By Sudarsan Raghavan
Nigerian
President Muhammadu Buhari salutes his supporters during his
inauguration in Abuja, Nigeria, on May 29. An official in Nigeria says
the new president's wealth declaration shows that he has been living "an
austere and Spartan lifestyle" compared to his predecessors and other
senior government officials, with $150,000 in his personal account.
(Sunday Alamba/AP)
By the standards of sub-Saharan African leaders, Nigeria's President Muhammadu Buhari is dirt-poor.
According
to a statement released by his government, he has $150,000 in his
savings account. He owns five homes and two mud houses, an orchard and
ranch with 270 head of cattle, 25 sheep, five horses and a variety of
birds. He has bought two cars from his savings
"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, describing the president's
assets as "Spartan."
The
question on many minds is this: Is Buhari, Nigeria's former military
ruler and ex-head of the oil ministry, telling the truth?
Corruption,
after all, is a major problem in Africa's largest economy. Buhari
himself has publicly said that more than $150 billion is missing from
the government's coffers. Still, the public declaration appears to be an
attempt to show some much-needed transparency. Buhari was elected in
March largely by promising that he wouldn't tolerate corruption.
What's clear is that Buhari has done what his predecessors — and most other African leaders — have never done.
Consider these five other African leaders. They have been labeled by Forbes Magazine as the "
five worst leaders in Africa."
1. Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, president of Equatorial Guinea
He's
Africa's longest-serving ruler, an autocrat who leads the tiny,
oil-rich West African nation of Equatorial Guinea. Despite its vast
natural wealth, the majority of its people live in deep poverty with no
access to clean drinking water, proper educational or health facilities.
One fifth of children die before age 5. The money has gone into the
pockets of Mbasogo and his family.
They own luxury properties in the United States and other countries, a private jet and a fleet of luxury cars.
2. José Eduardo dos Santos, president of Angola
He's
Africa's second-longest-serving leader. Angola is the continent's
second-largest oil producer, and one of the biggest suppliers of oil to
the United States. It also has massive diamond deposits. Dos Santos's
relatives hold key positions in his government and control a huge share
of Angola's economy, amid widespread allegations of corruption. Nearly
70 percent of the population lives in dire poverty, and a third of the
nation's children are malnourished.
3. Robert Mugabe, president of Zimbabwe
He
has ruled the southern African nation for a quarter-century. He was the
architect of controversial policies, most notably the seizure of
white-owned commercial farms. Though the country in recent years has
seen an economic rebound, Mugabe remains one of the continent's most
autocratic rulers. He wields nearly total control of government
institutions, and his loyalists have used violence to retain control.
Human rights abuses are rife, while unemployment remains among the
highest in sub-Saharan Africa.
4. Omar Al-Bashir, president of Sudan
Bashir
seized power in a bloodless military coup in 1989 and has since
disbanded political parties, the nation's parliament and many
privately-owned media outlets. Under his rule, civil war erupted, in
which more than 1 million people were killed. Bashir is wanted by the
International Criminal Court at the Hague on charges of war crimes and
crimes against humanity for his role in the killing and rape of
civilians in Sudan's Darfur region. A U.S. diplomatic cable, leaked by
Wikileaks, unveiled that Bashir may have
stolen as much as $9 billion from state coffers and deposited it into his private bank accounts in Great Britain.
5. King Mswati III, king of Swaziland
He
is the continent's last reigning monarch, presiding over a nation
with one of the world's highest HIV rates, where average life expectancy
— 33 years — is among the lowest in the world. Despite his people's
suffering, the king leads
a lavish life with a taste for luxury cars, first-class travel and expensive parties, even as the nation's economy is in dire straits
