The apex Yoruba sociocultural organisation, Afenifere has scored President Bola Tinubu low in its assessment of the President’s performance in the last 24 months.
The group said that rather addressing the country’s challenges, the President is fixated about winning second term election in 2027.
In its mid term report on the President’s performance, Afenifere insisted that every human development and sociopolitical index have regressed since president Tinubu assumed office two years ago, turning the promise of renewed hope to a nightmare of regressing hopelessness and despair.
“Basically, due to unforced errors, especially the oversight of the production element of subsidies and floating of the Naira, without any preparation to cushion the predictable impact, the Tinubu economic reforms have turned out to be Tinubu economic deform”
Afenifere blamed the president’s economic policies, including unrestrained borrowing, for what it described as a titanic crash in Nigeria’s production ability.
“Our GDP (Gross Domestic Production) crashes to $188.27 billion, according to IMF 2025 projections, from the $363.8 billion left behind by President Buhari, who brought it down from $574 billion that it was under President Jonathan, according to World Bank statistics. According to National Economic Summit Group, over 7 million businesses have closed down since 2023.
“In spite of the phenomenonal rise in public revenue from subsidy withdrawals and massive devaluation of the Naira, the Nigerian public debt has increased by over N100 trillion in just two years. Specifically, as reported by Debt Management Office, Public Debt shot up from N87.91 trillion left behind in 2023 by President Buhari administration, to N187.79 trillion projected for 2025. This is in stark contrast to the debt that was just N12 trillion before APC came to power in 2015. In dollar terms, our debt rose from $108.23 billion in 2023 to $142.47 billion in 2025, despite cutting subsidies”, it said.
The Yoruba group described as horrific, the poverty level in the country, lamenting that “according to the World Bank in May 2025, the poverty rate has increased from 38.9% in 2023 to now over 54% poverty rate, with over 75.5% of rural dwellers now living below the poverty line. Our GDP per capital also fell by 75% from $3,222.7 in 2014 to $1,637.47 under Buhari and now a mere $806 in 2025. According to the IMF, this is a stark indication of Nigeria experiencing shrinking prosperity and complicating poverty crisis”.
“In absolute figures, the people living in poverty increased from 87 million to over 130 million people, with 13 million more people falling into poverty in 2025. About 33 million face starvation to death”
Afenifere stressed that “despite the Tinubu administration’s economic policies causing huge inflation that cut real wages in over half, only 4.1% of the Nigeria population in the civil service had their wages increased by 38%. Reliance on unproven channels for the distribution of pitiable halfhearted food and other palliatives were corruptly split among those connected, while uncontested mega projects were brazenly given to those with well known connections to the President. It is obvious that the Tinubu administration has no intention of delivering the greatest good to the greatest number of people.
“Two years into its tenure, and contrary to its well advertised electoral promise, the Tinubu administration is yet to implement Oronsaye Report to cut cost of governance, instead the costs have ballooned with new cost centers for cronies to milk. The tone of government at all levels is one of profligate lifestyle, while the masses are being berated about Nigeria’s wasteful past and the imperative of sacrifice to restore fiscal integrity. The government’s first supplementary budget and subsequent budgets were spent on not only preserving but increasing the luxurious lifestyle of those in government – new Presidential jet, Cadillac limousines, N160 million cars for each federal legislator and scandalous increase in unaccounted constituency projects worth billions to each legislator”.
On security, the group accused the administration of toying with the lives of Nigerians.”In the quest for absolute power, the Tinubu administration is trading off lives of Nigerians by refusing to devolve power for state police. Across Nigeria, there is a resurgence in the activities of bandits, kidnappers and insurgents.
“According to Amnesty International, in two years of Tinubu over 10,000 people have been killed and nearly a 1000 villages destroyed, while two new terrorist groups have evolved. The failure to treat this as an emergency to devolve power to enable states create state police places responsibility, if not culpability, for all lives lost since 2023 at the feet of the President. In addition to personal physical insecurity, there is food insecurity as rural dwellers run for dear life from foreign herders and now itinerant ”hunters.
“Rather than focusing on service delivery, the Tinubu administration is focusing on winning the 2027 election regardless of the voters. No amount of propaganda will erase hunger and poverty in the land. Only selfless and empathetic leadership can serve the people, not Prebendalist and hedonistic lifestyle,” Afenifere added.
