No Nation Operates With Nigeria-Type Fiscal Recklessness & Succeeds – Peter Obi

FISCAL RECKLESSNESS

With the announcement that the Nigerian Senate is likely to approve the 2026 National Budget on March 17, every Nigerian is asking an important question: which budget will Nigeria use this year? Will it be the budgets for 2023, 2024, 2025, or 2026, or some combination of all these years? It is worth noting that as of last year, in our government, implementation of budget items from the 2023, 2024, and 2025 budgets was in a unique approach to budgeting, which continues to perpetuate a trend of fiscal recklessness.

President Tinubu inherited a legally signed N21.83 trillion budget for 2023. A few months after taking office, he presented a N2.17 trillion supplementary budget that faced widespread criticism for prioritising benefits for public office holders at a time when Nigerians were enduring painful economic reforms without a credible social protection framework. Instead of restoring fiscal discipline, the President repeatedly expanded the 2023 budget without a clearly defined end date.

The pattern persisted with the passage of a N35.06 trillion budget for 2024 and a N54.99 trillion budget for 2025. In less than three years, President Tinubu has exercised appropriation powers over more than N114 trillion in public spending. Yet, the government has failed to achieve even fifty per cent budget implementation, exposing a profound crisis of budget credibility. Alarmingly, until mid-2025, Nigeria was effectively operating with about three overlapping budgets, without clear legal or fiscal guidance on when each one expired or began. No serious country manages its budgets or fiscal operations in such a manner.

Even more troubling is the government’s opaque decision to repeal the 2024 and 2025 budgets and re-enact them with extended implementation timelines. Nigerians have not seen these re-enacted budgets, and there is no public information regarding the specific capital projects included or their associated costs. This is not reform; it represents fiscal obscurity elevated to the level of state policy.

The proposed 2026 budget, despite still lacking critical details, indicates that the administration has no intention of addressing the structural weaknesses at the core of Nigeria’s public finance system.

This lack of transparency is not accidental; it reflects a deliberate pattern of undermining public scrutiny and debate. The Federal Government has stopped publishing treasury reports on the OpenTreasury.gov.ng portal, dismantling a vital transparency framework inherited from the previous administration. In 2025, no budget implementation report was released, regardless of how poor the performance was!

No nation can operate with such recklessness and succeed.

Every effort must be made to quickly return Nigeria to the January-December budget cycle that was inherited and mismanaged by the current government. This change would enhance effective planning and tracking, promote transparency and accountability, and foster sustainable growth and development.

A new Nigeria is POssible! -PO