Nigeria’s new leader faces huge challenges

Nigeria, the most populous African nation and the largest oil producer in the continent, has elected a new president, Bola Tinubu, who had served as largest city in the country and in the continent Lagos’ mayor for two terms at the turn of the century. He is also seen as the ‘godfather’ two of the presidents of the country, including the outgoing Muhammadu Buhari of the All Progressives Congress. Buhari, who served two terms as presidents in 2015 and 2019 has been seen as an ineffective leader, who failed to tackle the economic crisis as well as the violence of religious militants and other armed groups, who control significant chunks of the country. Tinubu, 70, has distanced from the Congress saying that people should look at his mayoral record in Lagos. “I am not the party. My track record should speak for me. Look at Lagos: Before I came, we had dead bodies on the road, a chaotic traffic system, robbery daytime and nighttime.” He says he improved conditions in Lagos though the many of the residents of Lagos disagree.

The presidential election was troublesome, and opposition parties say there was foul play. The independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) denies the charges. Nigeria is the most divided country, and no one leader seems to command the respect of people across the country. But Tinubu managed to garner 25 per cent of the votes in two-thirds of the 36 states as required by law. Tinubu got 8.79 million votes, followed by Atiku Abubakar of People’s Democratic Party (PDP) with 6.98 million votes and Peter Obi of the Labour Party with 6.1 million votes. Nigeria has a total of 93.4 million registered voters. There is speculation whether Pinubu is in good health and there is the suspicion that he is older than his stated age of 70. Nigeria has been faced with political and crises through much of its independent existence since the 1960s, and it faced an acute famine and a civil war in Biafra in the 1960s. It would seem that the people had voted Pinubu after much thought.

The question is whether Pinubu who had been operating from behind the scenes in the last decade and supported the winning leaders is capable of leading the troubled nation from the front. His success as mayor of Lagos as claimed by his supporters could give him an initial advantage of carrying the trust of the people. But the problems that can be handled successfully at the municipal level are not the same as those that a leader faces at the national level. And this could prove to be the challenge for Pinubu.

What is interesting about Nigeria is that through all the many problems it had been confronting for decades, it has remained a united country. The democratic system with its electoral procedures, despite its questionable credibility, has kept the constitution in place. It can be argued that Nigeria is too big a state to be allowed to fail because it would unleash political instability beyond the Nigerian borders and that Africa has a strategic stake in the survival and stability of Nigeria. The electoral success of Pinubu would also test the ‘strong leader’ thesis. The question is whether a strong leader can put together a team of competent people to solve the complex problems facing a big country like Nigeria. Pinubu as mayor of Lagos had earned the reputation of finding technological competent people to handle problems. The talent to find competent people to run the country would be an asset in a trouble-ridden country like Nigeria, and Pinubu should be able to succeed where others have failed if he can bring together the right people to manage Nigeria.