Kerry Meets With Nigerian Leaders to Encourage Peaceful Election

Secretary of State John Kerry traveled to Lagos to urge both sides to accept the results of Nigeria’s Feb. 14 election.

Concerned that Nigeria could face postelection turmoil, Secretary of State John Kerry on Sunday urged President Goodluck Jonathan and his principal political rival to respect the results of next month’s presidential vote and to discourage their supporters from carrying out violent protests.

“It is imperative that these elections happen on time, as scheduled, and that they are an improvement over past elections,” Mr. Kerry said in a news conference at the end of his visit here.

But a major attack by Boko Haram militants on Sunday in Maiduguri, a major city in northeastern Nigeria, demonstrated the challenge that confronts the Obama administration as it tries to develop a strategy to help stabilize the strategically important nation.

Mr. Kerry said there was evidence that the militants from the Islamic State group, which has declared a caliphate in eastern Syria and northern and western Iraq, were now making an effort to forge alliances with terrorist groups in Africa.

“It is obviously a concern that they may try more aggressively to try to spread to countries in center and southern and other parts of Africa,” said Mr. Kerry, who added that there was no indication as yet that Boko Haram has formally affiliated itself with the Islamic State.

Mr. Kerry said that the United States was prepared to do more to help the Nigerian military’s fight against Boko Haram, an Islamist group that does have links to Al Qaeda. But underscoring his larger point, Mr. Kerry warned that the level of American support would be influenced by the determination of Nigeria’s politicians to carry out fair and peaceful elections.

“Bottom line, we want to do more,” he said. “But our ability to do more will depend to some degree on the full measure of credibility, accountability, transparency and peacefulness of this election.”

Mr. Kerry met with Mr. Jonathan at the State House, a meeting that included a 20-minute session in which the two spoke by themselves. Then Mr. Kerry rode to the United States Consulate here, where he met with Muhammadu Buhari, a retired general who is strongly challenging the Nigerian president in a nation increasingly fearful of attacks by militants from Boko Haram. Mr. Kerry also spoke by phone with Attahiru Jega, the head of Nigeria’s independent election commission.

“There has been a history of violence being fomented by political parties here in previous elections,” a senior State Department official told reporters before Mr. Kerry’s meetings.

“We hope that if there is any doubt about the election that they will use their court system and not encourage their supporters to go into the streets,” said the official, who declined to be identified under the department’s protocol for briefing reporters.

The Nigerian public has become increasing alarmed by the army’s inability to stop attacks and kidnappings by Boko Haram, which already controls much of the northern part of Nigeria.

“There is increasing concern about the future of Nigeria’s political stability as the conflict continues,” noted a report by C.N.A. Corporations, a research organization based in the United States, which recently issued a report on the conflict with Boko Haram. “The inability of the military to beat back Boko Haram, combined with an increasing number of bombings in the south of the country and high-profile kidnappings, has eroded support for President Jonathan’s administration (even within his traditional southern support base) and has begun.”

The election on Feb. 14 is expected to be closely contested, and it is possible there could be at least one runoff, which would prolong uncertainty and potentially open the door to violent protests.

Under election rules, a candidate must get at least 50 percent of the overall vote and 25 percent of the vote in two-thirds of Nigeria’s states to win.

If no candidate wins outright, a runoff will be held a week after the initial vote under the same rules. If there is still not a clear victor, a second runoff would be held seven days later, and the candidate who receives the majority of the votes nationwide would be declared the winner.

An oil exporter, Nigeria has the biggest economy in Africa, but the decline in world oil prices has shaken its economic prospects.

Complicating the voting is Boko Haram. The Independent National Electoral Commission has said that citizens who have been displaced by the fighting but still reside in the same state in which they are registered will be allowed to vote. But that will not help Nigerians who have fled the violence in the north.

If political violence erupts, it could have sectarian overtones, because much of Mr. Buhari’s support comes from the predominantly Muslim north, while Mr. Jonathan has support in the mainly Christian south.

Encouraged by Kofi Annan, the former United Nations secretary general, both candidates have issued statements opposing violence.

“That said, there is a propensity for such violence to erupt, and we want to get ahead of it,” said the State Department official.

The American calculation seems to be that any push to expand the military campaign against Boko Haram will need to follow the election.

How specifically the United States plans to help Nigeria regain the initiative against the group remains unclear. The abduction of more than 200 schoolgirls by Boko Haram in April provoked outrage in the United States and Europe. But a breakdown in trust between the United States and the Nigerian military has hampered cooperation against Boko Haram, as have fears that the provision of heavy weapons to Nigerian forces could lead to human rights abuses.

Mr. Kerry said this month after meeting with Philip Hammond, the British foreign secretary, that the attacks by Boko Haram constituted war crimes, and he asserted that the United States was planning a “special initiative” to counter the group.

But Mr. Kerry did not provided details of what that initiative was on Sunday.

President Obama is planning to convene an international meeting on combating violent extremism on Feb. 18, and that could be an opportunity for discussing new ideas, the State Department official said.

Mr. Jonathan became acting president in 2010 when his predecessor was ailing, and he won an election the next year. His party has governed Nigeria since the end of military rule in 1999, but his election in 2011 dispensed with the tradition of rotating the presidency between the largely Christian south and the predominately Muslim north.

Mr. Buhari became head of state in 1983 through a military coup but governed only until August 1985, when he was removed from power by another coup. During his term in office, he imposed austerity measures and restrictions on the press. But he is now presenting himself as the strongman Nigeria needs to confront Boko Haram.