The Commonwealth is a voluntary association of 56 independent countries. It is home to 2.5 billion people, and includes both advanced economies and developing countries. 33 of the members are small states, including many island nations.
The African Union is a union consisting of 55 African states. The AU was established on 26 May 2001 in Addis Ababa and launched on 9 July 2002 in South Africa to replace the Organisation of African Unity (OAU).
Due to deep-seated regional, ethnic and religious cleavages, elections in Nigeria have been bitterly contested ever since their reintroduction in 1999. In a country where politics is widely regarded as the way to access power and resources, the stakes are invariably high, but the context of the 2015 elections was particularly worrying. Goodluck Jonathan’s People’s Democratic Party (PDP) had been in power since the return to multiparty democracy in 1999 and was widely regarded as corrupt and high-handed.
Nigeria faces security threats, including the Boko Haram insurgency in the northeast, banditry and kidnappings in the northwest, and farmer-herder conflict in the Middle Belt. These threats have displaced millions of people and caused widespread economic damage.
