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The manifesto of
presidential candidate, Muhammadu Buhari, and his running mate, Tunde
Bakare, encapsulates the belief that the country’s missing ingredient
for the greatness so passionately sought by many Nigerians, is a few
good people. It is not surprising, I suppose, from a man who justified
his self-invitation to lead a country on the grounds that its leaders
were hopelessly corrupt, waged a war against indiscipline only to be
defeated by other military officers who expected the rhetoric of
incorruptibility to remain rhetoric. That his running mate is a former
barrister clothed in theological garb reinforces the image of
incorruptibility projected by this presidential team of the Congress
for Progressive Change. Major-General Buhari’s manifesto is the most
concrete of the Nigerian ones I have studied, about how to reduce
corruption, and one of the vaguest about how precisely to improve the
lot of the ordinary person.

It starts with
linguistic flourish: “Every country has its ‘lost generation’. Some
were stolen away by war, some by economic downturns, and some by
visionless governments. Nigeria is perhaps the only one stolen by too
much power, money, leisure and privilege.” I must confess that I have
never associated life in Nigeria with a surfeit of leisure. Life seems
to be a perpetual grind for too many people. Then, it proceeds to its
diagnosis and prescriptions. Mr. Buhari intends to reform politics and
governance by amending Nigeria’s “Constitution to remove immunity from
prosecution for elected officers in criminal cases.” He plans also to
restructure government into a lean organism. To stimulate transparency,
all governmental contracts exceeding N100 million are to be published
in all media, a freedom of information bill granting individuals the
right to state data is to be enacted, and all minutes of local
government meetings are to be published.

A Conflict
Resolution Commission is to be established to “help prevent, mitigate
and resolve civil conflicts within the polity” and permanent peace is
to be brought to the Niger Delta, Plateau and other troubled zones. Mr.
Buhari offers no explanation whatsoever about how such a desirable
outcome is to be accomplished. His explanation-devoid style of promises
extends into the economic arena. Nigeria’s gross domestic product is
set to grow at 10 per cent per annum. How? With what inflation target?
Or national savings rate? I was impressed by the promise of
implementing a national identification scheme to enable the informal
economy to be merged into the formal economy. Without answers to those
questions, this wish is a mere dream. I was impressed by the promise of
implementing a national identification scheme to enable the informal
economy to be merged into the formal economy. India is in the midst of
issuing universal identity numbers to each of its 1.2 billion
residents, based on unique biometrics markers such as fingerprints.
Nigeria should be able to emulate India.

Another proposal
that would have substantial benefits for Nigerians is that of creating
a national electronic land title register. The inability of farmers to
specify precisely the contours of their holdings inhibits their ability
to raise capital from formal financial institutions. It is no
coincidence that the most productive farmers on earth — American
farmers — have mortgages covering most of their farmland. If only the
same could be said of Nigeria’s farmers! Mr. Buhari did not disappoint
by failing to pledge to triple Nigeria’s power supply. All Presidential
candidates must throw out a huge number in the electricity generation
industry. The balance of his manifesto is full of the usual
developmental bromides populating Nigerian presidential manifestos:
pass swiftly the Petroleum Industry Bill; raise the federal budgetary
allocation for education or open six new grand health or educational
facilities. Mr. Buhari intends to open six new science and technology
universities. Nollywood will receive some sort of assistance. The
environment seems to be dear to his heart. He plans to encourage the
planting of lots of new trees to arrest the spread of the Sahara desert.

There is little doubt of Mr. Buhari’s patriotism. Yet, some
omissions left me unhappy. The promise of N30 billion for the farming
sector reveals little ambition for that sector. There is tremendous
growth of income and employment there. For example, by designing a
system of combining road, rail, and sea transport and technical farming
expertise, landlocked and arid Mali was able to increase its mango
exports by 1,042 per cent between 1993 and 2008 and boost rural income.
What Mali has done, Nigeria can surpass! There were no proposals to
simplify the conduct of formal business in Nigeria. Corruption withers
in a slimming state. In sum, this is not the manifesto for a vibrant
Nigeria.