The Briefing Room - Nigeria's Maybe Coup

Welcome back to the briefing room the weekly show that looks at what other news roundup shows are covering and then snares at it as it adjusts its hips to glasses and sips some overpriced coffee before smugly thinking to itself amateurs i'm simon and this week we're covering madagascar's unexpected and unwanted new military regime following a gen z

Revolution that definitely was not aimed at installing a hunter after that we check in on the recent controversy surrounding poland and the suspect in the nord stream pipeline bombings first though we're diving into what we call nigeria's maybe coup and the fallout from a dramatic few days in africa's most populous country as always thank you for subscribing

And supporting fronts legends not only does your membership help fund exclusive content like this but it also allows us to cover important but less lucrative topics on the main channel so thank you again your support means a lot and now let's dive into the baby coup for our first story we head to nigeria where reports recently emerged of a coup attempt

Against president bola ahmed tinubu's government the news first reported by local outlets the premium times and sahara reporters alleged that the defense intelligence agency dia has been holding 16 officers incommunicado since september following intelligence that they were holding secret meetings and expressing discontent with the administration a military

Source told the premium times that the officers were planning to assassinate several government officials as part of the plot and that news according to the same source caused panic in abuja quoting them here the coup plot caused panic in government after it was leaked because the military high command had repeatedly assured the government of the military's

Loyalty to the administration and civil authorities out of that panic the government cancelled the national independence day parade on october the first because it was a military ceremony and they did not want to take the risk end quote additional reporting from prn nigeria alleges that politicians from the south and north of nigeria were involved in the

Plot and are being investigated however according to the nigerian government none of this happened there's nothing to see here move along please in a statement brigadier general tukur gusau the director of defense information said that the reports were false and that the officers were being held as part of a routine disciplinary process he further clarified

That the cancellation of the independence anniversary parade was to allow the president to attend a strategic bilateral meeting outside the country and for members of the afn to sustain the momentum on the fight against terrorism insurgency and banditry so what's actually going on did a coup really happen is there any way to find out the truth and if a coup

Did happen why would the nigerian government try and cover it up well let's start with the first question what's going on at this time no one knows for sure the two outlets the premium times and sahara reporters are both standing by their reporting while the government continues to insist that reports of a coup are about as credible as the reports that nasa

Faked the moon landing and because you pay for fronts like a big brain we know you know that's not true so in the absence of a consensus reality let's try and work out what is true from the available information one the nigerian government did cancel the independence parade at the time they didn't provide any reason why but said that other planned events

Would go on including a televised address by the president what we can't confirm is whether the cancellation was because of a bilateral meeting we went through all the press releases issued by the office of the president and found no mention of a bilateral meeting that overlapped with the independent celebrations we did find a press release saying that the

President was returning to abuja following a 10-day working visit to lagos and another one announcing that the president would be flying to rome on the 12th of october as part of a conference on west africa's security crisis as part of this conference he was scheduled to have bilateral meetings with other regional leaders again the independent celebrations

Were on october 1st and the rome conference wasn't until the 12th almost two weeks later so the explanation that the independent celebrations were cancelled because of bilateral talks doesn't quite add up now does it our second true statement is that the nigerian government is holding 16 military officers we don't know why but the answer to that might lie in

Who is holding these men as we mentioned the soldiers are allegedly being held by the dia nigeria's primary military intelligence agency which operates directly under the ministry of defense that's highly unusual because the dia's mandate does not include trying or investigating military officers accused of discipline issues that's usually reserved for the

Military the only possible reason why the dia would be holding them is if they wanted to keep them separate from the military to root out any additional conspirators but this is only true if the dia is holding them if the military is holding them then odds are that it is just a routine disciplinary issue just to keep score we have one fact that lines up with

Reporting the cancellation of the military parade and one piece of circumstantial evidence that could prove decisive but it depends entirely on whether the dia is actually involved or not there's not much to go on but and we're gonna go out on a little bit of a limb here we are leaning towards the idea that the attempted coup did take place and abuja is

Doing everything in its power to stop that news from coming out and that takes us to our final question why would the nigerian government try to cover up a coup if it had happened and to answer this you need a bit of context since gaining independence in 1960 nigeria has had five successful coup attempts and multiple failed ones at one point things were so

Bad that so Some in the West mockingly referred to it as Cloud Cuckoo Land.

The Nigerian military controlled the government for much of the latter half of the 20th century. Following the death of General Sani Abacha, his successor, General Abdul Salami Abu Bakar, began a transition to democracy, which was completed following the 1999 elections, ushering in Nigeria's Fourth Republic.

This means that the current iteration of democracy in Nigeria is younger than most people watching this video. Since the emergence of the Fourth Republic, there has only been one significant coup attempt in 2004, and Abuja would like to keep it that way.

The Nigerian army has rejected multiple calls to overthrow the government, and most recently, during protests in 2024, when General Christopher Moussa, Chief of Staff of the Nigerian Armed Forces, told journalists, and we'll quote him here, democracy is what we stand for, and democracy is what we will continue to defend.

By contrast, Nigeria's West African neighbors are suffering from a bit of a coup epidemic right now. It's like a cold, but instead of getting chicken soup and warm blankets, you get armed soldiers overthrowing governments before they themselves are overthrown.

Direct neighbors like Niger, Chad, and Burkina Faso have all suffered coups in recent years, sometimes more than one of them.

So, you can see why Nigeria, with a long history of military rule, neighbors who have had their own governments overthrown, and a recent history of the public calling for military coups, would want to bury this story. It's to defend the democracy, and deter any possible copycats. And honestly, we can't say that we blame them.

Democracy is an idea worth defending, especially when you have experienced the alternative. We might take that for granted, having never experienced a military dictatorship, but we can guarantee you that the Nigerian people do not. Sometimes, you have to bend the truth a little to defend democracy.

Just a few short weeks ago, it seemed as if the world's growing youth protest movement was going to topple its second corrupt government in as many months.

But even though Madagascar's Gen Z protests did succeed in toppling a corrupt president, it appears that the nation's troubles with a self-enriching authoritarian elite might not even be close to a resolution.

When Madagascar's now former president, Andre Radulina, was ousted a bit over a week ago, it was because of the intervention of a military unit called CAPSAT.

Seizing on growing marches and demonstrations, CAPSAT took to the streets and called on the rest of the Nigerian military to support Radulina's overthrow. But as soon as the unit placed its finger on the scales, pro-democracy and human rights activists started to grow nervous.

All the way back in 2009, it was CAPSAT that had installed Radulina in the first place, and although the relationship between CAPSAT and Radulina had soured in the intervening years, that didn't mean that CAPSAT had become an instrument for the will of the people.

The unit was still led by people with deep ties to Madagascar, Madagascar's corrupt national elite, just a portion of the national elite that didn't particularly enjoy living under Rangelina's authority.

And within days of Rangelina's decision to flee the country, it became clear that the CAPSAT skeptics across the globe had figured out what was really going on.

Three days after the leader of CAPSAT, Colonel Michael Rangelina, announced that Madagascar's military was taking control of the country, he was taking the oath of office to become the nation's new president.

By his own description, the colonel intends to run a military council that will lead the nation for at least 18 to 24 months, before there's even a chance that a set of elections might be held.

A few days later, the colonel appointed a powerful businessman with connections to the Rangelina government to serve as the new prime minister, in a move that the nation's Gen Z protesters said had come without any consultation, and that, quote, runs contrary to the desired structural change that Madagascar's protesters had been working to bring about.

The military takeover was quickly condemned by UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres, while the African Union suspended Madagascar from all activities within the bloc until it engages in a civilian-led electoral process and a proper transition of power.

In Madagascar, the mood on the CAPSAT takeover is decidedly more upbeat, with only minimal public demonstrations against the decision to place CAPSAT's leader in power.

As the Institute for Security Studies explained it, quote, the AU decision to sanction Madagascar has angered many Malagasy who see the junta as a legitimate government that came to their rescue.

Not only that, but the nation's new military leader was imprisoned for months in 2023 and 2024 after criticizing Rangelina, and although he was largely unknown before the takeover, he's impressed the people of Madagascar with his personal demeanor and his apparent combination of patriotism and religiosity.

Certainly, the situation in Madagascar is duh, and a change in leadership, no matter how that change came about, does have the potential to bring a meaningful improvement in Madagascar's overall condition.

Right now, three out of four people in the country live below the poverty line, and Madagascar ranks very close to the bottom of the Global Human Development Index measured by the UN.

But African Union leaders, as well as global experts watching this process with an awareness of how military takeovers tend to go across the African continent, have real reason to doubt that the optimism of Madagascar's people is well-founded.

This military takeover mirrors a range of other coups across Africa in the last decade, where military seized on public discontent, claimed that they were protecting the people of their nation, and then went on to entrench themselves in authoritarian regimes that show zero sign of giving up their power.

Madagascar is among the African nations that are most vulnerable to that sort of takeover across all of Africa. It plays host to a very well-entrenched class of business and political elites who've built a culture of graft and corruption that's been baked into Madagascar's society.

The country is very poor, but its problem are made so much worse by a filter of self-enrichment that intercepts the wealth Madagascar does have before it ever reaches ordinary people.

Capsat is led by people who've directly benefited from that system for years, including the current president, and its loyalties appear to lie with a class of disillusioned elites who've been plotting a way to realize greater power long before the global Gen Z protest movement began.

The protest movement mobilized Madagascar's people and gave them away to air grievances and frustration with their leaders, but it had neither the time nor the knowledgeable and powerful leadership that would have allowed the protest movement to get ahead of the ambitions of Capsat and its influential backers.

As painful as it may be to acknowledge, Madagascar's protest movement appears to have gotten played, and with at least two years to work before they'd even have to acknowledge the idea of a peaceful transfer of power, there's no telling how deeply entrenched the nation's new leaders may be when, or if, the people of Madagascar finally get a chance to vote

For a better future.

And for our final story today, we turn our attention to the sidelines of the Russia-Ukraine war, and specifically to an attack that came to define the first year of the war, the bombing of the Nord Stream pipelines.

The Nord Stream pipelines were underwater pipelines, obviously, built by Russia's state-controlled Gazprom and designed to deliver up to 110 billion cubic meters of natural gas annually across the Baltic Sea to Germany.

The $11 billion Nord Stream 2 project had been particularly controversial, with Kiev and Washington worried it would grant Russia too much control of European energy security. And if anyone's watching from the past, well, that's exactly what's going to happen. But the worries went deeper.

Ukraine, which had long played the middleman and routed Russian gas to Europe, also feared that Russia would use the project to further isolate it. Then Russia invaded Ukraine, and about six months later, a series of powerful underwater explosions rocked the Baltic Sea, causing a series of major leaks and making the pipelines inoperable.

Much of the Western world believed that Russia was responsible, with one of Zelensky's top advisors, outright calling it a, and we'll quote him here, terrorist attack planned by Russia and an act of aggression towards the EU.

In the years since the attack, though, investigations, primarily led by the German government, have cast doubt on the idea that Russia was involved, and instead have pointed the finger either at Ukraine or, at the very least, at people acting in what they assumed were the best interests of the government in Kiev.

Germany issued international arrest warrants for the Ukrainian nationals it believed were responsible, and two were arrested, one in Poland, the other in Italy. Now, if this was any other crime, this is the part of the story where the Polish and Italian authorities would hand over the suspects to Berlin for prosecution.

The German prosecutors would then present... their case with the usual level of German efficiency and either secure a conviction or see the suspects declared innocent. Case closed, Boston Legal, one of my favorite TV shows by the way, would be proud. However, this case is anything but ordinary because of, well, everything that surrounds it.

The geopolitical stakes have turned what should be a straightforward criminal case into a legal and diplomatic quagmire. Italy's highest court recently ruled that the Ukrainian national in their custody couldn't be extradited to Germany, while a court in Poland took it a step further.

Judge Darius Lebowski of Warsaw's District Court blocked an extradition request, ordered the suspect released, and argued that if Ukraine was responsible for the attack, then it was, and we'll quote them here, justified, rational, and just.

Donald Task, the Prime Minister of Poland, celebrated this ruling writing in part on X. Rightly so. The case is closed.

But is it? Why did Poland choose not to extradite, and what does Germany think of this? Well, let's start with the first question.

Is the case closed? For now, the answer is yes, because there isn't any international incentive to punish the Ukrainians for actions that many deem necessary during a war. As the Polish court ruling put it, quote, the court rules that if the explosions were part of a military action against Russia's war machine, they were an act of just war, not sabotage.

Responsible Statecraft, an online magazine that covers foreign policy and generally takes an editorial stance, perhaps best described as anti-Ukraine but not pro-Russia, put it slightly differently. We'll quote them here, it's like a cell phone going off in a church. Everyone hears something, but no one looks and pretends not to notice.

However, whether the case remains closed after the war ends is anybody's guess. So, let's go to our second question. Why did Poland choose not to extradite?

Well, beyond their support for Ukraine, Poland chose not to extradite simply because they've been opposed to the Nord Stream project since long before the Ukraine war started.

In a 2007 diplomatic cable leaked by WikiLeaks, a Polish official laid out their government's official position that, and we'll quote them here, Poland considers the project as opposing our interest and the general rule of European solidarity.

Beyond that, there's the basic fact that, and we really need to stress this, Ukraine is currently being invaded by Russia.

As noted in the ruling that we quoted a moment ago, the Polish position could be best summed up as, if Moscow is allowed to bomb Ukrainian cities, but Kiev can't retaliate against Russian infrastructure, then how the hell are they supposed to fight a war? And that leads us to our final question. What's Germany think of all of this?

Officially, they're not saying much. According to independent outlet Insight News Media, Berlin refused to comment on the case publicly with a spokesperson for Germany's foreign ministry, saying the government respected the independence of the Polish judiciary.

Unofficially, though, they are mad. the investigators were already angry at what they see as poland's obstruction of justice because warsaw had initially refused to execute the warrant a former german intelligence officer even alleged that poland was refusing to cooperate in order to hide their own involvement in the attack although we do have to point out

That there is no credible information that has linked warsaw with those attacks additionally germany is afraid of the precedent that this could set if poland's reasoning stands it could set a precedent for other eu courts to invoke wartime moral arguments in cases involving national allies a move that could undermine the coherence of european legal

Cooperation under the european arrest warrant framework this is happening at a time when relations between the two nato allies are increasingly tense poland's new president carol naraki renewed his calls for germany to pay reparations to poland for world war ii during a visit to berlin in response german leaders have reiterated that they considered the issue

Legally closed and that no reparations erode beyond historical grievances tensions are high after berlin introduced border controls on its border with poland in 2023 and recently toughened its approach rejecting undocumented arrivals and sending them back to poland under eu and bilateral agreements warsaw says this has placed an unfair burden on the country

Poland recently retaliated by introducing temporary checks on its border with germany ostensibly as a way to limit migration so yes it's entirely possible the national grievances are playing a role here but this case also goes to the heart of the difference between eastern and western europe over the ukraine war for nations such as poland ukraine's fight is

An existential one should kiev fall warsaw is under no illusions that it would have to fight russia itself a few years down the line so things like the pipeline bombing are seen not just as justifiable acts of war but actions that could help protect the polish state itself on the other hand nations in the west of europe still tend to act like the war is an

Unfortunate issue that nonetheless shouldn't affect business as usual just witness the recent failure of eu leaders to agree on using frozen russian assets as a loan to fund kiev a failure based on belgians worries about legal ramifications should they have to pay russia back one day for those in the east such a stance is madness in their eyes russia has

Already broken the law massacring civilians bombing kindergartens and executing pow's why should anyone give two about legal niceties in the face of such aggression the fact is that this tension does exist at the heart of europe as demonstrated by the very different approaches to nordstrom case and unless the continent can resolve these differences unless

The east can convince the west that things are as desperate as they seem from warsaw vilnius to lynn or helsinki then europe will continue to be hamstrung in the face of the greatest war in its soil since 1940 Thank you for watching.