By S. A. Ndanusa, PhD, OON
Three years may be long enough to alter the direction of a country, but it is rarely long enough to know where that direction will finally lead.
This is the difficulty in assessing President Bola Ahmed Tinubu. Since assuming office on 29 May 2023, he has taken decisions of unusual breadth, speed and consequence. Some have corrected distortions that Nigeria had tolerated for decades. Others have imposed costs that millions of Nigerians are still struggling to absorb. A few may eventually prove historic. Some may yet become warnings about the difference between political courage and policy craftsmanship.
The sensible question, therefore, is neither whether Tinubu is a hero nor whether he is a villain. Nigeria already has enough people employed in both departments.
The more useful question is this: what has genuinely changed under Tinubu, how does it compare with the record of previous administrations, what has the change cost, and is it beginning to improve the lives of Nigerians?
Every administration since 1999 has left something behind.
President Olusegun Obasanjo inherited a country emerging from military rule, burdened by external debt and weakened institutions. His administration liberalised telecommunications, consolidated the banking industry, introduced pension reform, created important anti-corruption institutions and secured historic debt relief. Not everything worked, and not every institution fulfilled its promise, but the economic and institutional architecture of Nigeria changed substantially.
President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua brought a quieter style, greater respect for due process and the Niger Delta amnesty, which helped restore oil production and reduce militancy. Illness denied him the time necessary to define a larger economic legacy.
President Goodluck Jonathan advanced agricultural reform, completed the privatisation of electricity generation and distribution, rebased the economy and supported significant infrastructure and financial sector initiatives. He also attempted partial subsidy reform in 2012. The attempt met fierce resistance, partly because Nigerians did not trust that the promised savings would be used well. As is often the case in Nigeria, a technically defensible policy arrived at the public square without sufficient political preparation and was promptly chased home.
President Muhammadu Buhari invested heavily in roads, railways, bridges and social intervention programmes. His administration completed the Second Niger Bridge and enacted the Petroleum Industry Act after decades of delay. But it also left behind an increasingly difficult macroeconomic inheritance: petrol subsidies had become enormously expensive, public debt had risen, Ways and Means financing had expanded, inflation was accelerating, and the foreign exchange market had become fragmented by multiple windows and administrative allocation.
Tinubu therefore did not inherit a tidy house. But inheritance, however uncomfortable, cannot become a permanent exemption from accountability. Every Nigerian President inherits unfinished business. The office does not come with the option of governing only when conditions are convenient.
Tinubu’s distinction lies first in his willingness to disturb several long standing arrangements almost simultaneously.
The petrol subsidy was pronounced dead in his inaugural address. The foreign exchange system was liberalised shortly afterwards. The Central Bank began retreating from expansive development financing and returning towards monetary and financial stability. A major banking recapitalisation programme followed. Tax reform moved from committee work into legislation. Student financing acquired an institutional vehicle through NELFUND. Regional development commissions multiplied. Large infrastructure projects were launched or accelerated.
Previous governments often approached reform like cautious swimmers: one foot in the water, the other safely on dry land. Tinubu jumped into the pool wearing his agbada.
That decisiveness matters. For years, Nigeria knew that the petrol subsidy was fiscally unsustainable and vulnerable to fraud. We knew that multiple exchange rates encouraged arbitrage and rewarded privileged access rather than productive enterprise. We knew that the Federal Government’s revenue was inadequate, the tax system fragmented and the CBN dangerously overextended. Many governments diagnosed these conditions accurately. The missing ingredient was frequently the willingness to pay the political price of treatment.
Tinubu supplied that willingness.
But willingness is only the beginning. A surgeon should be credited for accepting a difficult operation; he must still be judged by whether the patient survives, recovers and leaves the hospital in better health.
Subsidy removal released government from an increasingly dangerous fiscal obligation. It also contributed to a sharp rise in transportation, production and household costs. Foreign exchange liberalisation reduced the opportunities created by multiple official windows and moved the market towards greater transparency. It also produced a severe depreciation of the naira, increased the domestic cost of imports and aggravated inflation.
Some of these consequences were inevitable. Others were intensified by sequencing, weak coordination and inadequate preparation.
Removing the subsidy and liberalising foreign exchange within a short period may have been economically coherent, but together they delivered a powerful shock to an economy heavily dependent on imported fuel, machinery, medicine, food inputs and raw materials. Social protection was not sufficiently established before the shock arrived. Public transportation alternatives were limited. The wage response came slowly. Cash transfer systems encountered familiar problems of data, coverage and trust.
The reforms may have been necessary, but necessity does not automatically establish that their design and implementation were optimal. A medicine can be necessary and still be administered too abruptly or without enough attention to the condition of the patient.
The macroeconomic picture has since shown signs of repair. The CBN reports that it cleared the verified foreign exchange backlog, unified the official market and began rebuilding reserves. Banking recapitalisation seeks to produce institutions capable of absorbing shocks and financing larger investments, although larger bank balance sheets will mean little if credit remains too expensive for productive businesses.
The more disciplined relationship between the fiscal authorities and the CBN is equally important. Nigeria could not indefinitely finance government deficits through monetary expansion and then appear surprised when inflation arrived at the family dining table without an invitation.
The tax reforms may prove among the administration’s most durable achievements. Nigeria requires a simpler, fairer and more coherent revenue system. It cannot finance modern infrastructure, education, healthcare, security and social protection through borrowing and the hopeful observation of oil prices. The important test, however, is whether reform broadens the tax base and improves compliance without turning compliant businesses into the permanent family breadwinner of government.
The new tax framework should reduce duplication, protect small businesses, clarify obligations and improve administration. But Nigerians will reasonably ask a second question: what is government doing with the additional revenue?
That question cannot be answered merely by announcing that revenue has increased. Revenue is an input, not a national achievement. The ultimate measure is whether it produces better roads, reliable electricity, safer communities, functioning hospitals, effective schools and a more productive economy.
The same principle applies to the increased allocations received by states and local governments following subsidy removal and exchange rate changes. More money has entered the federation account, but the visibility of that money in many communities remains uncertain. Federal reform cannot succeed if increased transfers disappear into thirty six state capitals and 774 local government headquarters like respectable visitors who arrived but left no forwarding address.
NELFUND represents a genuinely important shift. For the first time on this scale, access to higher education is being supported through an institutional loan mechanism rather than left almost entirely to family income and occasional scholarships. Its interest free structure and income related repayment concept recognise that education is both a private opportunity and a public investment.
Yet NELFUND’s long term success will depend on accurate records, equitable access, graduate employment and effective loan recovery. A student loan system operating in an economy that does not create sufficient jobs can gradually become a graduate frustration fund. The programme must therefore be connected to university quality, skills development, labour market information and employment creation.
The renewed emphasis on technical and vocational education is also welcome. Nigeria cannot industrialise while treating technical education as the waiting room for students considered insufficiently academic. Germany, China and other productive economies did not build manufacturing strength by producing only managers, consultants and motivational speakers. Someone must design, operate, repair and improve the machines.
Infrastructure is another conspicuous feature of the administration. The Lagos Calabar Coastal Highway, Sokoto Badagry Superhighway, Abuja Kaduna Kano Road and other transport projects reflect an ambition to connect markets and reduce logistics costs. Infrastructure is not merely concrete and ribbon cutting. A well chosen road changes the economic geography of the communities around it.
But ambition must be accompanied by transparent procurement, credible financing and rigorous project selection. A project does not become economically sound simply because it is very long, very expensive and visible from the air. Nigeria must know what each major project will cost, how it will be financed, what traffic and commerce it will support, and what other investments have been postponed to accommodate it.
The regional development commissions similarly acknowledge that Nigeria’s challenges vary across its geopolitical zones. The North-East faces reconstruction after insurgency. The North-West confronts banditry, poverty and weak human-development indicators. The Niger Delta has environmental and infrastructure burdens despite its resource contribution. Other zones possess their own structural needs.
But commissions are easier to establish than development. Nigeria has a remarkable talent for responding to institutional weakness by creating another institution. Unless the commissions have clear mandates, professional governance, measurable outcomes and protection from political patronage, the country may merely decentralise bureaucracy without decentralising prosperity.
Oil and gas reform offers another mixed picture. The administration has worked to improve investment incentives, regulatory clarity and production. Domestic refining has altered the petroleum landscape, although much of that capacity comes from private investment rather than direct government construction. The failure of the public refineries, despite repeated expenditure, remains a monument to the cost of refusing to confront institutional failure early.
The government deserves credit where regulatory changes encourage production and investment. But the sector still requires transparent measurement of output, remittances and costs. Nigeria should no longer conduct the business that finances much of the federation with accounting arrangements that would worry the treasurer of a small cooperative society.
Security remains the most sobering test. Defence expenditure and the welfare of security personnel have received greater attention, and the discussion about state police has advanced. Nigeria’s size and diversity make the present policing structure increasingly difficult to defend. But state police must not become private enforcement agencies for governors. Recruitment, funding, command, accountability and protection against political abuse must be resolved before constitutional enthusiasm becomes operational regret.
More fundamentally, Nigerians judge security reform not by appropriations or official statements but by whether they can travel, farm, worship, trade and sleep without fear. On that measure, progress remains uneven. The state has not yet established an unquestioned superiority over terrorists, bandits, kidnappers and other criminal networks.
This brings us to the central tension in Tinubu’s record.
His government has made significant progress in correcting prices and improving macroeconomic incentives. It has been less successful, so far, in protecting citizens from the transitional consequences and translating reform into broad improvements in welfare.
The IMF’s 2026 assessment acknowledges that the reforms have strengthened resilience and improved macroeconomic outcomes. It also estimates that poverty reached 63 per cent and that about 27 million Nigerians faced food insecurity in late 2025. The World Bank similarly observes that poverty remains widespread and that food costs continue to bear most heavily on poorer households.
These are not minor footnotes to an otherwise successful reform story. They are at the centre of it.
A government cannot permanently ask citizens to admire improvements in macroeconomic indicators while their own household accounts remain in intensive care. Stability is indispensable, but it is not the destination. Its purpose is to create the conditions for investment, production, employment and improved living standards.
The administration must therefore move decisively from correction to construction.
Having removed or reduced subsidies, it must show what the fiscal space has built. Having liberalised foreign exchange, it must support the productive capacity that earns foreign exchange. Having increased public revenue, it must demonstrate higher expenditure quality. Having strengthened banks, it must ensure that finance reaches businesses rather than circulating mainly among government securities, foreign exchange transactions and large corporations. Having expanded infrastructure, it must prove value for money. Having created development commissions, it must produce development.
Tinubu may already qualify as one of the most consequential Presidents of the Fourth Republic. But “consequential” is not necessarily a compliment. A consequential leader changes the trajectory of events; history determines whether the eventual destination justified the disruption.
His boldness compares favourably with many predecessors. His willingness to confront politically protected distortions is difficult to deny. His administration has also shown a capacity to pursue multiple reforms at once. But the same speed that demonstrates courage can create coordination failures. The same political strength that enables difficult decisions can weaken consultation. And the same confidence that drives reform can become dangerous if it stops listening to the people carrying its burden.
The fairest provisional judgement is therefore this: Tinubu has probably changed more economic rules, more quickly, than any Nigerian President since Obasanjo. He inherited an unsustainable system and confronted several of its contradictions rather than continuing to finance them through postponement. That is significant.
But he has not yet completed the more difficult task of converting macroeconomic correction into inclusive economic renewal.
The first phase of his presidency was about removing distortions. The second must be about building productive capacity, creating jobs, restoring purchasing power, improving security and making government revenue visible in public services. Nigerians have paid heavily for the reforms. The government now owes them the returns.
The engine may finally be receiving serious attention. But Nigerians do not live inside the engine. They are the passengers. History will judge Tinubu not only by the courage with which he opened the bonnet, but by whether the vehicle eventually moved and how many Nigerians were still able to afford the journey.
Suleyman A. Ndanusa, PhD, OON, is an economist, lawyer, strategic studies scholar, and public policy thinker and practitioner with extensive experience in financial markets, regulation, governance, national Security and development.
