In present-day Nigeria many cultures have their states. The area has an eventful history. In the northern cities of Kano and Katsina, recorded history dates back to about 1000. In the centuries that followed, these Hausa kingdoms and Kanem-Bornu near Lake Chad prosper as important terminals of north-south trade between North African Berbers and forest people who exchanged slaves, ivory, and kola nuts for salt, glass beads, coral, cloth, weapons, brass rods and cowrie shells used as currency. In the southwest, the Yoruba kingdom of Oyo is founded about 1400 and at its height from the 17th to 19th centuries attains a high level of political organization and extended as far as modern Togo. In the south central part of present-day Nigeria, as early as the 15th and 16th centuries, the kingdom of Benin develops an efficient army; an elaborate ceremonial court and artisans whose works in ivory, wood, bronze, and brass are prized throughout the world today. In the early 19th century the Fulani leader, Usman dan Fodio, promulgates Islam and brings most areas in the north under the lose control of the formation of the Fulani Emirate of Sokoto.

Britian founds in 1881 the Oil Rivers Protectorate, renamed and enlarged into Niger Coast Protectorate in 1892, Protectorate of Southern Nigeria in 1900 and Colony and Protectorate of Southern Nigeria in 1906, when the colony of Lagos merges into Southern Nigeria. Lagos was acquired by Britain in 1861 and orginally subordinated to Sierra Leone between 1866 and 1874 and to the Gold Coast between 1874 and 1886. From 1886 until 1906 it was a separate British colony. In 1914 Southern Nigeria unites with Northern Nigeria into the Colony and Protectorate of Nigeria. Northern Nigeria was a separate protectorate which was formed in 1900.

In 1947 Nigeria gets its own legislature and selfgovernment. Benjamin Nnamdi Azikiwe of the National Council of Nigeria and the Cameroons is the first chief minister since 1954. This leads in 1954 to the formation of the Federation of Nigeria. Finally independence is granted in 1960: Nigeria becomes a federal parliamentary democratic monarchy under the British crown. Nigeria is a federation of three regions (northern, western, and eastern) under a constitution that provides for a parliamentary form of government. Under the constitution, each of the three regions retains a substantial measure of self-government. The federal government has exclusive powers in defense and security, foreign relations and commercial and fiscal policies. The northern part of British Cameroons is incorporated into Nigeria in 1961. Abubakar Tafawa Balewa of the Northern People's Congress becomes federal prime minister.

Nigeria gets a new federal parliamentary constitution in 1963 and is renamed Federal Republic of Nigeria. Benjamin Nnamdi Azikiwe becomes president and Balewa remains prime minister. In 1966 a small group of army officers, mostly southeastern Igbos, led by Johnson Aguiyi-Ironsi, overthrows the government and assassinate the federal prime minister and the premiers of the northern and western regions. The military government that assumes power is unable to quiet ethnic tensions or produce a constitution acceptable to all sections of the country. In fact, its efforts to abolish the federal structure greatly raises tensions and leads to another coup later that year. The coup related massacre of thousands of Igbo in the north prompts hundreds of thousands of them to return to the southeast, where increasingly strong Igbo secessionist sentiment emerged. The coup leads to a military regime lead by Yakubo Gowon until 1975. His regime leads to secession of the Igbo populated Eastern Region of Nigeria in 1967 as Biafra. This secession is not internationally recognized and after a bloody war with up to a million casualties Biafra is reintegrated into Nigeria in 1970.

In 1975 Murtala Ramat Muhammad and a group of fellow officers stage a bloodless coup, accusing the military government of Gowon delaying the promised return to civilian rule and becoming corrupt and ineffective. Muhammed replaces thousands of civil servants and announces a timetable for the resumption of civilian rule by 1979. Muhammed also announces the government's intention to create new states and to construct a new federal capital in the center of the country. Muhammed is assassinated in 1976 in an abortive coup. His chief of staff, Olusegun Obasanjo, becomes head of state. Obasanjo adheres meticulously to the schedule for return to civilian rule, moving to modernize and streamline the armed forces and seeking to use oil revenues to diversify and develop the country's economy. A constituent assembly was elected in 1977 to draft a new constitution. Political parties are allowed and in the 1979 elections the northerner Alhaji Shehu Usman Shagari of the National Party of Nigeria (NPN) is elected president. In 1983 Shagari and the NPN are returned to power in a landslide victory, with a majority of seats in parliament. But the elections are marred by violence and allegations of widespread vote rigging and electoral malfeasance lead to legal battles over the results.

In 1983 the military overthrows the democratic government and Muhammadu Buhari emerges as the leader of the Supreme Military Council (SMC), the country's new ruling body. His government is overthrown by the SMC's third-ranking member, Ibrahim Babangida, in 1985. He promises to return the country to civilian rule by 1990, later extended until 1993. In 1989 he allows the existence of two parties, the National Republican Convention (NRC) and the Social Democratic Party. Other parties are not allowed.

The 1993 elections, which are deemed to be Nigeria's fairest, early returns indicate that M.K.O. Abiola wins a decisive victory. However Babangida annulls the electio. After protests he is forced to hand over to Ernest Shonekan. With the country sliding into chaos, Sani Abacha assumes power. He dissolves all democratic political institutions and replaces elected governors with military officers. New elections are announced for 1998. Abacha dies in 1998 and is replaced by Gen. Abdulsalami Abubakar. During both the Abacha and Abubakar eras, Nigeria's main decisionmaking organ is the exclusively military Provisional Ruling Council (PRC) which governs by decree. New elections are held in 1999 in which three parties participate, the eople's Democratic Party (PDP), the All Peoples Party (APP), and the predominantly Yoruba Alliance for Democracy (AFORD). Former head of state Olusegun Obasanjo wins as a civilian candidate for the PDP the presidential election. Most civil society leaders and most Nigerians see a marked improvement in human rights and democratic practice under Obasanjo. The press enjoys greater freedom than under previous governments. Problems of communal and religious violence have confront the Obasanjo government since its inception. In national elections in 2003, Nigeria re-elects Obasanjo as president.