Even if many Nigerians were disappointed by the fraudulent nature of April’s presidential elections, it was at least Nigeria’s first transfer of power from one civilian president to another. Africa’s most populous country is now in its longest period of uninterrupted civilian rule, a sign that in spite of its apparently ungovernable nature and ethnically divisive and violent politics, the influence of the military in politics is diminishing.

An institution that has now produced all but three of Nigeria’s rulers after independence and was once dominated by northern Muslim generals, the military has undergone some important changes during the eight years of rule under Olusegun Obasanjo, Nigeria’s immediate past president.