Will Nigerians Get to Vote This Time?
Women wait to collect their Permanent Voter Cards from an official of the Independent National Electoral Commission at Shimawa, a rural town in southwestern Nigeria, on March 13, 2015.
Photographer: Pius Utomi Ekpei/AFP via Getty Images
On March 28, Nigerians will go to the polls to elect the next government of Africa’s most populous country. The choice is between the incumbent People’s Democratic Party (PDP), led by Goodluck Jonathan, president since 2010, and the All Progressives Congress (APC), led by a former major general and onetime dictator of Nigeria, Muhammadu Buhari. Jonathan’s supporters are mainly in the more prosperous, oil-rich south, which is mostly Christian and boasts sub-Saharan Africa’s largest city, Lagos. Buhari’s backers come from the impoverished, mostly Muslim north. The most recent polls, taken in December, showed a dead heat, with each candidate garnering 42 percent support.
Nigerians wonder if an election will actually take place on March 28. It was scheduled for Feb. 14, but less than a week before, the chairman of the election commission postponed it, because Jonathan’s national security adviser said the army needed more time to make the north safe for voters. The militant Islamic group Boko Haram has terrorized much of the northeast since 2009, driving about a million Nigerians from their homes. “This election is to me a life-and-death issue,” says Falmata Modu, a mother of four who fled fighting in the town of Bama. “I need someone who can have this nuisance sent packing from our towns.” Troops from neighbors Niger and Chad have joined the Nigerians in attacking Boko Haram. Modu supports Buhari.