Patience ran out in Nigeria. The long lines, which have been installed in the country for months, will be formed in a different way today in the most populous state in Africa, with 225 million inhabitants. Since the government's hasty decision a few months ago to issue new banknotes, thousands of Nigerians have been forced to form endless lines in front of banks, sometimes for several days, due to cash shortages. There are not enough bills and the withdrawal of money is limited to just 40 dollars a day per person.
Today the queues will be repeated but the wait will be different, perhaps more hopeful: Nigeria will gather today in front of the polling stations in the most open presidential elections in its recent history. With no reliable polls, there is complete uncertainty as to who is the favorite to replace outgoing leader Muhammadu Buhari, who is unable to run after serving two terms. Ayodeji Rotinwa, a journalist for The Continent, does not doubt the unpredictable soul of the contest: "These are the least predictable elections that we can remember."
The novelty lies above all in a tide: the Obimania. For the first time, a candidate who is not from one of the two main parties in power, Peter Obi, has a chance to win.
Obi, 61, leads several opinion polls on voting intentions, has a huge pull among the young population (70% of the population is under 30 years old) and treasures a rarity; a hopeful past in politics. “He is one of the few governors in the history of Nigeria – says Rotinwa – who has left the state coffers in a better state than when he arrived. He has cultivated a reputation for humility and frugality."
Obi also has political intelligence: aware that his base of followers is concentrated in the Christian south, where he comes from, he has chosen a politician from the north as his right arm to try to gain support.
Faced with Obimania, tradition and experience rise up. The former governor of Lagos, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, 71, who will have the entire machinery of the party in power behind him, is the main favorite for many. After a lifetime dedicated to national politics, with enormous influence in high places, his catchphrase underscores his intentions bluntly: It's my turn.
The other candidate with potential and former vice president from the north, Atiku Abubakar, also in his seventies, will in turn seek to make this election the final one. After appearing up to five times and losing every time, he has built a solid base of support throughout the country over the past few years. It remains to be seen if he will catch up with him in his presumably last chance for power. For Abiodun Adeniyi, a professor of mass communication at Abuja's Baze University, the race for the Nigerian presidency will be decided by details. "This is one of the closest elections ever held in the history of this country."
If all goes according to plan – the nuance is important: Nigeria has seen elections postponed within hours of the polls opening – Nigerians will decide today the direction of change, but perhaps nothing is fully final yet. Under Nigerian electoral law, for one of the candidates to win, he must win a majority of the vote, but also 25% of the vote in at least 24 of Nigeria's 36 state-provinces. If none of them succeeds, there will be a second round between the two most voted options within three weeks.
The campaign of the three candidates has gravitated around three core issues: insecurity, economy and unemployment. The next president will have to deal with entrenched insecurity in the country, especially in the north, where Boko Haram killed more than 8,000 people last year.
The economy, with inflation above 21% and choking the throats of a very unequal society, is another urgent task for the new executive. Finally, the new leader will have to choose between putting a solution to crippling unemployment (one in three adult Nigerians does not have a job) or dealing with the growing frustration of a population where there are already more than 135 million young people under 24 years of age.
The political analyst for the Nigerian daily The Vanguard, Adekunle Adekoya, believes that discontent with Nigeria's elite, whom he describes as a "perpetual failure" and who have been unable to harness the country's abundant human and material resources, may play an important role in these elections. But he fears that the need may dampen the thirst for change. “I have a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach that the poverty that plagues our land is being used as a weapon against voters, who sacrifice a thoughtful decision for immediate gratification. Cry my beloved Nigeria!”
Despite the fact that insecurity, the economy and unemployment will be the three main axes that the new president will have to face, the Nigerians have a more urgent request for whoever wins. And it is not minor. From Lagos, the filmmaker Fedo Francis describes by phone the exhaustion of the endless queues “This cannot continue. Lack of cash and huge queues at banks are crazy. You have to queue from 5 or 6 in the morning, every day. I hope the new president solves this problem, honestly it is a serious problem that there is no cash.
The Nigerian population, poor for the most part, unequal and fed up with the inefficiency of their rulers, is losing patience. Whoever emerges victorious at the polls and becomes the new president of Nigeria will have no time to waste. The waits are over.
