Tag: Atiku Abubakar

Lagos, Nigeria (CNN)Many called Chike Ukaegbu's bluff when he announced he was running for the highest office in Nigeria at the age of 35. Politics in Nigeria was closed to younger candidates up until the Not Too Young To Run bill -- championed by a youth movement -- succeeded last year in lowering the ages for elected offices. President Muhammadu Buhari first ruled Nigeria in 1983 as a military head of state. Only candidates with deep pockets and wealth amassed from the nation's resources have emerged victorious in past elections, Raphael said, shutting out younger aspirants and newcomers without a "war chest" to finance their campaigns. Despite its young population, Africa has been under the grip of older leaders, widening the gap and disconnect between the leadership and the electorate. Cameroon's 85-year-old president Paul Biya was elected for a seventh term last October, extending his 36-year rule in the country. "By the time we get to the election... we will have many Ugandans registered as voters," Wine said. The 37-year-old says nothing will change if young people remain apathetic and abstain from the polls and politics. None of these men are by definition youthful candidates, but they are newcomers and some decades younger than the frontrunners. Now, we have old leaders ruling a digital population."

Lagos, Nigeria (CNN)Bring Back our Girls activist and former Nigerian minister Oby Ezekwesili has thrown her hat into the election ring for Nigeria's upcoming 2019 elections and says her candidacy will "disrupt the politics of failure" in Africa's most populous nation. "It's totally unacceptable. Incumbent President Muhammadu Buhari, who is also running for a second term, vowed to tackle corruption in his first term, a promise many Nigerians say he has not fulfilled. You prevent opportunities for corruption; you reduce corruption. "What my agenda is to deregulate the economy in the kind of way that public officials don't have too much presence in the economy to be able to utilize it for personal gain," she said in the interview. Her record of fighting corruption and plugging financial leaks in Nigeria's public sector, when she served as a minister proves she will deliver on her campaign promises, she said. "I believe I am the candidate of the Nigerian people as I am not running alone. We are all running together. All of us that want a new direction for our country are running together," Ezekwesili said. I'm simply a candidate who is providing a direction for the rest of society to take on these folks."