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

“Throughout its history, Nigeria has been plagued by religious divisions. Tensions have only intensified since the restoration of democracy in 1999, with the divide between Christian south and Muslim north playing a central role in the country’s electoral politics, as well as manifesting itself in the religious warfare waged by Boko Haram.
Through the lens of Christian–Muslim struggles for supremacy, Ebenezer Obadare charts the turbulent course of democracy in the Nigerian Fourth Republic, exploring the key role religion has played in ordering society. He argues the rise of Pentecostalism is a force focused on appropriating state power, transforming the dynamics of the country and acting to demobilize civil society, further providing a trigger for Muslim revivalism.
Covering events of recent decades to the election of Buhari, Pentecostal Republic shows that religio-political contestations have become integral to Nigeria’s democratic process, and are fundamental to understanding its future.”

✦ Table of Contents

Cover
About the author
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Contents
List of abbreviations
Acknowledgements
Introduction
1. Pentecostal republic, enchanted democracy
Introduction: demons in the villa
State of siege
A Pentecostal republic
An African test case
Intellectual context and outline of chapters
2. 1999–2007: Pentecostalism ascendant
Obasanjo builds a mosque
From chaos to order
Power shifts: the (second) coming of Obasanjo
The rise of ‘political Christianity’
A prayer answered: the making of a ‘born-again’ president
Christians in power
Courting the theocratic class
Sharia politics
Conclusion: Obasanjo, Pentecostal?
3. 2007–10: a Muslim interlude?
An Òrìṣà follower’s stand
From Obasanjo to Yar’Adua
The rise of Boko Haram
A crisis of absence
Prophetic politics
Terminal struggle
Conclusion
4. 2010–15: Pentecostalism re-ascendant
Introduction: a president, his confidant, and a botched arms deal
Between North and South
The ‘lucky’ one
Bio-politics
Performing piety
Queer politics
Politics of insurgency
News of a kidnapping
Conclusion: a lesson in performance
5. Electoral theologies
Introduction: a royal blessing
Religion talk
Acts of faith
Game of robes
Conclusion
6. ‘Kill them before they kill you’: on violent Pentecostalism
Introduction: the pastor as fortune teller
Ubiquitous evil: the cosmos of Pastor D. K. Olukoya
On the violent heart of Pentecostal praxis
Quotidian violence in Africa: between the epochal and the episodic
Violent Pentecostalism?
7. Conclusion
Introduction: a political bromance
Spiritual radicalism
A reactionary turn
Final thoughts: democracy and invisible power
Notes
References
Index