![\"\"](\"https:\/\/eandelmagazine.com\/eandelmagazine\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/91ca91b99d084fa429ca2b2fa01e440db8c8b27d-300x169.jpg\")
<\/p>\nMuhammadu Buhari died Sunday in London, where he had been receiving medical treatment.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
He first took power in Africa\u2019s most populous nation in 1983, after a military coup, running an authoritarian regime until fellow soldiers ousted him less than 20 months later. When he was elected in 2015 on his fourth attempt, he became the first opposition candidate to win a presidential election there.<\/p>\n
Buhari rode into power in that election on a wave of goodwill after promising to rid Nigeria of chronic corruption and a deadly security crisis. He led until 2023, during a period marked by Boko Haram’s extremist violence in the northeast and a plunging economy.<\/p>\n
Current President Bola Tinubu in a statement described Buhari as \u201ca patriot, a soldier, a statesman … to the very core.\u201d Tinubu dispatched the vice president to bring Buhari’s body home from London.<\/p>\n
Others across Nigeria remembered Buhari as a president who left the country of more than 200 million people \u2014 divided between a largely Muslim north and Christian south \u2014 more at odds than before.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe uneven response to Buhari\u2019s death, with muted disillusionment in some quarters and sadness in others, is a reflection of how difficult it is to unite a country and his inability to do so after decades in the public eye,\u201d said Afolabi Adekaiyaoja, an Abuja-based political scientist.<\/p>\n
Coming from Nigeria\u2019s north, the lanky, austere Buhari had vowed to end extremist killings and clean up rampant corruption in one of Africa’s largest economies and oil producers.<\/p>\n
By the end of his eight-year tenure, however, goodwill toward him had faded into discontent. Insecurity had only grown, and corruption was more widespread.<\/p>\n
Nigeria also fell into a recession amid slumping global oil prices and attacks by militants in the sprawling oil-rich Niger Delta region. The currency faltered as Buhari pursued unorthodox monetary policies to defend its fixed price to the dollar, and a massive foreign currency shortage worsened. Inflation was in the double digits.<\/p>\n
Civil society accused him of authoritarian tendencies after protesters were killed during a protest against police brutality and over his decision to restrict access to social media, as young people vented their frustrations against economic and security problems.<\/p>\n
Buhari\u2019s attempts at managing the problems were complicated by prolonged medical stays abroad. His absences, with few details, created anxiety among Nigerians and some calls for him to be replaced. There also was anger over his seeking taxpayer-funded health care abroad while millions suffered from poor health facilities at home.<\/p>\n
\u201cI need a longer time to rest,\u201d the president once said in a rare comment during his time away.<\/p>\n
His presidency saw a rare bright moment in Nigeria\u2019s fight against Boko Haram \u2014 the safe return of dozens of Chibok schoolgirls seized in a mass abduction in 2014 that drew global attention.<\/p>\n
But others among the thousands of people abducted by Boko Haram over the years remain missing \u2014 a powerful symbol of the government\u2019s failure to protect civilians.<\/p>\n
At the end of 2016, Buhari announced that the extremist group had been crushed, driven by the military from its remote strongholds.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe terrorists are on the run, and no longer have a place to hide,\u201d he boasted.<\/p>\n
But suicide bombings and other attacks remained a threat, and the military\u2019s fight against Boko Haram continued to be hurt by allegations of abuses by troops against civilians. In early 2017, the accidental military bombing of a displaced persons camp in the northeast killed more than 100 people, including aid workers. The U.N. refugee chief called the killings \u201ctruly catastrophic.\u201d<\/p>\n
As Nigeria\u2019s military reclaimed more area from Boko Haram\u2019s control, a vast humanitarian crisis was revealed. Aid groups began alerting the world to people dying from malnutrition, even as government officials denied the crisis and accused aid groups of exaggerating the situation to attract donations.<\/p>\n
The extremist threat and humanitarian crisis in the northeast \u2014 now exacerbated by Trump administration aid cuts \u2014 continues today.<\/p>\n
Years earlier, as Nigeria’s military ruler, Buhari oversaw a regime that executed drug dealers, returned looted state assets and sent soldiers to the streets with whips to enforce traffic laws. With oil prices slumping and Nigerians saying foreigners were depriving them of work, the regime also ordered an estimated 700,000 illegal immigrants to leave the country.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, government workers arriving late to their offices were forced to perform squats in a \u201cwar against indiscipline\u201d that won many followers. Buhari’s administration, however, was also criticized by rights groups and others for detaining journalists critical of the government and for passing laws that allowed indefinite detention without trial.<\/p>\n
As he pursued the presidency decades later, Buhari said he had undergone radical changes and that he now championed democracy. But some of his past stances haunted him, including statements in the 1980s that he would introduce Islamic law across Nigeria.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Muhammadu Buhari died Sunday in London, where he had been receiving medical treatment. He 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