The Unprecedented Level of Patience Shown to Buhari – Nigerian Economist

This is an explosive article about the spate of economic management under the
President Buhari administration of the All Progressives Congress.

Nigerians have never shown such level of patience and tolerance towards any of their past leaders for his record and strange
policies as that shown to their current leader, Muhammadu Buhari – a former military dictator now self-confessed democrat who said he came to fight corruption.

Buhari, 75, is being plagued with failures across every single sector in the economy, the like as has never been seen before. Less
than a year into office, the economy plummeted into recession, an economy
which had till then grown at an average rate of 7% in previous years (2011-2014). The
nation’s currency lost 70% of its value, unemployment rose from 6.5 to 26%, commodity prices tripled across many quarters and the state-regulated premium
motor spirit prices were hiked by 67% without practically anybody batting an eye.

There have been stern opposition to his policies however and to his very personality as well, notably in the South East and South-
South regions in the country as they are called, where he both received less than 5% of the votes cast at the last Presidential
election and where he has always been sternly unpopular for his history of bigotry against the people, perceived incompetence
and dictatorial tendencies. But in many other regions across the country the people have rather resolved to suffer patiently,
drawing up excuses for him at will, blaming everyone including his hundreds of political
appointees, anything and anybody but never the man himself.

But in many other regions across the country the people have rather resolved to suffer patiently, drawing up excuses for him
at will, blaming everyone including his hundreds of political appointees, anything and anybody but never the man himself.

Buhari’s party, the APC, promised Nigerians unprecedented swiping changes in government and the eviction of all corrupt
individuals.

One possible explanation for this could be his party’s hope narrative in the 2015 General election where citizens were promised an unprecedented crackdown on
corruption and the abolition of all
government waste by a man whose financial worth they declared to have been
less than N30million ($150,000 then), a historical low for a former top official in the country and most especially a former leader.

In a country plagued by acute corruption problems and with the unremitted crude oil revenue scandal of 2014 still fresh in the
people’s minds, many were eager for an abrupt change, the like as never been seen before. He was seen an army general, already experienced in government, with a great strength of will, tough to take on the nation’s cabal of hardened criminals. He
promised to appoint only technocrats to head the country’s departments and to see
out the lingering Boko Haram insurgency from the warfront. For a nation lacking basic amenities such as power supply in spite of
its huge energy resources and with the lingering insurgency crises, the choice seemed easy to many- the general with
integrity was the man for the country.

For a nation lacking basic amenities such as power supply in spite of its huge energy resources and with the lingering insurgency
crises, the choice seemed easy to many- the general with integrity was the man for the country.

Talk was cheap then but now reality has taken its course. His earliest opponents pointed out to his track record and not to
his speech, noting that the last time Nigeria fell into dismal failure, currency woes and
commodity shortages was when he had seized power as a military general in 1983 and stating that the facts of that record contradicted the poems of his image brokers.

Many however just wanted “change” as it was then called and so voted the General and sat to wait for the sung promises. But
from the onset of his government, the course was as his critics had predefined:
Incompetency, bigotry and dictatorial tendencies plaguing the country.

He ignored the newly born genocide in the middle belt of the country perpetuated by
the Fulani herdsmen of his kindred against the Christian communities in Benue, Plateau
and later on Kaduna. He breached the Central Bank’s 2007 Act of Independence.