Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari says his assets include
$150,000, two mud houses, livestock and an orchard, and a plot of land the
exact location of which he has yet to trace.
The asset
declaration, which Buhari's spokesman described as "Spartan," comes
as the President reaches 100 days in office.
"President
Buhari had no foreign account, no factory and no enterprises. He also had no
registered company and no oil wells," reads the statement released by the
spokesman, Garba Shehu.
Public
declarations are seen as crucial in fighting the corruption that plagues
Nigeria. They are a means of ensuring that, when the time comes to leave
office, government officials will not have used their positions to enrich
themselves.
Other assets
declared by Buhari -- who formerly headed the nation's petroleum ministry --
include five homes in addition to the two mud houses, farms, an orchard and a
ranch:
"The total
number of his holdings in the farm include 270 heads of cattle, 25 sheep, five
horses, a variety of birds and a number of economic trees," the official
statement reads.
Buhari's declared assets -- if accurate -- would make him quite
wealthy by the standards of ordinary Nigerians. But his holdings would be on a
small scale against the riches -- a total of $28.25 billion -- the APC has
claimed were "looted" by public officials under the administration of
his predecessor, Goodluck Jonathan. The APC contends that most of that money
was siphoned from Nigeria's oil industry.
Jonathan's
People's Democratic Party (PDP) has strongly denied the accusations.
Given the fierce
exchanges between the rival parties and the nation's history with official
corruption, Nigerians generally accept that transparency may be too much to
expect from its leaders.
Jonathan
notoriously said "I don't give a damn" when asked why he would not
publicly declare his assets, and most elected officials in Buhari's own All
Progressives Congress party (APC), still have not declared theirs.
'Baba Go-Slow'
Despite Buhari's declaration, some
Nigerians have not been impressed with his first 100 days. At newspaper stands
and beer joints around Lagos, you can hear the nickname "Baba
Go-Slow" -- on account of the perceived slow pace of Buhari's promised
changes.
"Buhari is
just making statements and press conferences, which I really don't
understand," says Emmanuela Mutumi, a makeup artist in Lagos. "He
needs to focus on what the people need."
Buhari, 72, was elected President in March after campaigning on
promises to fight corruption and beat the terrorist group Boko Haram in
northeastern Nigeria.After his election he said he intended to "plug
holes" in the "corruption infrastructure" in the country.
Buhari himself
was the nation's commissioner for petroleum resources in the late 1970s.
Many Nigerians
still believe in his integrity in the fight against the corruption and Boko
Haram, but there are concerns that after three months, no ministers
have been named to his Cabinet.
Buhari has
argued that he inherited from the previous administration a mess so large that
it will take time to fix.
"One
hundred days is too small," says Paul Audifferen, an engineer in Lagos.
"You have to give him time. Nigeria will take decades to repair because
the corruption has been there for a very long time. So you don't expect him to
just come from out of the blue, snap his fingers and say these are the glorious
days."
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