Atiku Abubakar, Nigeria’s former vice-president and a serial contender for the top job, has won the main opposition party’s nomination to challenge President Muhammadu Buhari in February’s elections.
Over the next five months, the pair will battle for control of Africa’s largest crude producer and most populous nation amid rising oil prices and a sluggish economic recovery.
Mr Buhari, a former military ruler with a cult-like following in the country’s predominately Muslim north, was thought all but unbeatable as recently as a few months ago. But recent state level elections have offered stark warning signs for his All Progressives Congress party.
Mr Abubakar, who is also Muslim and hails from the north-east of the country, served as deputy from 1999 to 2007 to then president Olusegun Obasanjo, with whom he had stormy relations. A wealthy perennial candidate with political allies across the country, he has pitched himself as a successful businessman ready to jump-start the economy and attract foreign investors.
Results from primaries at the weekend, showed him to be the overwhelming victor in a crowded field of other candidates.
Mr Buhari in 2015 became the first opposition candidate to defeat an incumbent president in Nigeria’s history. His victory also marked the first time the ruling People’s Democratic party had been out of power since the restoration of civilian rule in 1999. Mr Abubakar was one of the first of many high-profile politicians to defect from Mr Buhari’s party in order to challenge.
Mr Buhari campaigned to crack down on corruption and “decimate” Boko Haram, the jihadi group that at the time of his election controlled territory across north-east Nigeria. He has been credited with cutting down on graft, though some of his allies have been ensnared in corruption scandals.
But his record on security is mixed. Boko Haram, while significantly diminished, still wreaks havoc. Meanwhile, security crises — from deadly clashes between farmers and nomadic herders in the middle of the country to widespread banditry in rural areas — plague swaths of Nigeria.
Mr Buhari has also come under fire for his economic record. After entering office just as the oil price crash hit Nigeria’s crude-dependent economy, his administration took action that critics say made the ensuing recession worse. The economy has since inched toward recovery, with GDP growth forecast at 2.3 per cent this year. Unemployment has soared to 18.8 per cent from 7.5 per cent just before he took office.
The administration has defended its record, citing significant infrastructure investment; higher foreign reserves and a drop in inflation.
The electoral calculus of Nigerian politics is complicated. An informal system rotates the presidency between the predominantly Muslim north and the largely Christian south, while the winner must win at least a quarter of the votes in 24 of the country’s 36 states, in addition to the popular vote. The parties, meanwhile, are fluid because they are largely based on patronage rather than ideology.
Mr Buhari, 75, is out to prove he still has what it takes to govern Africa’s largest economy. He spent more than three months in the UK last year for an undisclosed ailment and has returned frequently for check-ups.
