Ahmed Bola Tinubu, former Lagos state governor, a frontline politician and one of the founding members of the All Progressives Congress (APC) will today, 29th May, take the reign of power in Nigeria as the 16th president, achieving one of his lifetime’s aims.
Tinubu who told Nigerians that he had long prepared for today, got to the Number One position in the country by winning the February 25th presidential election which the opposition is still contesting in court. Maneuvering through challenges from party members and opposition, he will take over the mantle from President Muhammadu Buhari who exits today, after an eight-year tenure that is widely described, as agonising and worst in terms of performance and with the highest human casualties in the history of the country.
Tinubu is back to familiar terrain, though in a higher capacity, having served at the center as a senator in the truncated third republic. In 1992, he was elected to the Senate, representing the Lagos West constituency in the short-lived Nigerian Third Republic.
His ability to manage Lagos state between 1999 and 2007, during which he laid the foundation for several developmental projects that are now reference points, despite a lack of federal allocation, propelled him over his rivals and helped to sway victory in his favour.
Still trying to break the shackles of mountains of petitions at the electoral tribunal, and several corruption allegations and alleged drug scandals, Tinubu is coming into power at a time the economy is in ruins and the morale of the citizens at the ebb never known in the nation’s history. These are in addition to several booby traps to floor his administration like the last-minute needless appointments by Buhari, the last Saturday’s un-procedural amendment to the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) act, and the passage of the supplementary 2022 budget by the outgoing Ninth National Assembly that was a rubber stamp for outrageous bills and motions.
Tinubu is faced with a country with low morale and one whose huge workforce and economy are now rickety.
Ex-president Buhari left Nigeria in a sorry state having led the country without any economic direction, and an administration during which the citizens were troubled by insurgencies, kidnapping, and other crises that left several thousand dead, millions in IDP camps, and several thousands of Nigerians that have turned to refugees in neighbouring countries. Buhari rode to power on the promises to change the country but the indices as of today, are failures that have left many impoverished.
Interestingly, Tinubu, who aided Buhari to power in 2015, is the one inheriting the failures and the huge debt left behind.
DMO, in its Fourth Quarter report of 2022, said Nigeria’s total debt hovers around N46.25 trillion of which the domestic debt stock was N27.55 trillion, and external debt stock was N18.70 trillion (USD 41.69 billion). The recent borrowing spree by the federal government and the National Assembly’s approval of the Central Bank of Nigeria’s Ways and Means advance to the federal government could have pushed the Nation’s debt overhang higher.
These are exclusives of several other debts like the over N4 trillion in the books of the Asset Management Company of Nigeria (AMCON) that will fall due by December 2023.
Tinubu is also inheriting a bloated civil service populated by corrupt and unfit personnel who have unremorsefully held the nation by its throat.
The ninth National Assembly worsened the situation, approving bills for new agencies at a time the nation faces a revenue drought that has made it unable to service those that are genuinely required.
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Every sector of the economy is in crisis which has led to several job losses and the impoverishment of the citizens.
The manufacturing sector is crippled and its export arm is dead. The banking industry churns out huge records of deposits when the citizens can no longer save, thereby calling to question, the figures from the operators year-on-year.
The nation is in a coma, and all eyes, are now on, how Tinubu will salvage it.
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