The Fourth Republic

The republic was established by a transition programme run by the outgoing military administration of Abdulsalami Abubakar after the death of Sani Abacha in 1998. A new constitution was promulgated in 1999, political parties were registered and elections were held for federal, state and local offices.

The framework retained the main features developed during the preceding decades: a presidential system, thirty-six states and a Federal Capital Territory, a bicameral National Assembly, and a federal government whose revenue depends heavily on oil and gas and is shared with the states and local governments under an allocation formula.

Olusegun Obasanjo took office as President on 29 May 1999. Since then general elections have been held in 2003, 2007, 2011, 2015, 2019 and 2023, and the presidency has been held by Obasanjo, Umaru Musa Yar'Adua, Goodluck Jonathan, Muhammadu Buhari and Bola Ahmed Tinubu. In 2015 an incumbent president was defeated at the polls and power was transferred to an opposition candidate, the first such transfer in the country's history. On the death of Yar'Adua in 2010, the constitutional provision for succession by the Vice-President was followed.

Institutional developments in the period include the creation of anti-corruption agencies, the negotiation and substantial repayment of external debt in the mid-2000s, the introduction of biometric voter registration and electronic accreditation in later election cycles, telecommunications liberalisation that produced very rapid growth in mobile phone use, and the emergence of Nigerian film and music industries with continental and international reach.

The period has also seen sustained security and governance challenges, including insurgency in the north east, conflict over land and pastoral routes in the middle belt, and unrest over pollution and resource control in the delta states, together with recurring debates about restructuring the federation, revenue allocation, policing and the shape of local government. Court challenges to election results and reform of electoral law have been continuous features of each cycle.

Twenty-six years of uninterrupted civilian rule is itself the period's most measurable outcome: the transfer of power at fixed intervals, including from a governing to an opposition party, has become the expected route to office.

The questions inherited from earlier periods remain open, among them how revenue should be divided between the federal government, the states and the communities where oil and gas are produced, how policing and security should be organised, and whether the current structure of thirty-six states is the right one. Because this period is ongoing, this page describes its framework and general trajectory rather than assessing any particular administration, and it is kept under review.