Nigeria's soft-spoken top candidate

Party insiders say that Yar'Adua won the PDP candidacy against other strong candidates, after Obasanjo intervened. Charles Dokubo, political analyst with the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs, says Obasanjo's meddling is jeopardizing the credibility of the presidential polls before a ballot has been cast.

"It seems Obasanjo is trying to dictate who will rule Nigeria," says Mr. Dokubo. "It makes a sham of the elections."

Yar'Adua, speaking from his base in the capital, Abuja, told reporters that he would be his own man and dismissed the possibility that Obasanjo could continue to have influence during his tenure.

"I am amazed and amused any time people say these sort of things," said Yar'Adua at his considered pace. "There is no way you can govern a state or a federation or any nation by proxy – it just doesn't work."

A shrewd political operator

Yar'Adua's backers say he is a shrewd operator unlikely to be pushed around by Obasanjo after polling day. They point to his track record in Katsina as an example of how he will tackle corruption, which is stultifying national economic growth.

Yar'Adua is among the few of Nigeria's 36 governors who declared his assets before taking office in 1999 and again when he was reelected in 2003. And, in 2002, he won an award from Nigerian Union of Journalists as Nigeria's most transparent governor. The award was presented by none other than Mr. Buhari, his presidential rival.

Back in the simple Yar'Adua family home, the framed pictures that crowd the walls display the family's political pedigree.

Yar'Adua's father was a minister in Nigeria's first postindependence government. He and Habiba are two of 13 children their father had with Fatima, his third of four wives.

For much of his life, Yar'Adua was overshadowed by his older brother, Shehu, who played a leading role in the coup that installed Obasanjo as a military leader during the 1970s. He later died in jail after criticizing other military juntas.

Though a blue-blood politico, Yar'Adua is not above menial labor, Habiba says.

"He worked as the manager of the [family] farm but still he used to work with the laborers as if he was not the general manager," Habiba says.

In the sleepy streets of Katsina, residents seem generally satisfied with Yar'Adua's work during his eight years as their state governor.

They point to the large new compound of the State Secretariat, which rises out of the dust surrounded by smooth new roads complete with working street lights.

At the local polytechnic, where Yar'Adua taught chemistry for many years, lecturers say that things have improved since Yar'Adua become governor in 1999 – they have more buildings, more teachers, more books, and they are even paid on time.

But others say it has not been enough.

At the opposition Action Congress Party regional headquarters, party secretary Abdu Babangida, acknowledges that there have been gains under Yar'Adua, though somewhat limited.

"Yes, we have a road," he says. "But people still don't have fuel to put in their motorbikes. There are new school buildings, but without equipment or good teachers."

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