Bola Tinubu And His Game

 By Ikechukwu Amaechi

Today, May 29, 2025, is exactly two years since Bola Tinubu took the oath of office as President and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, Federal Republic of Nigeria. And it is more than enough time to assess his stewardship.

*Tinubu

Even those who said, as Professor Wole Soyinka did in 2023, that the traditional 100 days was too short a time to make such an assessment will hardly have any excuse now. For those who may have forgotten, on December 24, 2023, Soyinka paid a visit to Tinubu in his Lagos home. Asked to assess Tinubu’s performance, the Nobel Laureate claimed that three months was too short a time to assess any government.

Most presidents “don’t start from ground zero. They often start lower than ground zero and they need time to make up,” he said. Ironically, while Soyinka was waiting for the one year anniversary to make his assessment, Tinubu and his ministers were already doing so and high-fiving themselves on their “achievements.”

It is instructive that the Nobel Laureate, who is not known for suffering fools gladly, is still tongue-tied. Speaking on Channels Television on Monday, March 24, Soyinka now says he will only speak on Tinubu’s government when he has something to say. “People should stop trying to work on my timetable for me, I had not swallowed an alarm clock. I don’t see why I should put my alarm on and say one year has passed, now, I must make an assessment.”

Maybe, Soyinka is right. In espousing his political philosophy – Emilokanism – President Tinubu can be brutally frank. He is one politician who understands the psyche of the average Nigerian. Most Nigerians have scant disregards for decent people in politics who play by the rules. They would rather exalt strong men. And Tinubu is a strong man.

So, when he, as the presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress, APC, told some of his political associates in London in December 2022 how he hoped to win the 2023 presidential election, he didn’t mince words. “Political power is not going to be served in a restaurant. They don’t serve it a la carte. At all cost, fight for it, grab it and run with it,” he admonished top party operatives after his outing at the Royal Institute of International Affairs – Chatham House – a British think tank.

And that was exactly what he did. He fought for power with all the arsenal at his disposal, grabbed and ran away with it while asking his flustered opponents to “go to court.” They did and the rest is history. Now going into the 2027 battle as a president seeking re-election, he is doing an encore, but this time using the power that he already has in such a Machiavellian way to render the opposition impotent. That, he calls “the game.” And just as he did in December 2022, he is letting Nigerians take a peep beforehand at his plan.

Speaking at the APC National Summit at the Banquet Hall of the State House, Abuja on May 23, Tinubu said of the defections to the APC: “You don’t blame a people bailing out of a sinking ship. I am glad about what we have and I am expecting more to come. That is the game… Sweep them clean.”

That game is definitely at the expense of Nigeria’s democracy. Contrary to Tinubu’s claim that the defections demonstrate the democratic preferences of the defectors, they are emblematic of the carefully calibrated. Moreover, the fact that team Tinubu’s bloom has fallen off the rose in the last two years cannot be understated just as the Jagaban luster has faded. So, on what basis will any altruistic politician defect to APC or join hands with a government as Tinubu’s whose promise of leading the country to the promise land can only be believed by those living in cuckoo land.

For those who are still in doubt, on August 4, 2024, Tinubu outlined the achievements of his administration with emphasis on fiscal reforms, economic resurgence, and social welfare improvements, all aimed at stimulating growth, reducing debt burdens, and improving the living standards of Nigerians. None of these has been achieved. But his lieutenants, including the presiding officers of the National Assembly, are already on overdrive, doubling down on his claim.

On Wednesday, Speaker of the House of Representatives, Tajudeen Abbas, enthused that Tinubu has demonstrated courage and good leadership by lifting the economy, fixing the foreign exchange market, generating jobs and confronting insecurity. He touted the president’s removal of petrol subsidy, describing it as “a policy that once drained over $10 billion each year,” but which saved Nigeria over N1 trillion within two months.

Tinubu’s predecessor, Muhammadu Buhari, also weighed in same day. Assessing Tinubu at midterm, Buhari urged Nigerians to be patient with him. “Our expectations from our governments should not get heavy,” he cautioned.

Really? The tragedy of the APC-led governments is the wide gulf between the claims made by government officials and the lived realities of the people. When a government prioritises propaganda and outright lies over hard work, common good suffers. It is even more so with the Tinubu government.  While it is true that the removal of petrol subsidy means more money in the coffers of government, the Naira weakening 0.6 per cent to N1,681 per dollar on Wednesday, according to the Financial Market Dealer Quotation, FMDQ, means the currency has lost 72 per cent of its value since Tinubu’s reforms ensued, making it worthless, literally.

But assuming, without conceding that the government now earns money in real terms, to what use is the money put and why the continuing insane borrowing? Is it not curious that Tinubu is requesting legislative approval for a new external borrowing plan amounting to over $21.5 billion, alongside a domestic bond issuance of N757.9 billion to settle outstanding pension liabilities in the 2025–2026 borrowing plan?

When this is approved, as, indeed, it will be approved by a rubber stamp National Assembly, it will have dire consequences on an already fragile economy because the country’s public debt will exceed N180 trillion. Meanwhile, as was aptly captured in a Vanguard newspaper report titled, “Nigeria’s debt heads for N180trn as Tinubu seeks N34trn new loans,” the Federal Government’s debt service-to-revenue ratio, a critical measure of ability to repay loans, deteriorated to 131 per cent in the first two months of 2025 from 118 per cent in the corresponding period of 2024. This impending loan can only make a bad situation worse.

The Tinubu administration has failed in delivering on the primary duty of government as enshrined in the 1999 Constitution, which is ensuring the security and welfare of the people. Last month, the International Monetary Fund, IMF, expressed concern over the high poverty rate and food insecurity in Nigeria. His economic policies have pushed many Nigerians into the poverty loop in the last two years.

Despite rebasing the Consumer Price Index, CPI, in January which on paper resulted in a sharp decrease in the headline inflation rate, the reality is different. The purchasing power of the Naira in the hands of ordinary Nigerian has been grievously eroded. The idea of the middle class has become a misnomer. Insecurity has not been tamed and Nigerians are being slaughtered everyday like sacrificial lambs. Unemployment is worse today than it was two years ago, just as foreign direct investments, FDIs, have dried up, all pretensions to the contrary notwithstanding. Corruption has not abated in the last two years and despite the huge revenues pouring into government coffers, the embarrassing infrastructure deficit remains dire.

Hardly can any Nigerian, except those who are lining their pockets in the corridors and back alleys of power, say that he is better off today socio-economically than he was two years ago. These two years have been hell on earth, literally, for most Nigerians. That is Tinubu’s mid-term scorecard devoid of any sycophantic embellishments.

And the reason for the poor outing is simple. Tinubu has used the first half of his four-year tenure to play politics rather than govern. In any democracy where votes count, the reverse is the case. Leaders use the first half or more of their tenure to work for the people, not impoverish them, while they and their cronies are luxuriating in stupendous wealth. He decided to travel that route having convinced himself that the people will not have a say in how 2027 pans out. That, in a nutshell, is the real meaning of “the game.” But that should be a challenge to Nigerians!

*Amaechi is the publisher of TheNiche (ikechukwuamaechi@yahoo.com)