For a long time, Nigeria has bandied around what has amounted to a myth that whoever seeks the presidency hardly gets it. Historical observers have variously posited that what we have almost always had are “accidental” presidents—men reluctant to step out for leadership roles but who somehow, through whimsical engineering of fate, find the presidency thrust on them. A run through the list of our past leaders, civilian and military, attests to this. It was a myth that held up until Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.) showed up and ran until he eventually became president in 2015. Well, Nigeria’s luck…

Immediarely preceding this piece are the summaries for the Nigerian Presidential election results for 2007, 2011 and 2015. In the absence of pertinent data, politics in Nigeria is often reduced to tall tales and decorated half-truths. Bola Tinubu's ventilations at Abeokuta fully exemplified this. While Tinubu was arrogantly boasting at Abeokuta, lost on him was the irony that Buhari was not the only one who had suffered defeat in previous Presidential elections. In 2007, Buhari very significantly outperformed the combination of Tinubu and Atiku. In fact, despite the fact that Buhari spent very little money, Buhari garnered over 6 million…