Permit me to start by thanking Chatham
House for the invitation to talk about this
important topic at this crucial time.
When speaking about Nigeria overseas, I
normally prefer to be my country’s public
relations and marketing officer, extolling
her virtues and hoping to attract
investments and tourists. But as we all
know, Nigeria is now battling with many
challenges, and if I refer to them, I do so
only to impress on our friends in the
United Kingdom that we are quite aware
of our shortcomings and are doing our
best to address them.
The 2015 general election in Nigeria is
generating a lot of interests within and
outside the country. This is
understandable. Nigeria, Africa’s most
populous country and largest economy, is
at a defining moment, a moment that has
great implications beyond the democratic
project and beyond the borders of my
dear country.
So let me say upfront that the global
interest in Nigeria’s landmark election is
not misplaced at all and indeed should
be commended; for this is an election
that has serious import for the world. I
urge the international community to
continue to focus on Nigeria at this very
critical moment. Given increasing global
linkages, it is in our collective interests
that the postponed elections should hold
on the rescheduled dates; that they
should be free and fair; that their
outcomes should be respected by all
parties; and that any form of extension,
under whichever guise, is unconstitutional
and will not be tolerated.
With the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989,
the dissolution of the USSR in 1991, the
collapse of communism and the end of
the Cold War, democracy became the
dominant and most preferred system of
government across the globe. That global
transition has been aptly captured as the
triumph of democracy and the ‘most pre-
eminent political idea of our time.’ On a
personal note, the phased end of the
USSR was a turning point for me. It
convinced me that change can be
brought about without firing a single
shot.
As you all know, I had been a military
head of state in Nigeria for twenty
months. We intervened because we were
unhappy with the state of affairs in our
country. We wanted to arrest the drift.
Driven by patriotism, influenced by the
prevalence and popularity of such drastic
measures all over Africa and elsewhere,
we fought our way to power. But the
global triumph of democracy has shown
that another and a preferable path to
change is possible. It is an important
lesson I have carried with me since, and
a lesson that is not lost on the African
continent.
In the last two decades, democracy has
grown strong roots in Africa. Elections,
once so rare, are now so commonplace.
As at the time I was a military head of
state between 1983 and 1985, only four
African countries held regular multi-party
elections. But the number of electoral
democracies in Africa, according to
Freedom House, jumped to 10 in
1992/1993 then to 18 in 1994/1995 and
to 24 in 2005/2006. According to the
New York Times, 42 of the 48 countries
in Sub-Saharan Africa conducted multi-
party elections between 1990 and 2002.
The newspaper also reported that
between 2000 and 2002, ruling parties in
four African countries (Senegal,
Mauritius, Ghana and Mali) peacefully
handed over power to victorious
opposition parties. In addition, the
proportion of African countries
categorized as not free by Freedom
House declined from 59% in 1983 to 35%
in 2003. Without doubt, Africa has been
part of the current global wave of
democratisation.
But the growth of democracy on the
continent has been uneven. According to
Freedom House, the number of electoral
democracies in Africa slipped from 24 in
2007/2008 to 19 in 2011/2012; while the
percentage of countries categorised as
‘not free’ assuming for the sake of
argument that we accept their definition
of “free” increased from 35% in 2003 to
41% in 2013. Also, there have been some
reversals at different times in Burkina
Faso, Central African Republic, Cote
D’Ivoire, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Lesotho,
Mali, Madagascar, Mauritania and Togo.
We can choose to look at the glass of
democracy in Africa as either half full or
half empty.
While you can’t have representative
democracy without elections, it is equally
important to look at the quality of the
elections and to remember that mere
elections do not democracy make. It is
globally agreed that democracy is not an
event, but a journey. And that the
destination of that journey is democratic
consolidation – that state where
democracy has become so rooted and so
routine and widely accepted by all
actors.
With this important destination in mind, it
is clear that though many African
countries now hold regular elections, very
few of them have consolidated the
practice of democracy. It is important to
also state at this point that just as with
elections, a consolidated democracy
cannot be an end by itself. I will argue
that it is not enough to hold a series of
elections or even to peacefully alternate
power among parties.
It is much more important that the
promise of democracy goes beyond just
allowing people to freely choose their
leaders. It is much more important that
democracy should deliver on the promise
of choice, of freedoms, of security of
lives and property, of transparency and
accountability, of rule of law, of good
governance and of shared prosperity. It
is very important that the promise
embedded in the concept of democracy,
the promise of a better life for the
generality of the people, is not delivered
in the breach.
Now, let me quickly turn to Nigeria. As
you all know, Nigeria’s fourth republic is
in its 16th year and this general election
will be the fifth in a row. This is a major
sign of progress for us, given that our
first republic lasted five years and three
months, the second republic ended after
four years and two months and the third
republic was a still-birth. However,
longevity is not the only reason why
everyone is so interested in this election.
The major difference this time around is
that for the very first time since
transition to civil rule in 1999, the ruling
Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) is facing
its stiffest opposition so far from our
party the All Progressives Congress
(APC). We once had about 50 political
parties, but with no real competition.
Now Nigeria is transitioning from a
dominant party system to a competitive
electoral polity, which is a major marker
on the road to democratic consolidation.
As you know, peaceful alternation of
power through competitive elections
have happened in Ghana, Senegal, Malawi
and Mauritius in recent times. The
prospects of democratic consolidation in
Africa will be further brightened when
that eventually happens in Nigeria.
But there are other reasons why
Nigerians and the whole world are
intensely focussed on this year’s
elections, chief of which is that the
elections are holding in the shadow of
huge security, economic and social
uncertainties in Africa’s most populous
country and largest economy. On
insecurity, there is a genuine cause for
worry, both within and outside Nigeria.
Apart from the civil war era, at no other
time in our history has Nigeria been this
insecure.
Boko Haram has sadly put Nigeria on the
terrorism map, killing more than 13,000
of our nationals, displacing millions
internally and externally, and at a time
holding on to portions of our territory the
size of Belgium. What has been
consistently lacking is the required
leadership in our battle against
insurgency. I, as a retired general and a
former head of state, have always known
about our soldiers: they are capable, well
trained, patriotic, brave and always ready
to do their duty in the service of our
country.
You all can bear witness to the gallant
role of our military in Burma, the
Democratic Republic of Congo, Sierra
Leone, Liberia, Darfur and in many other
peacekeeping operations in several parts
of the world. But in the matter of this
insurgency, our soldiers have neither
received the necessary support nor the
required incentives to tackle this
problem. The government has also failed
in any effort towards a multi-dimensional
response to this problem leading to a
situation in which we have now become
dependent on our neighbours to come to
our rescue.
Let me assure you that if I am elected
president, the world will have no cause to
worry about Nigeria as it has had to
recently; that Nigeria will return to its
stabilising role in West Africa; and that
no inch of Nigerian territory will ever be
lost to the enemy because we will pay
special attention to the welfare of our
soldiers in and out of service, we will
give them adequate and modern arms
and ammunitions to work with, we will
improve intelligence gathering and border
controls to choke Boko Haram’s financial
and equipment channels, we will be
tough on terrorism and tough on its root
causes by initiating a comprehensive
economic development plan promoting
infrastructural development, job creation,
agriculture and industry in the affected
areas. We will always act on time and
not allow problems to irresponsibly
fester, and I, Muhammadu Buhari, will
always lead from the front and return
Nigeria to its leadership role in regional
and international efforts to combat
terrorism.
On the economy, the fall in prices of oil
has brought our economic and social
stress into full relief. After the rebasing
exercise in April 2014, Nigeria overtook
South Africa as Africa’s largest economy.
Our GDP is now valued at $510 billion
and our economy rated 26th in the world.
Also on the bright side, inflation has been
kept at single digit for a while and our
economy has grown at an average of 7%
for about a decade.
But it is more of paper growth, a growth
that, on account of mismanagement,
profligacy and corruption, has not
translated to human development or
shared prosperity. A development
economist once said three questions
should be asked about a country’s
development: one, what is happening to
poverty? Two, what is happening to
unemployment? And three, what is
happening to inequality?
The answers to these questions in
Nigeria show that the current
administration has created two
economies in one country, a sorry tale of
two nations: one economy for a few who
have so much in their tiny island of
prosperity; and the other economy for
the many who have so little in their vast
ocean of misery.
Even by official figures, 33.1% of
Nigerians live in extreme poverty. That’s
at almost 60 million, almost the
population of the United Kingdom. There
is also the unemployment crisis
simmering beneath the surface, ready to
explode at the slightest stress, with
officially 23.9% of our adult population
and almost 60% of our youth
unemployed. We also have one of the
highest rates of inequalities in the world.
With all these, it is not surprising that our
performance on most governance and
development indicators (like Mo Ibrahim
Index on African Governance and UNDP’s
Human Development Index.) are
unflattering. With fall in the prices of oil,
which accounts for more than 70% of
government revenues, and lack of
savings from more than a decade of oil
boom, the poor will be disproportionately
impacted.
In the face of dwindling revenues, a good
place to start the repositioning of
Nigeria’s economy is to swiftly tackle
two ills that have ballooned under the
present administration: waste and
corruption. And in doing this, I will, if
elected, lead the way, with the force of
personal example.
On corruption, there will be no confusion
as to where I stand. Corruption will have
no place and the corrupt will not be
appointed into my administration. First
and foremost, we will plug the holes in
the budgetary process. Revenue
producing entities such as NNPC and
Customs and Excise will have one set of
books only. Their revenues will be
publicly disclosed and regularly audited.
The institutions of state dedicated to
fighting corruption will be given
independence and prosecutorial authority
without political interference.
But I must emphasise that any war
waged on corruption should not be
misconstrued as settling old scores or a
witch-hunt. I’m running for President to
lead Nigeria to prosperity and not
adversity.
In reforming the economy, we will use
savings that arise from blocking these
leakages and the proceeds recovered
from corruption to fund our party’s social
investments programmes in education,
health, and safety nets such as free
school meals for children, emergency
public works for unemployed youth and
pensions for the elderly.
As a progressive party, we must reform
our political economy to unleash the
pent-up ingenuity and productivity of the
Nigerian people thus freeing them from
the curse of poverty. We will run a
private sector-led economy but maintain
an active role for government through
strong regulatory oversight and deliberate
interventions and incentives to diversify
the base of our economy, strengthen
productive sectors, improve the
productive capacities of our people and
create jobs for our teeming youths.
In short, we will run a functional
economy driven by a worldview that sees
growth not as an end by itself, but as a
tool to create a society that works for
all, rich and poor alike. On March 28,
Nigeria has a decision to make. To vote
for the continuity of failure or to elect
progressive change. I believe the people
will choose wisely.
In sum, I think that given its strategic
importance, Nigeria can trigger a wave of
democratic consolidation in Africa. But
as a starting point we need to get this
critical election right by ensuring that
they go ahead, and depriving those who
want to scuttle it the benefit of derailing
our fledgling democracy. That way, we
will all see democracy and democratic
consolidation as tools for solving
pressing problems in a sustainable way,
not as ends in themselves.
Permit me to close this discussion on a
personal note. I have heard and read
references to me as a former dictator in
many respected British newspapers
including the well regarded Economist.
Let me say without sounding defensive
that dictatorship goes with military rule,
though some might be less dictatorial
than others. I take responsibility for
whatever happened under my watch.
I cannot change the past. But I can
change the present and the future. So
before you is a former military ruler and a
converted democrat who is ready to
operate under democratic norms and is
subjecting himself to the rigours of
democratic elections for the fourth time.
You may ask: why is he doing this? This
is a question I ask myself all the time
too. And here is my humble answer:
because the work of making Nigeria
great is not yet done, because I still
believe that change is possible, this time
through the ballot, and most importantly,
because I still have the capacity and the
passion to dream and work for a Nigeria
that will be respected again in the comity
of nations and that all Nigerians will be
proud of.
I thank you for listening

I will be back if....