sign that he is prepared to help the country's leader-in-waiting.
"I am sure there are men and
women of goodwill, character and virtue... that you can mobilise to join
hands with you in the reform, repairs and re-direction that will be
imperative to put Nigeria back on fast lane," Obasanjo said in a letter
to Buhari.
Both Obasanjo, 78,
and Buhari, 72, are both former military rulers of Africa's most
populous nation who have gone on to become elected civilian president.
Obasanjo,
head of state from 1999 to 2007, fell out with the beaten presidential
candidate Goodluck Jonathan and has launched a series of public attacks
on the outgoing president.
In mid-February he publicly tore
up his PDP membership card and refused to back Jonathan's re-election
campaign, despite having been widely believed to have helped his initial
rise to the top job.
His
public letter to Buhari so soon after his election win will likely be
interpreted as a pitch for a job, after he made encouraging noises to
Buhari's candidacy on the campaign trail.
"With
so much harm already done to many national institutions, including the
military, which proudly nurtured you and me, you will have a lot to do
on institution reform," he wrote.
Although
once seen as a political godfather in Nigeria, Obasanjo's influence has
been on the wane and he retired from front-line politics to his chicken
farm.
But he still enjoys international respect outside the country.
He
is a member of the Africa Progress Panel advocacy group on equitable
and sustainable development and was UN special envoy to war-torn DR
Congo.
He also headed an African Union observer group to the Zimbabwe election in 2013.
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