By Kazeem Akintunde
President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, on January 1st, 2025, was named by Thisday Newspapers as its man of the year for 2024. The Board of editors at the Newspaper based their decision on what they termed his bold, resilient and courageous decisions so far taken since he assumed office on May 29, 2023. In the wisdom of the Newspaper’s editors, Tinubu is the number one Nigerian whose policies and programmes have greatly affected and impacted the lives of many Nigerians in the year 2024.
Although the twin policies – fuel subsidy removal and the floating of the Naira – that have impacted negatively on the lives of most Nigerians were thrust upon them in 2023, their impacts on Nigerians were gravely felt last year. While many Nigerians kicked against the policies, claiming that they have made life unbearable for them, the President has insisted that those reforms are needed in order to reset the nation’s ailing economy. Again, he has never hidden his belief that those policies would bring relief for Nigerians in the near future.
During his first and only presidential media interview few days ago, Tinubu told the nation that we have to swallow the bitter pills that the policies have become, and that we cannot be doing the same thing repeatedly and expecting different outcomes. With that bold statement, he served the nation notice of his resolve to stick to his reforms and see them through.
Again, in his address to the nation on January 1st, Tinubu told his compatriots that they would start to reap the fruits of his reforms this year, and that the pains and suffering that came with those reforms would start to ease. In the 2025 budget alone, Tinubu is projecting a N34.82 trillion in revenue and N47.90 trillion in expenditures, resulting in a N13.08 trillion deficit, an equivalent to 3.89 per cent of GDP. To show that things are beginning to look up, he pointed at the third quarter 2024 growth rate of 3.46 per cent, a trade surplus of N5.8 trillion, and foreign reserves standing at $42 billion.
Apart from that, he has set a very tall ambition for himself when he projected inflation to drop from 34.6 per cent to 15 per cent by the end of this year, and the naira-dollar exchange rate to improve from N1,700 to N1,500 per U.S. dollar.
One wonders where his optimism is coming from, but I will personally name Tinubu Man of the Year for 2025 if he succeeds in reducing inflation from 34.8 per cent to 15 per cent. In fact, I would celebrate him as the best thing that has ever happened to Nigeria since Independence in 1960. It would be an audacious record if he could peg inflation rate to 15 per cent within a 12-month calendar year.
One way he could achieve this is by massive investment in the Agricultural sector that would guarantee a bumper harvest to farmers. This can be achieved if insecurity is tackled frontally in the North, which would enable farmers to return to the farm without the fear of being kidnapped for ransom or have to pay protection fees to bandits or share their produce with non-state actors at gunpoint. Farmers in Nigeria between 2020 and 2024 paid over N1.19 billion as ransoms for their release from bandits after being picked up from their farms.
An analysis of the various 2024 crisis reports released by the research firm, SBM Intelligence, shows that between 2020 and 2024, farmers in Nigeria’s insecurity hotspots states, paid over N1.19 billion for their release from bandits’ dens. The SBM report noted that the FCT had the highest ransom demands, followed closely by Lagos and Kaduna States. However, when comparing the geopolitical zones, the South-East had the highest ransom paid and collection rate overall, reflecting how kidnappers have continued to demand in-kind payments from victims’ families. This has negatively impacted farming, with prices of foodstuffs hitting the roof and beyond the reach of most Nigerians. As expected, the cry of hunger reached its zenith last year, with many families thrown into the poverty quagmire.
In providing succour to fellow Nigerians, many public-spirited individuals provided foodstuff and cash gifts, but the desire to be part of the lucky recipients led to stampedes in three different parts of the country, leading to the death of more than 70 Nigerians, many of whom were children and elderly women. The Ibadan Stampedes led to the dead of 35 children, with several others injured. The organisers of the charity fun fair are still behind bars today. The same thing happened in Abuja, and death by stampede was also recorded in Orkija, Anambra State.
To tackle the scourge, Tinubu and state governors should ensure that serious attention is given to agriculture in 2025 so that there would be massive food supply, which would ultimately lead to a reduction in the prices of food items in the market. Already, he has told the nation that he does not believe in price control, and that the solution to high cost of food items is through massive supply of foodstuffs in the market.
In Nigeria, once price of goods and services increase, it hardly comes down. But under him, we are beginning to see a different Nigeria. For the first time in a very long while, there was no scarcity of petroleum products during the yuletide. This has been attributed to the deregulation of the downstream sector of the petroleum industry. Again, the price of fuel dropped marginally during the Christmas when Dangote Refinery crashed the price of fuel, selling it to marketers at N899 per litre. The marketers are now selling to Nigerians at N935 per liter. To ensure that Nigerians get to buy the product at that rate, Dangote refinery entered into a partnership agreement with three of the major petroleum product marketers – MRS, Hyden, and Ardova. The three marketers now sell the product to motorists at N935 in Lagos. In order not to lose their customers to those marketers, NNPC stations across Lagos have also slashed their price to N925, a situation welcomed by most Nigerians.
With the Warri Refinery also said to be back on stream and working at 60 per cent of installed capacity, there are assurances that the price of fuel may still drop as deregulation brings about healthy competition. With the Naira expected to gain minimal strength in the year against the Dollar, many Nigerians may not be too happy with the N1,500/$ figure that the President is projecting, as that is still considered to be on the high side. Indeed, the Nation’s currency did poorly last year, but with the foreign reserves above $40billion for the first time in a long while, Nigerians still expect the Naira to do better and an exchange rate with the Dollar in the region of N1,200/$ would have been more ideal.
Tinubu promised to also ameliorate the suffering of the masses through series of proposed reforms through a new tax regime. However, there has been growing opposition against his tax reform bills by Northern politicians and governors. Recently, the Bauchi State Governor, Senator Bala Mohammed, insisted that the bills are tilted in favour of only one section of the country. Interestingly, the governor made his position known when he received the Christian community on a courtesy visit to him in Bauchi State.
The governor, who also doubles as the Chairman of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) Governors Forum, urged President Tinubu to back-pedal on the tax bills, saying that doing otherwise could lead to anarchy.
According to him, the tax reform bills are not good policies for northern Nigeria “because we are not going to get money to pay salaries. They must listen, otherwise, they are calling for anarchy and that is not good. We voted for the president in the state and other states”. Few days later, the Kano State Governor, Abba Yusuf, also shared similar sentiment.
Contending that the tax reform bills are not the solution to the country’s economic challenges, the Governor noted that “Kano State stands firmly against any policy that negatively affects the welfare of our people,” adding that the bills were “ill-timed, lopsided, and inimical to the unity of the country.
“Nigerians in general and the North in particular, are growing under hyperinflation and unprecedented insecurity. Therefore, the presidency should pay more attention to tackling extreme poverty and hunger, especially in the northern part of the country.”
At his last media chat, Tinubu insisted that the tax reform bills have come to stay, adding that the present tax law are fit for 19th century Nigeria. Although the tax reform bills are presently before the National Assembly, Tinubu should be ready to make concessions, as the bills as now being termed as anti-Islamic in the North.
One of the major misgivings the North appears to have against the tax reform bills is the proposed increase in the Value Added Tax (VAT) and the distribution of revenue to the states. For instance, Section 146 of the Nigeria Tax Bill provides for an increase in VAT from the current 7.5 percent to 10 percent in 2025, 12. 5 percent in 2026- 2029 and 15 percent in 2030.
Additionally, the North appears to have issue with Section 77 of the Tax Administration bill, which states that revenue accruing from VAT shall be distributed to the three tiers of government as follows: Federal Government – 10 percent; State government – 55 percent, and Local government – 35 percent, “provided that 60 percent of the amount standing to the credit of states and local governments shall be distributed among them on the basis of derivation.” The North believes that this particular Section 77 of Tax Administration Bill would affect the region adversely.
The region is also frowning at Chapter 2, Part 1, Section 4, sub-section 3 of the National Tax Bill; titled “Income, profits or gains chargeable to tax”, which deals with the income of a family recognised under any law or custom in Nigeria as family income “in which several interests of individual members of the family cannot be separately determined.” This provision, according to the Northern leaders, is anti-Islamic, as it is tantamount to taxing inheritance, a thing that is forbidden in Islam.
The opposition from the North notwithstanding, Tinubu has proven to be a leader who follows his conviction and he is determined to see through whatever he believes in. However, 2025 would be a significant year for him as a litmus test to see if there would be relief for the masses from the present hardship, a positive change in the trajectory of life for the people, and a defining one that has the potential to determine if his contemplation to return to Aso Villa in the next general election would regain a sound footing. The ball is in his court.
See you next week.
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