There are signs that Nigerians \u201d\u201d among the most resilient and adaptive people on the continent \u201d\u201d are losing patience. This week, there were small, but rowdy, protests in Lagos and Abuja, at which demonstrators complained about their \u201cmissing president\u201d\u009d.<\/p>\n
There is an irony that Mr Buhari, a retired major general, is missing in action. He ran the country as a military ruler in the mid-1980s after seizing power in a coup. In civilian guise, his leadership style has verged on the invisible. After winning power in 2015 on the fourth attempt at the ballot box, he set out at a pace that has marked his presidency: it took him six months to name a cabinet. Hopes that he had surrounded himself with a lean team of capable technocrats empowered to get policy cranking have come to naught. Policymaking \u201d\u201d such that it is \u201d\u201d has been crafted instead by a tiny cabal of loyal, less qualified, stalwarts. Mr Buhari has failed to articulate anything approaching a vision.<\/p>\n
During his campaign, Nigeria\u2019s soldier-turned-politician promised to train his sight on three main objectives: to improve security, crack down on corruption and diversify the oil-dependent economy. Progress on the first two has been patchy, and on the third dismal.<\/p>\n