How and why President Buhari failed in leadership

JThe editor welcomes brief letters on topical issues. Write an e-mail to sunday@dailytrust.com or sundaytrust@yahoo.com. udging by the high spate of insecurity, collapsed economy, endemic corruption in public affairs, among several other vices pervading the country at the time President Mohammadu Buhari left office on May 29, 2023, Nigeria can be rightly said to have drifted inexorably into a failed state. All over the country, especially in the North and the Southeast, kidnappings, killings and bloodlettings of horrifyingly unimaginable proportions had become standard daily occurrences of communities. While internecine genocide, communal killings and banditry were going on in villages and towns unabated, highways had been taken over by armed robbers and kidnappers. Almost on a daily basis, villages were raided and people abducted even when the previously kidnapped ones were still in captivity. Since there were no federal or state authorities to turn to, citizens were left with no option but to negotiate with the new rulers of the day – kidnapers, bandits and unknown gunmen - to secure the release of the abducted. In the Southeast, for about three years, IPOB, commanding ‘Unknown Gunmen’, became so strong it declared and enforced a sit-at-home order on Mondays throughout the region. In the South-south, pirates were seizing oil installations and siphoning national oil at will. In the Southwest, cultism and harvesting of human organs for ritual purposes had been standardized.

To all intents and purposes, therefore, adding to the Boko Haram insurgents which he inherited from the previous PDP regimes, under him insurgents, bandits, kidnappers, unknowngunmen,pirates,cultistsandritualists had been added as de facto governments of the day in many communities of Nigeria. In such communities, citizens either obeyed the rules of the outlaws or lost their lives. The point being made here is that nowhere and no one was safe under the Buhari government, except probably the heavily guarded so-called public officials. And when the president’s convoy was itself attacked by bandits, lawlessness became complete. In consequence, traveling, trading, farming and such other necessary daily lifestyle activities of ordinary citizens were either halted altogether or carried out in dread by those who were compelled to undertake them.

Eight years of his leadership had not improved the national economy either; rather, it actually collapsed. The national Gross Domestic Product (GDP), representing the total value of all economic activities in the country, had nosed-dived and remained down, pushing the country into almost a state of permanent recession throughout his regime. Depletion of our foreign reserve and humongous debts with no productivity combined to send the value of the naira plummeting to an exchange rate of N650 to $1 by the time he left office, and the resulting inflation sent many Nigerians below poverty line into a state of deprivation and destitution. In 2018, Nigeria was pronounced the poverty capital of the world.

The same failure was as well evident in the fight against corruption. With the appointment of Ibrahim Magu as the head of the EFCC, the key anti-corruption agency, in contravention of the law, the fight against corruption started on a wrong footing under Buhari. On account of security reports accusing Magu of corruption, thus denting his moral standing to prosecute the war, the Senate declined to confirm his nomination as required by law. Still, President Buhari put him in office for about five years, thus calling to question the sincerity of the administration’s commitment to fight corruption. Not surprisingly, Magu himself ended up being further accused by his supervising minister, Abubakar Malami, of re-looting recovered corruption loots and ignominiously removed from office. In effect, the twin evils of bribery and corruption continued having a field-day under the Buhari-led APC regime. Hence, all over the country, persons on corruption charges were roaming about free. Many had even bribed themselves back into public offices either in elective or appointive capacities. There were also widespread outrageous open displays of stupendous wealth by several serving public officers, hitherto living from hand to mouth, suggesting corrupt enrichments in the Buhari government. Less than two years before he left office, Nigeria was ranked amongst the top most corrupt countries on earth. As it is, Magu’s successor at EFCC, AbdulRasheed Bawa, is currently under detention for more than two months on allegations of impropriety.

Aside from these core issues, there were also many other aspects of our national life that similarly deteriorated under the Buhari administration, principal of which is ethical decay. What was morally wrong, had become politically right. But one needs not list instances, for they were endless! Right under our noses, we helplessly watched Nigeria drift into a failed state. This is the stark reality that must be admitted of the Buhari regime.

Buhari ran for office and was elected president on a set of principles of trust and hope. In 2015, the overriding factor in his campaign was Buhari himself, on his assumed integrity, incorruptibility, forthrightness and the magic wand to deliver! The presidential campaign was mainly about Buhari the person - not his policies, nor his programmes, nor even his political party, but Buhari the man and his promises – that had received the drumming endorsement of the Nigerian people, particularly northerners. To virtually everyone in the North, Buhari was the only man, and therefore the only hope, for the people. That was why a sagacious political strategist would draw up a sophisticated strategic blueprint after his 3-failed attempts without asking for something in return. That was why an old woman of over 80 years would sit out in the scorching sun of the northern desert for a whole day just to see the man Buhari and donate her lifelong savings towards his election bid without expecting anything back from him. That was why poor wheelbarrow pushers, nail cutters, shoe shiners, hewers of woods and fetchers of water, literally the wretched of the earth, would starve themselves to buy cards and donate their meagre earnings towards his election without any hope of ever meeting him. And that was why someone would trek from Lagos to Abuja in joyous celebration of Buhari’s electoral victory without a price tag.

So, when Buhari won the contest and was sworn-in as president, it was expected he would solve the numerous problems of the country.

Other than solving problems of individuals’ survival, there were also daunting challenges threatening the very survival of the nation itself that President Buhari was equally expected to resolve. In his campaigns, Buhari summed these concerns up into three – insecurity, corruption and economy. In other words, the resolution of these three would resolve both the individuals’ and collective developmental challenges of the nation; to create a sense of belonging and forge functional unity to a desperate and despairing nation torn apart by cries of marginalization, agitations and separatist tendencies.

Given that President Buhari came to office with the confidence and goodwill of Nigerians behind him, it was sad that, as seen above, he woefully failed in his leadership and lost the peoples’ confidence and goodwill till he left office. So how and why did he fail as president? To me, the simple and truthful answer to this twin question is that President Buhari just lacked leadership acumen, which he displayed in seven discernible ways.

First, as president, he was deficient in the effective acquisition, control and utilization of state authority to deliver valuable leadership. After being sworn-in to office he failed to immediately appoint officials who would take control and charge in the utilization of state power, ensuing a period of lull in the polity and creating doubts in people’s minds to his leadership ability. It was after petulant whispers started becoming loud reproaches that a handful of Advisers, Secretary to Government and a couple of personal aides were appointed. Then followed a much longer period of sloth; dragging to nearly six months before the government cabinet was at last grudgingly constituted. Consequently, when at last he constituted his cabinet, he ended up with a kakistocratic team that further plummeted the situation. Thus, from the beginning, Buhari had sown the first seed of leadership failure by neglecting this critical aspect in the exercise of state power as an important element of governance. Since then, he lost the momentum and never regained it till he left office.