#TinubuIsAFailure #APCMustDie #FixINEC #ElectoralReform
Nigeria is bleeding, not from war or natural disaster but from the systematic, institutionalized criminality of its ruling elite. At the epicenter of this hemorrhage is President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, whose proposed ₦45 trillion ($24 billion) foreign loan in the 2025 budget is not only scandalous but a brutal betrayal of 200 million people barely surviving under the weight of poverty, hyperinflation, and hopelessness. This is not a development plan; it is a blueprint for economic enslavement.
The justification for this colossal loan, offered by Tinubu’s handlers, insults the intelligence of Nigerians. Dressed in the deceptive language of “growth,” “infrastructure,” and “poverty alleviation,” the borrowing plan is a continuation of a corrupt pattern, one that mortgages Nigeria’s future to finance elite luxury and unaccounted expenditures while starving the poor.
Criminal Deception Masquerading as Strategy
Dr. Tope Fasua, the president’s Special Adviser on Economic Matters, shamelessly claims that the government is only tapping $1.3 billion of the $21.5 billion borrowing ceiling in 2025. This semantic gymnastics fools no one. The mere approval of this plan opens the floodgates to indiscriminate borrowing. Fasua points to a marginal decline in Nigeria’s debt-to-GDP ratio (from 52% to 50%) and a drop in debt service to revenue from 120% to 64% as supposed evidence of progress conveniently ignoring that these figures are distorted by currency devaluation and cosmetic economic projections.
More damning, Fasua touts “property taxes” and “fiscal reforms” as solutions, while citizens are crushed daily by regressive levies, multiple taxation, and a failed naira. Nigerians are not paying taxes into development; they are funding a mafia state.
Atiku’s Warning: A Pyramid Scheme of Doom
Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar rightly described the proposal as “irresponsible and perilous,” highlighting that Nigeria’s debt soared to ₦144.7 trillion by the end of 2024, a staggering 65.6% increase since Tinubu took office in 2023. What Atiku delicately calls a “loan dependent economy” is, in reality, a criminal Ponzi scheme: borrow, embezzle, recycle, and lie. The projected debt of ₦182 trillion by 2026 spells doom, not just fiscal, but existential for future generations.
This is not governance. It is fiscal terrorism.
Expert Voices Silenced by a Government Addicted to Debt
Professor Simeon Nnah, of Houdegbe North American University, warns that debt servicing already eclipses funding for education and healthcare, the two pillars of any real development strategy. His concerns are chilling: “There is little assurance the funds will be used productively.” In plain language, he is saying what Nigerians already know these loans will be looted.
Ikemesit Effiong of SBM Intelligence adds another layer of urgency: the multi-currency borrowing strategy leaves Nigeria vulnerable to exchange rate volatility, particularly with the naira in free fall. He warns that even “favorable” terms from the World Bank will not cushion the cost of poor decisions. The government is gambling with Nigeria’s sovereignty.
Seun Onigbinde: Where Are the Priorities?
Seun Onigbinde of BudgIT delivers a scathing reality check: “Why borrow $24 billion when our external debt is already $45.8 billion?” He exposes the hypocrisy of a government that claims to be broke but inflates budgets for luxury SUVs, estacodes, and foreign junkets, while children learn under trees and hospitals lack gloves.
The government’s answer to poverty is more debt; its answer to joblessness is more lies. Onigbinde’s call for loans tied to foreign exchange–generating projects is both commonsensical and damning: there is no plan, no transparency, and no measurable outcomes.
Civil Society Screams into the Void
Groups like CISLAC warn that borrowing without clear repayment plans will cannibalize future budgets. This is not a theory it is a historical certainty. Nigeria is littered with hundreds of incomplete or abandoned projects, each one a silent monument to theft. The consequences? Youth unemployment above 40%, maternal mortality among the world’s worst, and nearly 100 million Nigerians living in extreme poverty.
A Presidency of Fraudulent Promises and Fatal Consequences
Since Tinubu assumed office, the naira has crashed, fuel prices have tripled, inflation is above 30%, and the minimum wage remains criminally stagnant. Yet, instead of belt-tightening, the regime balloons its convoy of waste and demands gratitude from starving citizens. The truth is simple and devastating: President Bola Tinubu’s administration is looting Nigeria under the guise of reform.
The repeated use of words like “reform,” “diversification,” and “fiscal discipline” by this administration is an affront to language itself. If this is reform, then what is regression?
This Is Not Incompetence, It Is Deliberate Looting
The ₦45 trillion loan is not about infrastructure or development it is about sustaining a cabal that feeds fat on debt while the nation starves. It is about creating a debt trap so deep that Nigeria may never climb out not without defaulting, surrendering its sovereignty, or sacrificing entire generations.
We are watching in real time as the Nigerian presidency converts the country into a debt colony poor, powerless, and perpetually dependent.
The Case for Resistance and Reclamation
The National Assembly must reject this criminal borrowing proposal in its entirety. Not amend it, reject it. Civil society must escalate its resistance. Nigerians must recognize that the looting of the treasury is not an abstraction, it is what keeps their children out of school, their relatives in decaying hospitals, and their hopes in permanent exile.
President Tinubu has a choice: reverse this reckless path or go down in history as the architect of Nigeria’s final collapse. But one thing is certain no amount of propaganda, economic whitewashing, or IMF jargon can mask the truth.
This is not governance. This is organized economic sabotage.
