Halima Buhari, daughter of former President Muhammadu Buhari, has revealed that her late father was deeply aware of the disappointment many Nigerians felt over his administration and privately grappled with the weight of unmet expectations.
She made the emotional disclosure on Wednesday, December 17, during the public presentation of a book authored by former Minister of Information, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, as reported by the Nigerian Tribune.
Addressing a high-profile audience of former ministers, ex-governors, traditional rulers and political party leaders, Halima said Buhari knew that many Nigerians who placed great hope in his leadership, especially on security and economic revival, felt let down.
Pulling back the curtain on the human side of power, she said the former president often struggled with the harsh realities of leading a deeply complex nation.
“Behind every soundbite, there was a human being; sometimes tired, sometimes determined, sometimes frustrated, always painfully aware that his decisions impacted millions of lives,” she said.
“That human being was our father. I saw a side of him that never appeared on television and was rarely captured in print.”
Halima described Buhari as a quiet, reflective man who carried Nigeria’s burdens in silence.
“I saw the man who would sit quietly, listening more than he spoke. The man who worried about the security of ordinary people. The man who agonised over the gap between what was promised and what was possible,” she said.
“For the public, he was President Buhari. For us at home, he was simply ‘Baba.’”
She noted that leadership in Nigeria is rarely black and white, often defined by hard compromises and imperfect outcomes.
“Leadership, especially in a country as complex as Nigeria, is never as straightforward as it looks from the outside,” she said. “It involves trade-offs, compromises, and very often, imperfect choices.”
Halima stressed that Buhari was neither shielded from criticism nor dismissive of it.
“My father was not unaware of the criticism levelled against him. He knew that many Nigerians felt that more would have been done or done differently,” she said.
“He heard the voices of those who were disappointed, just as he heard the gratitude of those who felt their lives had improved.”
She cautioned against attempts to sanitise or rewrite his record, saying debate over Buhari’s legacy remains part of democratic growth.
“Our presence here today is not to rewrite that history or to insist on a single interpretation of his years in office,” she said. “Nigerians will continue to debate his legacy as they should in a vibrant democracy.”
According to her, differing accounts of the Buhari years will continue to surface.
“There will be books that praise, books that criticise, and books that will try to document,” she said.
She described Lai Mohammed’s book as a key insider account of governance and public communication.
“This particular book, written by someone who was in the inner circle of communication and messaging, provides one important perspective of how an administration must be shaped and sometimes challenged in the court of public opinion,” she said.
