An old man who overstayed his welcome

Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari is “tired of leading the nation,” said Hakeem Baba-Ahmed, and the feeling is mutual. At 80, he now does little but complain that he can’t wait for his second term to be over in May, claiming “he has not been as appreciated as he should have been.” Yet what, exactly, should we be thanking him for? Buhari will leave behind “a record of spectacular failure that will take the best part of the next decade to reverse.” Our oil-dependent economy is flagging, unemployment is soaring, and we’re currently one of the world’s most dangerous countries, battling both the Biafran separatists in the south and the Islamist terrorists of Boko Haram in the north. None of that seems to faze Buhari. The former dictator, who first led the nation for two years in the 1980s after taking power in a military coup, is content to spend his final months in office boasting that, this time, he came to power in a “credible election” and that the February vote to replace him will be free and fair, too. I doubt that. “A credible election is one conducted in a safe and secure environment,” but many Nigerians will have to dodge bandits or terrorists to get to the polls. President Buhari is tired? Well, “Nigerians are also tired of a president who will not govern.”