Former Nigerian vice president Atiku Abubakar is competing once again for the country’s top job in Saturday’s presidential elections.
This is the sixth time in three decades that Abubakar tries to become the Nigerian president.
The 76-year old is campaigning for the opposition’s People’s Democratic Party (PDP), and faces Bola Tinubu from the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) party and Peter Obi, the surprise third frontrunner from the Labour Party(LP). Abubakar is a Muslim from the Fulani ethnical group, reality he has in common with current president Muhammadu Buhari.
Before turning to politics in the 90s, Abubakar was antecedently a successful businessman.
Abubakar held the deputy administrative role under president Olusegun Obasanjo until 2007.
Since stepping down from office, he has tried to secure the presidential nomination for several parties, including the APC in 2015.
He returned to the PDP for the 2019 election and played on his character as a businessman with a tagline “Get Nigeria working again”.
During campaigning, Abubakar promised to tackle five crucial areas. These are insecurity, the economy, restoring the unity of Nigeria, investing in education, and declining further resources and powers to regions of the federation.
Nigeria is still recovering from the impact of the coronavirus epidemic and the fallout from the Ukraine war that has increased fuel and food prices.
According to the World Bank, inflation pushed N5million further Nigerians into poverty in 2022 to a sum of around N95million or nearly half the population.
Abubakar has two wives, 29 children’s and running many businesses
