Buhari vows to ‘lead from the front’ battle against Boko Haram

Presidential candidate Muhammadu Buhari on Thursday vowed to “lead from the front” in the fight against Boko Haram if elected in the country’s forthcoming election. The former military ruler, who rejected descriptions of him as a “dictator”, also argued against further delays to the election and said a free, fair and peaceful vote would boost democracy in Africa.

The 72-year-old Flag bearer of the opposition party, All Progressives Congress (APC) has been seen as neck-and-neck with President Goodluck Jonathan in the closely fought election campaign. 

Some have predicted that Jonathan’s Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) could lose power for the first time since Nigeria returned to civilian rule in 1999.

In a speech at the Chatham House international affairs institute in London, which was broadcast live online, Buhari asserted that Nigeria had been failed by a consistent lack of leadership from Jonathan in the insurgency. 

“Our soldiers have neither received the necessary support nor the required incentive to tackle this problem. Let me assure you that if I’m elected president, I vow to change that,” he added.

“We will give them adequate modern arms and ammunition, we will improve intelligence gathering… we will be tough on terrorists and tough on its root causes… in the affected areas.” “No inch of Nigerian territory will ever be in the hands of the enemy,” Buhari pledged, promising to return Nigeria to its former role as a stabilising force in west Africa.

- High expectations -

Critics have accused Jonathan and the PDP of delaying the vote to give them more time to seize back the momentum from the APC and Buhari said “any form of extension… will not be tolerated”. Instead, he said free, fair and peaceful elections could “trigger a wave of democratic consolidation in Africa” and help to strengthen democracy in Nigeria.

Buhari, seen as an anti-corruption figure despite allegations of serious rights abuses by his regime in the 1980s, also responded to descriptions of himself as a former dictator. 

“Let me say without sounding defensive that dictatorship was military rule, though some are less dictatorial than others,” he said. “I take responsibility for whatever happened under my watch. I cannot change the past but I can change the present and the future.

“So, before you is a former military ruler and a converted democrat who is ready to operate under democratic rules.” “I will, if elected, lead by personal example,” he said. 

“On corruption, there will be no confusion as to where I stand: corruption will have no place and the corrupt will not be appointed to my administration,” he said. 

On Nigeria’s economy, on paper Africa’s largest but where the majority of people remain impoverished, Buhari said an APC government would work to free people from the “curse of poverty”.