A weary Nigeria pins few hopes on poll marred by violence

After months of political unrest in which hundreds have been killed, Nigerians are preparing to head to the polls this weekend to shore up the country's fragile four-year-old civilian rule.

In Gusau, a small and dusty town on the fringes of the desert, the sense of disillusion is particularly bitter. In January 2000, Gusau led what Nigeria's 60 million Muslims hoped would be a revolution in northern Nigeria by installing Islamic law. But their hopes for change have now burnt out, as they did long ago across most of Nigeria.

"I will vote, but I know that nothing will be different. All our politicians are the same. Nothing has changed for the masses in Nigeria and it won't change now," said Hamisu Usman, a 30-year-old labourer sweating in the 40F heat.

Mr Usman earns just £2 a day carrying cement up a ramp on a building site. It is back-breaking work. In 1999, he voted for the former Central Bank official Ahmed Sani as governor. Mr Sani had promised to restore the strict Islamic law code known as sharia, last seen here in the 19th century.

He banned alcohol and prostitution and promised a new sort of justice, tackling crime and halting corruption. The Muslims who dominate the north welcomed his announcement, and within months 11 more states had adopted the code. But four years later, little has changed for most in the region. "Sharia has made no difference," Mr Usman said. "We do not want the military to come again. They are the worst. But we are suffering. We need an answer but I do not see it coming."

A country of more than 128 million people, and the fifth largest Muslim nation in the world, Nigeria suffered more than 15 years of military misrule after a coup in 1983, one of six it has seen since independence from Britain in 1960. Sharia was supposed, for the Muslims of the north, to bring change.

The system's defenders say restoration of the code – first introduced to northern Nigeria after a jihad in the region in 1804 – has reduced crime levels in those states that apply it. In Kano, northern Nigeria's biggest city, Muktar Usman Maidu, an Islamic scholar, said the law code had been a success. "It has reduced crime and curbed immoral behaviour. The courts function better and there is swifter justice."

But academics and other religious leaders dispute the claim. Since sharia was introduced, thousands of cases have come before the courts, but nobody rich and powerful has been prosecuted for corruption. Instead, poor thieves have had their hands amputated and two village women have been sentenced to death by stoning for adultery. Government is as corrupt in the sharia states as elsewhere in Nigeria, they say.

As the politicians' support for sharia has fallen, so the already deep-rooted cynicism about politicians has increased. The reasons to be cynical are easy to see. Nigeria earns billions of dollars every year from sales of its huge reserves of oil and gas, but little finds its way to the poor. On Tuesday, the government opened its biggest project of recent years, a sports stadium in the capital, which cost more than its annual budget for health and education.

The elections due on Saturday are for a parliament which, since 1999, has done little except to spend money on its members and block investigations into corruption.

One week later, elections for the 36 state governorships and a new president will be held. In a field of 20, the two main candidates for president are the incumbent, Olusegun Obasanjo, and Muhammadu Buhari of the All Nigeria People's Party. Both are former generals, a sign of how much influence the military still holds.

Problems of vote-rigging have dogged every election held in Nigeria since 1960, and these are expected to be no different. Voter registration was shambolic, and there have been widespread allegations of irregularities in the selection of party candidates.

Unrest linked to the elections cut Nigeria's oil output by 40 per cent over the last month. On Tuesday, a group of 13 minor parties called for voting to be delayed by four to five months because of the threat of more violence.

In a report published today, Human Rights Watch has documented many cases of political violence which, it warns, is threatening the legitimacy of the elections.