Trading Blames, Living In Denial While Nigerians Suffer!

 By Dan Onwukwe

No matter the clouds of controversy that trailed how he won the Feb 25, 2023 presidential election, one year has passed since Bola Tinubu was sworn in as Nigeria’s President. But the manner in which he has governed the country in the last one year still generates intense public debate. The following questions remain top of public discourse: Is Nigeria better now than Tinubu met it?

*Tinubu 

 Are the lives and livelihood of the citizens better or worse  now than before Tinubu came to power? And how will history judge him and the policies he has implemented in the last one year ? Of course, opinions  differ, but the general consensus is that history will not be kind to most of the policies that he initiated unless he changes course. On that score, it’s not unkind to say that his administration still carries more baggage than an ocean liner. 

Did Buhari Really Deliver ‘Change’?

 By Dan Onwukwe

To be sure, the jury has been out since on the performance of Muhammadu Buhari as President. It  is in the natural course of things for an outgoing government to appraise its performance in office and score itself  ‘excellent’ . In this part of the world, it’s difficult, if not impossible, to see an administration close to the exit door, up against the wall, to accept, even in the face of overwhelming evidence, that it has underperformed.

*Buhari 

But truth is constant. It does not fudge facts or define truth downwards. Truth does not exaggerate or oversimplify matters. It simply hits the bull’s-eye. Truth says it as it is.  Truth holds those who play fast -and- loose with the facts in derision, in utter contempt. The problem with all the President’s men is that they view admitting the truth as a sign of weakness.  In the last one month, most of the President’s men, and even the President himself, have been strutting the stage, thumbing their chests over the his accomplishments. Nothing wrong with that. But what are the facts on ground? 

Debt Trap And Incoming Administrations

 By Jerome-Mario Chijioke Utomi

It is no longer news that some of the first-term governors-elect will face many months of unpaid workers’ salaries and mounting pension liabilities, as well as agitation for the implementation of the nationally agreed minimum wage, rising inflation, escalating prices of goods and services, and dwindling purchasing power. These incoming governors, about seventeen of them, according to reports will have a difficult time boosting the economies of their individual states because they will take over at least N2.1 trillion in domestic debt and $1.9 billion in foreign debt from their predecessors.

It is equally a common knowledge that in January 2023, Patience Oniha, Director general, Debt Management Office (DMO), while fielding questions from journalists at the public presentation and breakdown of the highlights of the 2023 appropriation act in Abuja, noted that the incoming Federal Government would inherit about N77 trillion as debt by the time President Muhammadu Buhari’s tenure ends in May.