All eyes on Nigeria 2019 Presidential elections

84 million registered Nigerians are ready to cast their ballots on Saturday country's presidential and parliamentary elections. The stakes are higher as all eyes look to the Nigeria elections. Control of the Presidential Villa Aso Rock is now up for grabs, and any surprise, vote buying, vote rigging or delay in releasing election results will be watched closely. Incumbent president Buhari, 76, is running against 71 other presidential candidates but his main challenger is Atiku Abubakar, a 72-year-old business tycoon and former vice president. They are both Muslim candidates from the north of the country.


In 2015 when Mr. Buhari took over as president, Nigeria had the third-largest number of extremely poor people; in 2018, Nigeria overtook India to become the country with the largest number of the extreme poor — a staggering 91 million living on less than $2 a day.

Unemployment rates have risen from a little over 10 percent in 2016 to 23 percent in 2018. The stasis of the presidency was strikingly illustrated by Mr. Buhari’s taking six months to appoint government ministers and spending months away in London for medical treatment. His reluctance to speak to the people or to react in a timely manner to scandals in his government did not inspire confidence.