Buhari’s weapon for re-election: Incumbency
Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari’s party may be wracked by defections and his battles against corruption and an Islamist rebellion under fire, but he has one crucial advantage in securing re-election: incumbency.
The 75-year-old leader is going to need all the tools available to repeat his 2015 victory — the first time an opposition party won power at the ballot box in Africa’s biggest oil producer. At his disposal, analysts say, is a record with some policy successes, as well as the state fundamentals are better than power to reward or punish. when Buhari was elected.”
Buhari “seems prepared When the head of the Sento deploy the institutions of ate, Bukola Saraki — Nigeria’s state to his advantage,” said third-most powerful politi- Clement Nwankwo, execucian — joined more than 50 tive director of the Policy APC members in leaving for and Legal Advocacy Centre the opposition People’s Dem- in the capital, Abuja. “It’s ocratic Party over the past kind of a plan to beat peo- month, reaction was swift. ple into line.” Buhari — who First his home was blockwas briefly Nigeria’s military aded; days later security offi- ruler in the 1980s — will be cers barred entry to the leg- fighting against perceptions islature itself. It’s an exodus the country hasn’t gotten that Buhari needs stemmed any safer nor less corrupt if he’s to keep afloat a party during his tenure. A promwith a campaign machine ise to shatter Boko Haram’s spanning Africa’s most popnorthern Islamist insurgency ulous nation of almost 200 may have been partly ful- million people. filled, but inter-communal The PDP said the move violence has replaced it as was an attempt to smuggle in Nigeria’s deadliest threat. Buhari loyalists and remove
Ahead of elections in FebSaraki, who’d adjourned sit- ruary, Buhari is benefiting tings until late September. from a recovering economy Amid public outrage, the with rising crude prices after government and APC con- a 2016 recession triggered by demned the deployment as the sharp fall in the price of unconstitutional and Vice the commodity that is the President Yemi Osinbajo, country’s main export. Forwho’s acting head of state eign-exchange reforms by the while Buhari’s overseas, disgovernment have helped to missed the state security stabilize the naira. chief. “It was a crucial act of
“Oil output has been fairly damage control by the acting steady and prices are better president,” said Nwankwo. than anticipated,” said AntSaraki said he’s consider- ony Goldman, West Africa ing challenging for Buhari’s analyst at London-based job in the coming vote as PM Consulting. “Economic the candidate of the PDP because the country needs a business-friendly leadership that is currently lacking.
Buhari’s war on corruption gives him a way to coerce his opponents, according to Cheta Nwanze, an analyst at Lagos-based business advisory, SBM Intelligence.
Buhari signed an executive order in July empowering him to freeze the bank accounts of those implicated in graft investigations. The opposition says that it will be used to punish defectors, undermines Nigeria’s courts and violates the principle of presumption of innocence.
Critics point to the case of Benue state Governor Samuel Ortom. Shortly after he left the ruling party for the PDP, the Buhari-controlled financial crimes agency moved in to freeze Benue state’s bank accounts, citing a corruption investigation. Ortom’s office has asked why the probe only happened once the governor had left the APC.
Buhari has other elements in his favor. Amaka Anku, an Africa analyst at Washington D.C.-based risk advisers Eurasia Group, pointed to national railway lines and a metro system in the capital completed during his first term.