I have never pretended to be an economist, let alone an expert, because I’m not one. One thing I’m very sure of is that I’m not just financially literate but educated enough to understand basic economic workings and what commands wealth and the kinsmen that attract poverty, especially on a national scale. Hold on! Don’t think today’s piece is about some boring theories, the utilisation of which has incapacitated Nigeria’s economic journey till date.
I’m sure you still remember the absence of any economic sense behind the Udoji Awards of 1973 when Nigeria, instead of taking advantage of its massive oil wealth to kick-start its industrialisation journey, chose to drown workers in overflowing cash and almost facilitated the importation of the moon in bodily form to the country.
You couldn’t have forgotten so quickly how some voodoo Harvard-trained experts conned a gullible military President, Ibrahim Babangida, to criminally devalue Nigeria’s currency through some dubious high-sounding IMF-backed economic programmes like the Structural Adjustment Programme and its twin sister, the Second-Tier Foreign Exchange Market in 1986, the two-pronged biggest weapon fashioned against Nigeria’s economic survival. Unfortunately, the serial devaluation of the then strong Naira, which began under the gap-toothed Minna dictator, hasn’t abated until now.
Have I told you about the fraudulent crude swap programme our dear Goodluck Jonathan started in 2010, which remained a pure, complicated fleece as long as it lasted? Nigerians knew that 450,000 barrels per day were ferreted out of Nigeria. What came back as refined petroleum products and the expected by-products remained a mystery up until a few minutes ago.
So, we won’t go that way today. There is a serious matter of state on the table for thorough dissection revolving around President Bola Tinubu’s unmatched romance with foreign loans amidst the poor performance of many state governments despite a massive increase in their federal allocations under this federal administration.
Last week, Tinubu approached the Senate again, requesting the legislators’ approval of the 2026–2027 Supplementary External Borrowing Plan of $20.5 billion and €1.045 billion in external loans.
Regardless of the known fact that our data hardly follow logical rules in this country, you need to remember that Nigeria currently has a total external and domestic debt profile of $120 billion (DMO figure as of June 30, 2026), with an external debt figure of about $54.52 billion and $66.41billion in domestic debt (converted to dollars). This debt profile includes the portfolios of the federal and state governments and the Federal Capital Territory.
Tinubu said the latest projected loans would address Nigeria’s infrastructure deficit and finance gaps across priority sectors, with power, transportation, and healthcare listed as key areas. The sectors indicated by the President agreeably deserve thorough overhaul if our determination of a $1trillion economy is to be a reality by 2030.
The President, who has maintained that borrowing is not “leprosy” (whatever that means), has never hidden his penchant for borrowing, especially externally, to bridge the gap between budgeted amount and the nation’s weak revenue base. Aside from the routine criticism of the opposition, former President Olusegun Obasanjo called Tinubu’s justification of serial borrowings as “absolute nonsense”.
Don’t forget that Obasanjo, more or less a principality, is also an opposition figure of sorts depending on whose side he chooses to pitch his tent at any time. Are you still wondering why ‘aggrieved politicians’ across different parties are never in short supply at the Hilltop Mansion of the ex-President in Abeokuta? Some see Baba as the voice of the voiceless. Not a few also consider the former President an active player in Nigeria’s intractable problems.
My own position? Well, as one brought up in a very conservative environment, I was taught early in life not to talk too much under any condition. A certain Mr Kiss and Tell is currently cooling his nimble feet behind bars because he drove his tongue recklessly by admitting to facilitating the hacking of the telephone of the National Security Adviser of the nation, of all personalities o! How audacious?
Without mincing words, I must admit that Obasanjo and the opposition voices attacking the Federal Government’s latest loan request have valid grounds to carpet-bomb Tinubu for planning to take more loans between 2026 and 2027. Mind you, the loans are not meant for 2026 alone. The fears in many quarters are based on the theory that the country may drown in the ocean of debt very soon, with more loans. Valid argument!
As has been stated by Long Range in earlier editions, the United States of America tops the list of the world’s leading debtor nations, with the United Kingdom trailing in distant second place. France, Germany and the Netherlands round off the top five nations with the biggest external debt portfolios, with the least being $5.2trillion. Talking about these countries is not to compare Nigeria’s debt burden with these advanced nations.
It might be interesting to check how developing countries in the BRICS economic bloc (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) are indebted before we move ahead. Brazil, another big oil-producing South American nation, has an external debt burden of $898 billion; India with $778 billion and South Africa, $206.6billion. Russia and China aren’t developing countries; they are not in our league, though they are BRICS members.
Morocco and Egypt are continental economic powerhouses in Africa. Morocco carries an external debt profile of $88billion while Egypt’s external debt portfolio stands at $166billion. Nigeria’s external debt portfolio of $54.52billion, therefore, appears to be child’s play in comparison to its counterparts in Brazil, India and South Africa, as well as aspiring BRICS member Egypt.
It is evident that every serious-minded nation (hope Nigeria is one) may not be self-sufficient to fund its mega or legacy projects without accessing external and internal loans. This may be the thinking of the current Tinubu administration in theory. Who does not know that it is very easy to theorise? Nigeria’s problems often arise in the gap between policy formulation and implementation — between what is intended in theory and what is actually achieved in practice.
So, what is the fear this term? It may be centred on the possibility that despite listing the infrastructural areas to be addressed by Elder Tinubu, the loans may end up in private pockets, as has unfortunately repeatedly happened in the past, while the nation will be left to bear the burden of the loans looted by officials who are then rewarded with juicy offices and traditional titles for their thieving achievements. You may ask how this works in Katsina State especially.
Alhaji Faruk Umar Faruk, the Emir of Daura in Katsina State, conferred the traditional title of Ajiyan Hausa on the former Accountant-General of the Federation, Ahmed Idris, in 2023 after Idris was arrested and arraigned in 2022 for N109 billion fraud. The immediate past Minister of Aviation, Hadi Sirika, standing trial for N2.8bn contract fraud (among several fraud allegations), was appointed the Pro-Chancellor and Chairman of the Governing Council of Umaru Musa Yar’Adua University, Katsina State, by Governor Dikko Radda in October 2025, also arraigned.
In August of the same year, the Katsina Emirate Council rewarded Sirika with Marusan Katsina and District Head of Shargalle in the Dutsi Local Government Area for his ‘sterling achievements’. The former state governor, Ibrahim Shema (2007 – 2015), who is still on trial for N11 billion ecological fund fraud, is excitedly parading the state as a kingmaker. The state has equally withdrawn the N5bn SURE-P fund fraud case against Shema for no justifiable reason. Is this state not unique?
Do we have to revisit the $3.3bn crude-for-loan arrangement unilaterally negotiated and obtained by the immediate past Group Managing Director of the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation Limited, Mele Kyari, in August 2023, from AFREXIM Bank? The loan was deceptively labelled as funds to rehabilitate the Port Harcourt refineries and boost crude exploration by the then Nigeria Petroleum Development Corporation.
As of today, the $3.3bn has disappeared into thin air while the refineries in Port Harcourt are still as dead as death itself. So, where is the $3.3bn crude-for-loan Kyari took from AFREXIM Bank under Tinubu’s nose in 2023?
Can we ask ourselves if loans are useful or necessary? The Lekki port did not suffer undue delay because it was built with a Chinese loan. The ongoing Badagry—Sokoto highway of over 1,000 kilometres; the over 700-km Lagos—Calabar Coastal Highway, and the Kano—Maradi (Niger Republic) rail line will most likely be completed on schedule because the government took loans to finance them.
You may equally wish to know that Chinese loans helped the Federal Government to successfully complete the Lagos-Ibadan and the Abuja-Kaduna rail line projects, while the port modernisation project is to be executed with a dubious UK facility which Tinubu should have rejected, by the way.
It is clear that obtaining loans is not the issue in contention; it is what the loans are meant to accomplish on the ground, not on paper, and the more important but suspicious critical connection between the loan request and the 2027 elections. If the President hasn’t been able to clear the air on the Kyari’s crude-for-loan deal, I’m afraid I may not be able to trust the government to faithfully execute the projects as listed with its serial loans.
Has it ever occurred to you that almost all the Turn-Around Maintenance projects of the refineries in Nigeria, when they were said to be functional were usually done in the year preceding a general election? As they were deliberately designed, all the ATMs usually ended the way the previous ones did – in failure. A few of the refineries strangely went up in flames a week after completion.
Politics aside, I do not see the need for any economic alarm to be raised concerning Nigeria’s external debt profile. The figures, in relation to our revenue profile, do not give any cause for panic, especially with the nation’s improved revenue performance. Meanwhile, the government must intentionally diversify Nigeria’s mono-focused economy while facilitating and pursuing the nation’s industrialisation aggressively, not in conference papers.
It is, however, expedient that the Tinubu government ensure that the loan requests coinciding with the fast-approaching election ecosystem are utilised to bridge the nation’s infrastructural gap, as stated, not to settle the boys and pot-bellied officials.