Security Sector Governance, Accountability, and Human Rights in Nigeria: A Critical Institutionalist Study

This study develops a critical institutionalist analysis of security sector governance in Nigeria, investigating the structural and political conditions that enable persistent human rights violations by military and police forces despite formal constitutional, statutory, and international human rights obligations. Nigeria's security forces have been extensively documented as perpetrators of extrajudicial killings, torture, enforced disappearances, and gender-based violence in counter-insurgency operations in the North East, counter-banditry operations in the North West, and routine policing across all geopolitical zones, yet accountability for these violations has been minimal. Drawing on the critical institutionalism tradition, the security sector reform literature, and the human rights governance framework, the study develops an original analytical model that centres the interaction between impunity norms institutionalised within the security sector and the structural weakness of civilian oversight mechanisms in explaining accountability deficits. The model is tested through case studies of accountability outcomes in three documented mass atrocity episodes, drawing on primary fieldwork in Borno and Zamfara states involving interviews with survivors, security sector lawyers, human rights investigators, and former military officers, combined with analysis of official investigations, court proceedings, and international human rights monitoring reports. The study finds that impunity is institutionalised through a combination of command culture norms, legal immunity provisions in the Armed Forces Act, and the political dependence of oversight bodies on the executive branch. Original contributions include a comparative model of security sector impunity maintenance applicable across African conflict contexts. Keywords: security sector governance, accountability, human rights, Nigeria, critical institutionalism