Former Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari Dies at 82 in London

Former Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari, who was a great figure in the politics of Nigeria, passed away on Sunday in London, July 13, 2025, at the age of 82 after an extended sickness life as enumerated by the spokesperson of President Bola Tinubu in a statement.

The former president of the largest country in Africa, Buhari also was the first opposition leader to uproot an incumbent leader, Goodluck Jonathan, in the 2015 election, labeled as the fairest election in the history of Nigeria.

He is a retired Major General who was a former head of state in the military regime serving between 1983 and 1985 after a coup, a form of rule both applauded and criticized depending on the various aspects since he displayed anti-corruption actions and exercised dictatorship.

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Throughout his tenure as president, Buhari had campaigned on the issues of corruption and insecurity, mainly the Boko Haram insurgency in the northeast. Under his watch, some of the Chibok school girls kidnapped in 2014 were released, but violence took a stranglehold in Nigeria with armed groups proliferating into the northwest and southeast. His economic policies such as sustaining artificially high naira resulted into two recessions and a decline in the position of Nigeria as the largest economy in Africa. Opponents, such as an analyst Alexis Akwagyiram called his economic stewardship as very ineffective pegging it on the high inflation and losses in oil production on account of theft.

The health of Buhari had been a constant concern, and at the time he served as president, he had spent more than seven months on leave in London due to ill health, and this led to public discontent with his seeking medical care abroad in far-flung countries. He still had a fervent following in the largely Muslim north of Nigeria, in which his puritanical image and presumed good character appealed.

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President Tinubu gave tributes to Buhari calling him a patriot, a soldier and a statesman and instructed Vice President Kashim Shettima to follow his body back to Nigeria where he was to be buried in Katsina in accordance with Muslim traditions. The sentiments are diverse among the people thus echoing the polarized image of Buhari as the harbinger of democracy and a leader who followed up with his promises.