WAS THE BUHARI BRAND OVER-RATED BY NIGERIANS?

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By now, majority of Nigerians have drawn their conclusions about how much value they have received for investing their votes, support and prayers in the Buhari brand.

The Buhari political personality brand coasted into presidential office in a blaze of glory. Expectations were sky-high as Buhari was rightly or wrongly celebrated as the Biblical messiah who held the magic wand to chase corrupt government politicians and public servants out of town and set Nigeria on a steady course to unfettered prosperity and unabated progress. About three and half years later, the much desired dividends have remained elusive, a painful mirage that compels Nigerians to wonder what could have happened to the Buhari of their dreams. They are sure to now realise that sweet dreams contrast sharply with stark harsh realities.

Mrs. Aisha Buhari, the President’s wife was (shockingly) the first major personality to jolt Nigerians out of their dream world when she used the platform of BBC to announce that President Buhari had been hijacked by a cabal and the cabal knew nothing about the APC agenda and had no clue how to deliver Buhari’s brand benefits to Nigerians. She threatened that unless there was a shake-up in Buhari’s government she would not support Buhari in his second term bid.

Well, about 2 years later, nothing has changed in Bufhari’s government. This must have shocked many ardent Buhari supporters who had always believed that Buhari was a tough, strong leader. How could a political brand of ‘timber and calibre’ be hijacked by people, who according to Mrs. Buhari contributed precious little towards building and selling the brand.

The Second major Buhari brand believer to have the scales fall off his eyes is former President Olusegun Obasanjo. In a blistering 13-page open letter in January 2018, Obasanjo likened the state of the nation to lice-infested clothes; he said the country’s fingernails are stained with blood as they try to kill the lice by pressing them in-between two fingernails. According to him, in other to make sure that our fingernails remain blood-free we must do what it takes rid our clothes of lice.“The lice of poor performance in government – poverty, insecurity, poor economic management, nepotism, gross dereliction of duty, condonation of misdeed – if not outright encouragement of it, lack of progress and hope for the future, lack of national cohesion and poor management of internal political dynamics and widening inequality – are very much with us today,”

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“With such lice of general and specific poor performance and crying poverty with us, our fingers will not be dry of ‘blood,” he added. This is coming from a man who campaigned vigorously stood as guarantor for Buhari as a great political brand in the build-up to the 2015 general elections.

Meanwhile Buhari’s brand rating has been plummeting as his first term draws to an end. ‘Buharimeter’, an initiative of the Centre for Democracy and Development (CDD) which was launched to track the delivery of President Buhari’s campaign promises to Nigerians in its annual survey of May 2018 confirmed that President Buhari failed Nigerians in his three cardinal campaign promises: Corruption, Security and Economy.

The poll revealed that 40 percent of Nigerians approve of the president’s performance while 44 percent disapprove with the remaining 16 percent neither approving nor disapproving his performance. “This implies that the president is rated below average by Nigerians. The president’s approval rating of 40 per cent marks a decline of 17 percent from 57 percent rating recorded in the 2017 Buharimeter National Survey”. The survey further revealed that the federal government received ratings below average on the three cardinal campaign promises – Corruption, Security and Economy.

The poll indicated that about 67 percent of respondents rated poorly, the president’s performance on the economy, a setback to the 39 percent of respondents who rated his economic performance as poor in 2017. “This is notwithstanding the country’s economic recovery arising from the increase in her Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and a decrease in inflationary rate.”

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The survey also revealed that 57 percent of respondents rated the president’s performance as poor in the fight against corruption. On security, the poll revealed that only 21 percent of sampled Nigerians rated the government’s performance as good, while 24 percent as fair and 55 percent poor.

On sectoral performance, the effectiveness of President Buhari’s administration was also rated poorly across six sectors including Electricity, Education, Housing, Oil and Gas, Transportation and Health. The Presidency had earlier claimed that the rot and decadence it inherited from the Jonathan administration, slowed down its pace. It also said that falling oil prices reduced its ability to deliver on its promises. However, The Presidency recently insisted that they have indeed performed well on the economy. According to a document released by the presidency on its third anniversary the Nigerian economy is back and is on the path of growth after the recession of 2016-17. The presidency also said its Economic Recovery and Growth Plan (ERGP), which was launched by President Buhari in April 2017, has stabilised the macroeconomic environment; achieved agricultural and food  security and has also ensured energy efficiency especially in power and petroleum products. It also said the ERGP has improved transportation infrastructure and industrialisation primarily through the Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs).

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However, out in the streets, ordinary Nigerians, generally, complain bitterly about falling living standards, high unemployment which UK Pime Minister, Theresa May recently described as the highest per capita in the world. The citizenry is terrorized by criminals and militant herdsmen on the one hand and a Police Force whose SARS (Special Anti-Robbery Squad) teams arrest, extort and sometimes summarily execute with impunity on the other. The President’s handling of the militant herdsmen’s attacks in various parts of Nigeria is perhaps his most deprecating debacle. As Nigerians are left aghast as to how any president will choose to give what appears to be justification of serial mass murders, by blaming the killings on the drying up of Lake Chad and desertification, rather than seek out and punish the villains.

Clearly, Nigerians are complaining that this is not the Buhari’s Nigeria they had voted for. Presently, the Buhari Brand has not enacted a strong positive enduring legacy that will outlive his tenure and time is fast running out to establish one. Could it have been different if he had hearkened to the counsel of his wife and reorganised his government or will Nigerians give him a second chance to improve?  Only time and Nigerians will tell.