Economy: Tinubu Has Done More Than Other Previous Administrations, IMPI Claims
By Sunday Etuka
A think tank, the Independent Media and Policy Initiative (IMPI), has argued that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has done more to strengthen the economy and draw in foreign capital than earlier administrations that enjoyed multiple oil windfalls.
In a policy statement signed by its Chairman, Dr Omoniyi Akinsiju, IMPI said successive governments between 1999 and 2015 failed to turn the windfalls into lasting industrial assets or diversified non-oil growth.
It said surplus funds went into short-term consumption, the clearing of $12 billion owed to Paris Club creditors under former President Olusegun Obasanjo, and the funding of an Excess Crude Account (ECA) that had no constitutional backing.
According to the group, state governors routinely forced distributions from the ECA, cutting it from $22 billion in 2008 to under $3 billion by 2014, with the money mostly spent on recurrent public sector costs rather than capital infrastructure.
It added that the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) used foreign exchange earnings to artificially hold up the naira, subsidising cheap consumer imports and sending billions of dollars towards imported petrol while domestic refineries stayed in disrepair.
IMPI said that when global oil prices crashed in late 2014, Nigeria had no structural buffers. The country slid into a currency crisis and its first major recession in decades by 2016, with poverty rates rising to between 45 and 53 per cent.
The vulnerabilities, it said, led to consecutive current account deficits, which bottomed at $17 billion in 2019 and $15.8 billion in 2020.
The group said price controls and defensive interventions could no longer sustain the economy, which led to bold market corrections in 2023 centred on foreign exchange unification and the removal of the petrol subsidy.
These steps first pushed up inflation and weakened the currency, it said, but eventually reshaped the country’s external balance sheet. Nigeria has since moved from volatile deficits to a multi-year run of current account and merchandise trade surpluses, with gross foreign reserves rising from $45 billion to $55 billion by the third quarter of 2026, enough to cover over 14 months of imports.
IMPI said the current administration chose the harder but necessary path of dismantling unsustainable subsidies and market distortions to build an economy driven by real productivity and strong external buffers.
Among the factors it credited for the revival, the group pointed to domestic refining, which it said has turned Nigeria from a net fuel importer into a regional exporter of refined products across West Africa.
It also noted a significant surge in non-oil exports, especially agricultural produce, solid minerals and industrial chemicals.
IMPI added that credit rating agencies Moody’s, Standard & Poor’s and Fitch have upgraded Nigeria’s sovereign ratings and outlooks, lowering international borrowing costs and driving strong gains on the Nigerian Exchange (NGX).
