Today marks the first anniversary of the presidency of Bola Ahmed Tinubu, who rode to power on the mantra of renewed hope agenda for a better Nigeria. Clearly, this is an administration that has left no one in doubt of its bold policies, especially around the economy. But quite confounding are the policies’ glaring conflict with the platitude of hope and a better country for Nigeria. The truth is that the country is now worse off than Tinubu met it, yet the administration seems adrift from the existential free-fall into which it has plunged the country in just 12 months.
Section 14 (2) (b) of the 1999 Constitution, as amended, delineated the primary responsibility of government as the welfare and security of life and property. Yet, they are the two fundamentals that have eluded successive administrations, but which Tinubu’s electioneering campaigns promised to deliver to a mammoth of beleaguered Nigerians.
It was clearly not going to be a stroll in the pack after years of mismanagement by the two leading political parties. For instance, in the eight years that Muhammadu Buhari was in office, the naira lost about 70 per cent of its value against the dollar while the price level increased by 220 per cent, from 170 points to 540 points. The unemployment rate went from 7.5 per cent to 33.3 per cent until the NBS stopped releasing official data just as the fiscal deficit rose from less than N1 trillion to N7.4 trillion.
More like one who had longed for office all his life, Tinubu, from day one, rolled out aggressive economic reforms of the neoliberal market models. That first led to the removal of the fuel subsidy, then the electricity subsidy, the imposition of more taxes, including security levy, and the devaluation of the naira. Suffice it to note that these are all costs passed on to the people, 63 per cent or 133 million of which are multidimensionally poor.
Specifically, Tinubu’s removal of fuel subsidy without a clear-cut plan to ameliorate the intensity of its sundry hardship exposed his administration as inept. The immediate shocker for the public was the spike in prices of essential commodities by nearly 200 per cent in hours, and every other thing followed through the roof. A year after the decision and promise to fix the local refineries, prices of fuel are heading to a 300 per cent year-on-year increase in some parts of the country. Yet, public refineries have remained comatose. The policies have all caused the cost of living to gallop astronomically. Today, a three-month minimum wage (N90,000) can only buy a 50-kilogramme bag of rice in the open market, while a daily minimum wage can only afford an adult, a healthy diet for which the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) estimated at N982 as of March this year. Between March and now, the prices of tomatoes, oil, vegetables, fish, and other ingredients for preparing a healthy meal have shot up.
The fuel subsidy removal woes were complicated by the liberalisation of the FX market. From a trading band of N460/$, the naira has fallen to about N1500/$ and even crossed N1600/$ at the official market in March. Essentially, the naira has lost about 70 per cent of its value in one year – the same margin it lost during Buhari’s eight-year presidency. With claims that the Federal Government is paying N600 billion monthly as fuel subsidy, there is the tension that the FX reform-triggered naira loss has cancelled out the supposed gain of subsidy removal, pulling Nigeria back to the pre-Tinubu era. In reality, the poor cannot breathe under Tinubu. Inflation, which stands at a three-decade high of 33.7 per cent, the bleeding naira (which is now back to its tagline – worst performing currency), ravaging poverty, falling income, rising insecurity, and other social ills are suffocating both the rich and the poor.
Amid the unprecedented buffeting of the economy, insecurity has also continued to fester across the landscape. Tinubu, who described security as the “bedrock of a prosperous and democratic society,” had assured Nigerians that if elected, his “administration will be committed to permanently securing the safety, freedom, and prosperity of all Nigerians.” The only noticeable achievement in security is the significant increase in the budgetary allocation to defence and the economies of war. But in exchange, the terrorists have become more emboldened with mindless banditry, kidnappings of travellers, and other violent crimes, including daylight killing of farmers and residents. Today, over 100 communities are estimated to be governed by terrorists in Plateau State alone. It is the same narrative in Kaduna, Katsina, Benue and others with ungoverned territories. That is a recipe for food insecurity. Is it also a surprise that Nigeria has the world’s largest number of children below eight years who are not going to school? Records of the Nigeria Security Tracker (NST), a project of the Council on Foreign Relations Africa Programme, revealed that 543 persons died in violent attacks by gunmen in 2023 and the number has almost doubled in less than one year of Tinubu’s administration. Another report has it that over 4,000 people have been reportedly kidnapped since May last year after President Tinubu took office. So, where is the semblance of ‘hope’ he has been curating all his life?
Despite the enormity of the rot on the ground, Tinubu’s wronghead policies are not far-fetched, given the quality of aides he has chosen. A government that binges on cronyism and freely appeases politicians cum freeloaders is a grave suspect in matters of deep-thinking leadership. Except for one or two cabinet members, the array of personalities occupying critical offices does not elicit any hope, and no amount of presidential scorecard sessions and propaganda mill can whitewash the extended misery of Tinubu’s disastrous first year. A government that cannot parade the best-11 in a country rich in world-beaters from all walks of life is mediocre, irresponsible, and in wanton breach of the electorates’ trust. It is a disservice to modern democracy.
Truly, Nigeria has been plunged into the abyss while nothing has changed, and no hope rekindled. Most disappointing is that despite the appeal of the presidency to Nigerians to stoically bear the “momentary difficulty” for a brighter day to come, members of the political class are not living by such a mantra of sacrifice. Actually, they have continued in profligate use of public resources just for personal gains and to suggest that they live in a different world from the rest of Nigerians. Under Tinubu, corruption has become more entrenched, as if some Nigerians are above the laws of the land. That is not what it means to be a progressive government.
Tellingly, Nigerians are fed up in just about a year of this administration. Yet, given that there are three more years to go – out of which at least one would be devoted to the politics of 2027 – the Tinubu-led administration still has a chance to change the narrative and not continue to take Nigerians for a political ride. As a so-called progressive that supposedly feels the pains of Nigerians, where is his federalist restructuring agenda that they advocated as an opposition party? Nigeria can work by empowering the states and regions to be competitive socio-economically and security-wise, not just giving them more money from the federal allocation.
Tinubu should lead with a clearheaded and detailed survival plan on what to do at the federal level to put an end to the trial-and-error approach that leads only to policy flip-flops. He should drastically cut down wastage and fire underperforming aides, including service chiefs who neither protect lives nor secure critical infrastructure like the pipelines.
We reckon that it often takes a while to settle into an administration. But one year is enough to take a position. The valid question is, what does Mr Tinubu’s presidency stand for or oppose, the illusion of hope or its reality? It is time Tinubu takes a firm stand on governance and salvage what is left of his tattered agenda of renewed hope.
