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This article explains Nigeria's oil situation, its effect on the country, and how they plan to improve it all.

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Construction workers at the Dangote Oil Refinery, which is being built on the outskirts of Lagos, Nigeria. The $12 billion project is planned as the world's largest refinery. Credit Credit Akintunde Akinleye/Reuters

On any given weekday, commuters in Lagos, Nigeria's commercial capital, are snarled in traffic for hours.

Container trucks and tankers take up several lanes of traffic on the major thoroughfares close to the city's ports. Often these trucks have been parked on the highways overnight.

Cars and minivans snake along the remaining single lane, sharing it with pedestrians fighting off early-morning road rage as they slowly make their way from one end of the city to another. There is a palpable fear of accidents, or a spill. Much of Lagos is an environmental disaster waiting to happen.

It is here in this vibrant metropolis of 21 million people that Africa's richest person, Aliko Dangote, is undertaking his most audacious gamble yet. Mr. Dangote is building a $12 billion oil refinery on 6,180 acres of swampland that, if successful,- could transform Nigeria's corrupt and underperforming petroleum industry. It is an entrenched system that some say has contributed to millions languishing in poverty and bled the " giant of Africa '' for decades.

Planned as the world's largest refinery, Mr. Dangote's project is set in a free-trade zone between the Atlantic Ocean and the Lekki Lagoon, an hour outside the city center. The site employs thousands, and upon completion - Mr. Dangote says in 2020; some analysts suggest more likely in 2022 - should process 650,000 barrels of crude oil daily.

That's enough oil to supply gasoline and kerosene to all 190 million Nigerians and still have plenty to export. By the end of this year, the facility is expected to churn out three million tons of fertilizer. The production of diesel, aviation fuel and plastics will then follow.

"The construction site is already a huge beehive of activities, with workers, local and foreign, hard at work. It is going to be the largest manufacturing plant of any sort in Lagos," said Kayode Ogunbunmi, the publisher of City Voice, a Lagos daily newspaper and lifelong Lagos resident.

Indeed, some 7,000 employees are working around the clock on the site, many arriving by private ferry from the city center. Another 900 Nigerian engineers and technicians are being trained abroad for jobs at the refinery. Mr. Dangote, whose net worth is estimated at $11.2 billion, has had to build a port, jetty and roads to accommodate this project, along with new energy plants to power it all.

Nigeria's government, despite being a longtime crude oil exporter, has four underperforming and frequently broken down refineries with a combined capacity of 445,000 barrels daily. Those refineries - two in the oil hub of Port Harcourt, one in Warri in the Niger Delta, and the other in the northern city of Kaduna - are all operating at less than 50 percent of capacity.

Which means that even though Nigeria is Africa's largest oil producer, petroleum for everyday use must be imported. This has spawned fuel importers and diesel traders who have grown extremely wealthy. Nigeria's government subsidizes fuel imports to keep pump prices low, and this has contributed to Nigeria's well-documented culture of petroleum industry corruption.

"The failure to produce refined products over the last 25 years has created a huge architecture of graft and corruption around everything," said Antony Goldman, the co-founder of the London-based Nigeria specialists ProMedia Consulting.

Mr. Goldman does political risk analysis in West Africa and has been working in and out of Nigeria for two decades. Corruption, he explained, stems from illegal refineries and the local criminal network that helps transport illegal crude out of the country. Both elements, he said, have not been sufficiently challenged by the government or law enforcement agencies, which has further contributed to Nigeria's entrenched oil industry corruption.

"A refinery that actually works and can meet Nigeria's refined product requirement? It's a game changer," Mr. Goldman added. But change, no matter how positive, is potentially destabilizing. "These are not people who relinquish things without a fight," Mr. Goldman said of Nigeria's fuel import merchants.

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Aliko Dangote, center, listens to a speech in Lagos. Credit Stefan Heunis/Agence France-Presse - Getty Images

When Mr. Dangote initially unveiled his refinery plans in 2016, he said its aim was to challenge the status quo, which had seen the government spend about $5.8 billion to import petroleum products over the past year.

"This refinery is attacking the entire system," he said. "You export jobs and create poverty here, so that's what we are stopping," he told reporters at the time.

Despite creating thousands of jobs, Mr. Dangote's refinery hasn't been universally applauded in Nigeria. The biggest issue is its Lagos location: The refinery is being built hundreds of miles from the impoverished Niger Delta, where the bulk of Nigeria's oil is extracted.

Two undersea pipelines are under construction in the Delta and will carry petroleum about 340 miles to the refinery in Lagos.

The pipelin es will be costly; but also far harder to sabotage than conventional aboveground systems. And security is key in the Delta region, where local rebel groups like the Delta Avengers have kidnapped foreign oil workers and blown up pipelines to protest regional pollution and poverty.

Amid Nigeria's complex regional tensions, Mr. Dangote - a northerner by birth and Lagosian by decades of residence - is the one person, industry experts say, who could achieve a measure of détente in the region.

Yet critics - and Mr. Dangote has many - worry that his new refinery will allow him to essentially take over the Nigeria's oil and gas industry. Why would a nation leave an entire industry in the hands of one company? they ask.

The "monopoly" question has swirled around Mr. Dangote for decades. Twice divorced and currently (and vocally) looking for a third wife, Mr. Dangote made his initial fortune operating near-monopolies in cement, flour and commodities across Nigeria, where regulatory oversight is relatively lax. Mr. Dangote's companies, including pasta producers and property management, are found across Africa.

A decade ago, Mr. Dangote and other private investors tried and failed to buy the government-owned refineries. He was unavailable for comment, but previously told Reuters he does not apologize for his expansionist desires. "If you don't have ambition," he said, "you shouldn't be alive."

And for some in a tough business environment like Nigeria, a well-run monopoly is better than the current situation, where getting fuel remains an uncertainty. Indeed, despite oligarchy concerns, Mr. Goldman says he believes that Mr. Dangote's past success actually bodes well for the refinery and Nigeria. "He has a record of success and delivery, and he doesn't make mistakes on things like this," Mr. Goldman said.

And Nigerians are tired of power cuts and overpriced gasoline.

"Most Nigerians see Aliko as a doer," Mr. Ogunbunmi, the publisher, said. "Many quietly hope the refinery will help reduce uncertainties. Gasoline will be available, and possibly power."

Beyond solidifying his own legacy, Mr. Dangote hopes his refinery will help diversify Nigeria's economy while reducing its dependence on imported oil.

"We have other opportunities," he said at the plant's unveiling. "Agriculture is there. Petrochemicals are there, Nigeria has more arable land than China. If we finish our gas pipeline, it can generate 12,000 megahertz of power. That's huge. That's more than what we are looking for in Nigeria and we can supply the rest of West Africa."

As his refinery nears completion, Mr. Dangote says he will soon focus on his next dream, owning Britain's Arsenal football team. "Once I have finished with that headache, I will take on football," he said. "I love Arsenal, and I will definitely go for it."

Edozien is the author of the book "Lives of Great Men," a 2018 Lambda Literary Award winner and is director of the Reporting Africa program at New York University's Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute.

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In Nigeria, Plans for the World's Largest Refinery

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On any given weekday, commuters in Lagos, Nigeria's commercial capital, are snarled in traffic for hours. Container trucks and tankers take up several lanes of traffic on the major thoroughfares close to the city's ports. Often these trucks have been parked on the highways overnight.

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This photo shows how dependent Nigeria is on oil.

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This article provides links to the official documents regarding immigration in the UK. These documents provide more detail than any one article ever could - they break it down by sections to explain everything that must be taken into account when immigrating to the UK.

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A collection of the current Immigration Rules.

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This is a photo of the outside of an immigration detention center in the UK. It shows how they are similar to prisons in the way they are designed, with the barbed wire surrounding the building, etc.

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The African tribes were known to argue a lot because of their different beliefs on how things should run where they lived.

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African Politics Now Archives - African Arguments

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African Arguments is a pan-African platform for news analysis, comment and opinion. We seek to analyse issues facing the continent, investigate the stories that matter, and amplify a diversity of voices.

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This is the music that was played in mostly the tribes that had power.

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People benefited if their tribe was in power. However if your tribe wasn't in power you had a disadvantage. Tribes not in power were treated like "evil."

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Africa's democratic transition is back in the spotlight. The concern is no longer the stranglehold of autocrats, but the hijacking of the democratic process by tribal politics.

Kenya's 2007-08 post-election violence revealed the extent to which tribal forces could quickly bring a country to the brink of civil war.

The challenge to democracy in Africa is not the prevalence of ethnic diversity, but the use of identity politics to promote narrow tribal interests. It is tribalism.

There are those who argue that tribalism is a result of arbitrary post-colonial boundaries that force different communities to live within artificial borders.

This argument suggests that every ethnic community should have its own territory, which reinforces ethnic competition.

The last 20 years of Somalia have shown the dangers of ethnic competition and underscore the importance of building nations around ideas rather than clan identities.

Much attention over the last two decades has been devoted to removing autocrats and promoting multiparty politics.

But in the absence of efforts to build genuine political parties that compete on the basis of ideas, many African countries have reverted to tribal identities as foundations for political competition.

Leaders often exploit tribal loyalty to advance personal gain, parochial interests, patronage, and cronyism.

But tribes are not built on democratic ideas but thrive on zero-sum competition.

As a result, they are inimical to democratic advancement.

In essence, tribal practices are occupying a vacuum created by lack of strong democratic institutions.

Tribal interests have played a major role in armed conflict and civil unrest across the continent.

'Clever and calculating'

But the extent to which it blunts efforts to deepen democracy has received little attention. This is mainly because much of the attention has focused on elections.

According to US-based pro-democracy group Freedom House, 19 African countries were considered electoral democracies in 2012, down from 24 over the 2005-08 period.

These trends conceal the influence that tribal politics exerts on the democratic process.

It took Kenyan political parties nearly a decade to unite and defeat Daniel arap Moi's regime.

Leaders of the different opposition parties were primarily focused on pursuing their tribal interests rather than uniting around a common political programme.

They in effect played into the hands of the government in power that could divide them along tribal lines.

The opposition parties were unable to find common ground through coherent party manifestos.

According to research carried out on Kenya by Stephen Keverenge at the US-based Atlantic International University in 2008, 56% of 1,500 respondents did not know that their parties had manifestos.

The manifestos are generally issued late because much of the effort goes into building tribal alliances.

The new constitution of Kenya seeks to address the issue of ethnicity by ensuring that a president needs broad geographical support to be elected.

A winner must receive more than half of all the votes cast in the election and least 25% of the votes cast in each of more than half of the country's counties.

But tribal leaders are clever and calculating.

They are quick to dress in the latest fashion and co-opt emerging trends to preserve their identities.

They buy influence and create convenient alliances, shopping for international support in power centres such as London, Paris, and Washington DC.

Their sole mission is self-preservation, with the side effect of subverting democratic evolution.

For them tribal politics is a zero-sum game, so they are prone to using hate speech and inciting violence.

Intellectual input

The way forward for African democracy lies in concerted efforts to build modern political parties founded on development ideas and not tribal bonds.

Such political parties must base their competition for power on development platforms.

Defining party platforms will need to be supported by the search for ideas-not the appeal to tribal coalitions.

Political parties that create genuine development platforms will launch initiatives that reflect popular needs.

Those that rely on manipulating ethnic alliances will bring sectarian animosity into government business.

Whoever is elected as president will spend most of his or her time on tribal balancing rather than on economic management.

Party manifestos are fundamentally documents in which parties outline their principles and goals in a manner that goes beyond popular rhetoric.

They arise from careful discussion, compromise, and efforts to express the core values and commitments of the party.

Building clear party platforms requires effective intellectual input, usually provided through think-tanks and other research institutions.

Most African political parties lack such support and are generally manifestos cobbled together with little consultation.

Tribal groupings see themselves as infallible but parties have to be accountable to the people.

By stating a vision for the future, political parties provide voters with a ways to measure their performance.

Forging platforms fosters debate within parties that transcends tribal and religious differences.

'Road to doom'

Such debates are a central pillar of democracy.

Building modern political parties and associated think-tanks is, therefore, the most urgent way to counter tribal politics.

Policy debate is a key element of democracy.

Specific manifestos would foster healthy political competition that would force parties to distinguish themselves from each other.

Conversely, such debates would also help to illustrates areas of common interest.

Indeed, it is becoming clear that issues such as infrastructure - energy, transportation, irrigation, and telecommunication - and youth employment are emerging as common themes in African politics irrespective of ideological differences.

The predominance of such issues will select for pragmatic leadership over ideology.

It is therefore not a surprise that African countries are increasingly electing engineers as presidents.

In 2012 six African countries put engineers in top political offices.

This reflects the fact that at the local level, politics is primarily a long footnote on demands for power, transportation, irrigation, and communication.

Closely linked to these foundational concerns are demands for access to education and health.

Political parties are unlikely to differ on essential points, but they might offer different approaches.

So long as democracy offers the best chance for sustained growth and prosperity, tribal politics must be replaced by genuine party platforms and modern democratic institutions like think-tanks.

Otherwise Africa's road to doom will continue to be paved by tribal intentions.

Calestous Juma is professor of the practice of international development at Harvard Kennedy School and co-chairs the African Union's High Level Panel on Science, Technology and Innovation - @calestous on Twitter.

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Viewpoint: How tribalism stunts African democracy

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Africa's democratic transition is back in the spotlight. The concern is no longer the stranglehold of autocrats, but the hijacking of the democratic process by tribal politics. Kenya's 2007-08 post-election violence revealed the extent to which tribal forces could quickly bring a country to the brink of civil war.

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This song by Rihanna pays tribute to the general idea of immigration.

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These are some important facts about Boko Haram.

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Since 2009, the terror group has waged an insurgency aimed at establishing an Islamic caliphate in north-east Nigeria.

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This Poem explains what is was like during this horrific time and how harsh it was for women.

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Blood, fresh red blood,
Everyday i smell it.
Foul stench of humans,
Slaughtered like cattles,
And we accept it.
It's part of our lives now,
What can we do?
I hear men say.

Heads rolling,
They have been surprised by mean cutlasses,
Flesh of mortals blown to bits.
Bits of someone's beloved.
Tears of the bereaved claw the air,
The stink of death,
As each day churns out widows,
Each moment, the fatherless.

Up North is desolate,
Ethnic clashes turned to religious cleansing,
Men and women whose souls have become one with the soil,
But who were not given birth to by the soil,
Are denied the freedom to breathe the air of the land the
Called home.

Leaders turn blind eyes,
The man on the chief seat shakes a Weak head and trots off,
To spend the masses sweat.
We haven't remembered him yet.
The time would come when the
Poor will have no flesh to feed on
But our Leader's.

Boko! And men flee at the sound.
Lord let them not remember my
Dwelling,
A prayer of the poor,
But who are they?
Beasts!
And who are we?
Men?
I think not.

When death becomes inevitable,
Fear will lose strength,
Why fear what killeth?
If you fight or not?
But i will never dream the dreams
Of a coward.

Give me a gun,
Teach me to shower bullets on
The serial Beasts,
Who read Holy Books on mortals
They butcher.

I'll rather fight,
Than see the blood flow.
If i must,
Then i must.
And will break the dreaded curse,
The curse of Boko Haram.

Let my blood match their blood,
My anger, theirs,
My zeal for my country
With their zeal for madness.

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Boko Haram Poem by Melody Thaila Kuku - Poem Hunter

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Blood, fresh red blood, Everyday i smell it.Foul stench of humans, Slaughtered like cattles, And we accept it.It's part of our lives now, What can we do? I hear men say. Heads rolling, They have been surprised by mean cutlasses, Flesh of mortals blown to bits.Bits of someone's beloved.Tears of the bereaved claw the air, The stink of death, As each day churns out widows, Each moment, the fatherless.

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This article gives basic facts about Nigeria and its consumption of natural resources, including oil. It also provides readers with basic facts about everything "oil" in Nigeria, including oil production rates, refinery capacity, etc.

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The most populous country within OPEC, Nigeria has around 198 million inhabitants. Located on the Gulf of Guinea on Africa's western coast, Nigeria covers an area of around 924 thousand square kilometres. Abuja, the capital since 1991, has a population of more than one million.

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This photo shows how Boko Haram looks and how they portray themselves.