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Yar'Adua 'faces uphill struggle'
02/08/2007 12:38 - (SA)
Abuja - In his first two months in office, the shy, aristocratic new president of Nigeria has faced a nationwide strike, violence in the country's oil region and accusations that he's timid - he only announced a cabinet last week.
But, these problems paled compared to the jaw-dropping corruption, decayed infrastructure and widespread poverty that 140 million Nigerians were expecting President Umaru Yar'Adua to tackle.
Raymond Olanre said: "These big men always have big talk." Yar'Adua says "he will give us water and light, but that is just what the previous (president) said".
Like many Nigerians, Olanre feared Yar'Adua's links to former President Olusegun Obasanjo might prevent him from challenging a corrupt status quo.
8 tumultuous years of democracy
The ex-president plucked the former governor from obscurity and shoehorned him through the governing party's presidential nomination last year.
Yar'Adua's landslide in April's elections was condemned by domestic and international observers, who charged widespread voter intimidation and vote-rigging.
Now Nigerians were asking whether Yar'Adua, a reclusive former chemistry teacher from a royal Muslim family, would be able to stand up to his flamboyant and strong-willed predecessor and force through desperately needed reforms.
Under Obasanjo, Nigeria had eight tumultuous years of democracy, the longest period since independence from Britain in 1960.
But corruption was rife and most people had remained desperately poor despite the nation's oil wealth. Nigeria was Africa's largest crude exporter, an OPEC member and key supplier to the West.
Olanre earned about $2 a day, not much - but still more than most. At 22 years old, he had lived more than half the 43-year life expectancy of the average Nigerian.
Yar'Adua publicly declare his assets
Jibrin Ibrahim of Nigeria's Centre for Democracy and Development, a civil society think tank, said there were signs that Yar'Adua was preparing for real change. But every gain also showed how far the administration had to go.
In a surprising move, Yar'Adua publicly declared his assets - the first Nigerian president to do so - and urged his officials to do the same.
No official had so far, and on Sunday, Yar'Adua's bowler-hatted vice-president, Goodluck Jonathan, said in response: "I don't see any big deal".
Yar'Adua reversed the contentious sale of two of the country's broken down refineries to a shadowy consortium headed by Obasanjo's allies, a deal hurried through in the dying days of the old president's regime.
Incompetent management, sabotage and neglect had already shut the country's four refineries. Dependence on imports of refined petroleum pushed prices up and government popularity down.
And this month, four former state governors were charged with stealing state money, with more arrests promised by the country's anti-corruption watchdog.
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