Among the gallery’s visitors last week was Ehi, a businesswoman in her 40s who lives nearby and came with her three children. Hours before, officials had announced the results of Nigeria’s presidential election, held four days earlier. These had left Ehi bitterly disappointed. Her favoured candidate – Peter Obi, a 61-year-old businessman who had promised reform and radical change for Nigeria – had been soundly beaten by Bola Ahmed Tinubu, a veteran “political godfather” who was the candidate of the ruling All Progressives Congress.
“[Obi] articulated what he wanted to do. He had a real programme. Tinubu had no answers. He just left me with more questions,” Ehi said.
Further across the city, in the gritty, overcrowded streets of Lagos Island, voters had turned out four days earlier to vote for Tinubu, and there was much satisfaction. “Now things will get better. Who knows anything about this Obi man? But we know [Tinubu] … He will look after us,” said Adeleke Adejoke Bilikis, a jobless 43-year-old.
The residents of Lagos are not alone in seeing the election in Africa’s most populous country and biggest economy as a potential inflection point. Nigeria faces economic turmoil, widespread violence and systemic corruption. The eight-year rule of outgoing president Muhammadu Buhari was characterised by drift and disappointment. Before the election, commentators spoke of a chance to “change the trajectory”. That opportunity seems to have been missed.
This story is from the March 10, 2023 edition of The Guardian Weekly.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Sign In
This story is from the March 10, 2023 edition of The Guardian Weekly.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
'Pretendians' Controversy Over Formerly Unheard-Of First Nation
Local chiefs claim Kawartha Lakes group is part of wave of cases in which people falsely claim Indigenous identity
This Is The Emptying Of Rafah
Thousands of displaced Gazans are on the move again, packing their lives into carts and pickup trucks, as Israel's campaign against Hamas rages on
Vast Online Scam Dupes Thousands Of Shoppers
More than 800,000 people in Europe and the US appear to have been duped into sharing card details and other sensitive personal data with a vast network of fake online designer shops apparently operated from China.
Why Didn't Netflix Do More To Avoid The Baby Reindeer Furore?
What will happen next in the Baby Reindeer saga? Probably one or more bad things.
Picture this
From the galleries and squats of the 90s London art world to the riches of Covid-era New York, a tale of reunion, fame and fallout
Hit and miss Goths, glory and plenty of gimmicks
It was the most politically charged Eurovision song contest in memory-but it was won by a famously neutral nation. As the glittery dust settles from Saturday night in Malmö, Sweden, here's what we learned
Rose Boyt, daughter of the artist Lucian Freud, sat for her father three times.Now 65, she has written a remarkable memoir based on diaries she kept while being painted
ROSE BOYT'S MEMOIR, Naked Portrait, is, in the narrowest sense, her account of sitting for three paintings for her father, Lucian Freud.
A failure to reckon fully with the Troubles fuels distrust and discord
Fifty years ago, on 17 May 1974, my father, a bus conductor, was out on strike.
Believe it or not
Raffaella Spone was accused of faking an incriminating video of teenage cheerleaders. She was arrested, outcast and subjected to death threats. The problem? The video wasn't fake after all. She talks for the first time about being the centre of a story that created headlines around the world, yet nothing was as it seemed...
'HOPELESS AND BROKEN', 'I WORRY ABOUT THE FUTURE MY CHILDREN ARE INHERITING', 'I AM SCARED I DON'T SEE HOW WE CAN GET OUT OF THIS MESS'
We asked 380 climate scientists what they felt about the future.