Nigeria’s Quest For United Nations Security Council’s Seat

Evidence abounds of Nigeria’s quest for a permanent seat in the United Nations Security Council

(UNSC). This study examined critically, Nigeria’s persisting interest as variously expressed by her principal officers, evaluating its rationality vis-à-vis the objective realities of international politics, the design of the United Nations Security Council and the demands of prudent, appropriate sequencing of national priorities. It relied on documentary and secondary instruments of data generation, logical interpretation and analyses of relevant data. Political Realism is adopted as theoretical framework. The study observed that the veto in particular and permanent membership of the UNSC are not distributed based on ethics, sympathy, fairness, equity or even democratisation but capabilities in terms of national power in all its ramifications. Further, Nigeria is far from being a global ‘big power’ able to resist coercion and to effectively coerce others, hence there abound urgent necessary domestic imperatives which appropriate sequencing of priorities demand that they should prudently precede the lingering quest. Among the recommendations are profound domestic reforms which would put Nigeria on the road to de-facto big power status, a necessary first step towards realising her persistent ambition.  For now, Nigeria should limit herselfto non-veto wielding permanent representation of the Africa region.