As Nigeria prepares for the 25 February basic election, its industrial hub Lagos presents a snapshot of the opposing forces looking for to form the nation’s future – these seemingly content material with the established order and people who aspire for extra.
The state has the most important variety of registered voters – seven million – and has emerged as a key battleground in a contest the place either side is backed by a military of younger individuals, principally drawn from the third of Nigerians who cannot discover a job or are performing roles under their qualification.
“He is created jobs earlier than and he’ll do it once more,” mentioned Jimoh Adesina, 40, a driver with the general public bus scheme in Lagos who’s backing Bola Tinubu of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC).
Whereas driving a public bus is a good job, it’s not what you’d anticipate somebody with a level from a polytechnic to be doing, however Mr Adesina is pleased simply to be in work.
Unemployment and the economic system are key considerations for voters within the elections. Regardless of being Africa’s largest economic system and oil producer, 4 out of 10 Nigerians stay under the poverty line, based on the World Financial institution.
Mr Tinubu has based mostly his presidential marketing campaign on his two tenures as governor of Lagos state, and the achievements of the get together he helped convey to energy in 2015. These are greatest seen by way of the home windows of the Bus Speedy Transit (BRT) he launched that eased the town’s infamous visitors jams.
A contemporary bus terminal has changed chaotic scenes on the fashionable Oshodi interchange, whereas check runs are underneath means for a brand new electrical gentle railway which runs previous a refurbished Nationwide Theatre.
On the opposite aspect of the lagoon is a brand new nationwide rail line connecting Lagos with the town of Ibadan by way of a cease in Abeokuta, and a landmark bridge now results in the upmarket Lekki Peninsula the place upwardly cell younger Nigerians within the tech sector stay in swanky flats.
Africa’s richest man, Aliko Dangote, is constructing an oil refinery in a free commerce zone partly owned by the federal government, close by a brand new port constructed by the Chinese language is now operational and there’s speak of a fourth bridge to hyperlink the working-class mainland to the enterprise districts on the Island.
All these have reworked Lagos from the chaotic metropolis it was earlier than 1999.
Most of contemporary Lagos is Mr Tinubu’s creation or has been carried out by his proteges who’ve succeeded him since 2007, together with a brand new metropolis of luxurious flats on the Atlantic coast, the place he boasts that he tamed the oceans.
“He’s my father,” mentioned Mr Adesina, whose life is intertwined with the person he mentioned paid his examination charges and people of others in public colleges in 2001, and likewise gave him this job as a driver.
He’s certainly one of many throughout Nigeria whose lives have been touched by Mr Tinubu’s benevolence, both by way of state assets or his private wealth. The record contains soccer stars, musicians, politicians whose campaigns he sponsored and companies he bailed out throughout powerful occasions.
That’s the reason his slogan for the election, Emi Lokan, which loosely interprets to It Is My Flip, is mainly a rallying name for favours to be repaid in help of his presidential bid.
The kingmaker now desires to be king.
Though his get together has misplaced some help after eight years in energy, its nationwide equipment can be a bonus and Mr Tinubu plans to go to all of the states in Nigeria.
“These he meets by no means stay the identical, he impacts individuals’s stay both immediately or not directly,” mentioned Adekanye Adetutu, an ardent supporter whose charges had been additionally paid as a secondary college scholar.
However opponents say Mr Tinubu has used such benevolence to entrench a patronage system to create a help base of loyal followers, construct a political empire and hold maintain of state assets.
“Tinubu ought to get his foot off our necks,” mentioned Daniella Brodie-Mends, a 25-year-old first-time voter with dyed blonde hair at an outdated colonial sq. in Lagos the place hundreds gathered on the remaining rally of the Labour Celebration, whose candidate Peter Obi is fashionable with city voters.
The gang on the Tafawa Balewa Sq. was comparable to people who gathered on the Lekki tollgate throughout the 2020 EndSars protests, which campaigned towards police brutality after which morphed into calls for for higher governance in Africa’s most populous nation.
They’re younger, assured and plenty of are well-off, sporting the newest iPhones and Yeezy boots alongside nostril piercings, dreadlocks and tattoos, though his help isn’t confined to the middle-classes.
Many weren’t born when Mr Tinubu and others fought the army authorities of Sani Abacha within the Nineties, or had been nonetheless infants when he was governor between 1999-2007.
However they’ve little time for his democratic credentials and in some ways, signify the audacity of a brand new technology of younger Nigerians who really feel that the outdated politicians who run the nation have vastly restricted their potential and wish them out of their means.
They’re loyal to no-one, don’t desire hand-outs from the state or the roles of road sweepers, visitors regulators and park attendants by way of which Mr Tinubu has employed hundreds in Lagos.
They’re pals with the town’s profitable younger tech entrepreneurs and know of the immense alternatives that Lagos can supply, however they’re additionally prone to have skilled police brutality, seen their college schooling interrupted by strikes and are feeling the pinch of report ranges of inflation.
“I used to be holidaying in Europe each summer time earlier than this APC got here into energy,” mentioned one man who got here to the rally with dozens of face caps he had personally branded for the Labour Celebration.
Regardless of his previous affiliation with the principle opposition Peoples Democratic Celebration (PDP), Mr Obi is taken into account an outsider in comparison with the politicians his supporters accuse of holding Nigeria again.
The 61-year-old has promised to wean the Nigerian economic system off its dependence on imports by creating an surroundings the place exports will drive progress, and has constructed his marketing campaign on the prudent administration of public funds when he served two phrases as governor of japanese Anambra state.
He has run a nimble marketing campaign, visiting poor villagers in distant areas the place he’s fashionable, and his entrance into Lagos, when he rode in an open-roof automobile from one a part of the town to a different, felt like a victory parade.
However in a worrying signal forward of election day, dozens of his supporters had been attacked and injured en path to the venue.
It’s a sample that has been seen up to now, particularly within the 2019 basic elections the place voting in opposition strongholds was disrupted in Lagos and many citizens prevented from casting their ballots.
Such assaults are often carried out by Lagos’ highly effective gangs of road thugs who’re principally discovered at motor parks and markets.
They’re a menace many in Lagos would relatively not encounter however they carry out important tax-collection duties for native authorities, particularly from these within the casual sector of the economic system, resembling tricycle riders and road merchants.
Lagos has all the time adopted Mr Tinubu since 1999 and whichever get together he has chosen has swept the polls at each state and federal elections although the margins have been diminishing, with the PDP now represented by Atiku Abubakar and now the Labour Celebration, making inroads.
This metropolis has seen many adjustments over time, however now it seems like a showdown between the outdated and the brand new is imminent. And in some ways, its end result will dictate Nigeria’s future path.
