The Presidency has maintained silence in response to criticisms of President Bola Tinubu’s reforms by former President Olusegun Obasanjo and the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

Obasanjo, speaking at the Chinua Achebe Leadership Forum at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut, United States, described Nigeria as being under “state capture” and in a dire situation.

The remarks were relayed in a statement by his media aide, Kehinde Akinyemi.

“The country’s situation is bad,” Obasanjo reportedly said, adding that reforms have failed to deliver meaningful relief to Nigerians.

Similarly, the IMF, in its latest economic outlook report for sub-Saharan Africa, highlighted Nigeria as one of the Resource-Intensive Countries (RICs) struggling to realize the benefits of its reforms.

“While some countries in the region are experiencing positive outcomes, it is not looking good yet in Nigeria,” the IMF noted, raising concerns about the pace and impact of Tinubu’s economic adjustments.

The presidency has yet to issue a formal statement addressing these criticisms. However, a source at the State House told Daily Trust on condition of anonymity that Obasanjo is a statesman and that the Presidency “will not want to join issues with him.”

What Obasanjo said

Obasanjo, in his address titled “Leadership Failure and State Capture in Nigeria”, described Nigeria’s situation as bad.

The former leader also alleged that Nigeria’s failing status under President Bola Ahmed Tinubu was “confirmed and glaringly indicated and manifested for every honest person to see.”

He alluded to a World Bank and Transparency International’s definition of what a state capture was, saying it was described, “as one of the most pervasive forms of corruption,“a situation where powerful individuals, institutions, companies, or groups within or outside a country use corruption to shape a nation’s policies, legal environment, and economy, to benefit their own private interests.”

He noted that state capture is not always overt and obvious as it can also arise from the more subtle close alignment of interests between specific business and political elites through family ties, friendships, and the intertwined ownership of economic assets.

He said: “What is happening in Nigeria – right before our eyes – is state capture: The purchase of national assets by political elites – and their family members – at bargain prices, the allocation of national resources – minerals, land, and even human resources – to local, regional, and international actors. It must be prohibited and prevented through local and international laws.

“Public institutions such as the legislature, the executive, the judiciary, and regulatory agencies both at the federal and local levels are subject to capture. As such, state capture can broadly be understood as the disproportionate and unregulated influence of interest groups or decision-making processes, where special interest groups manage to bend state laws, policies, and regulations.

“They do so through practices such as illicit contributions paid by private interests to political parties, and for election campaigns, vote-buying, buying of presidential decrees or court decisions, as well as through illegitimate lobbying and revolving door appointments.

“The main risk of state capture is that decisions no longer take into consideration the public interest, but instead favour a specific special interest group or individual. Laws, policies, and regulations are designed to benefit a specific interest group, often times to the detriment of smaller firms and groups and society in general.

“State capture can seriously affect economic development, regulatory quality, the provision of public services, quality of education and health services, infrastructure decisions, and even the environment and public health.”

Obasanjo also alleged that Nigeria’s failing status under President Tinubu was “confirmed and glaringly indicated and manifested for every honest person to see.”

He was quoted to have stated, “As the world can see and understand, Nigeria’s situation is bad.

“The more the immorality and corruption of a nation, the more the nation sinks into chaos, insecurity, conflict, discord, division, disunity, depression, youth restiveness, confusion, violence and underdevelopment.

“That’s the situation mostly in Nigeria in the reign of Baba-go-slow and Emilokan. The failing state status of Nigeria is confirmed and glaringly indicated and manifested for every honest person to see through the consequences of the level of our pervasive corruption, mediocrity, immorality, misconduct, mismanagement, perversion, injustice, incompetence and all other forms of iniquity. But yes, there is hope.”

Obasanjo while copying from a short, classic treatise published in 1983, called ‘The Trouble with Nigeria’ by Chinua Achebe admitted that, “The trouble with Nigeria is simply and squarely a failure of leadership. There is nothing basically wrong with the Nigerian character. There is nothing wrong with the Nigerian land or climate or water or air or anything else. The Nigerian problem is the unwillingness or inability of its leaders to rise to the responsibility, to the challenge of personal example which are the hallmarks of true leadership.

“In hindsight, this forty-one-year-old prescriptive analysis on the root causes of Nigeria’s leadership crisis is quite moderate and appropriate. It is at least not as desolate as the diagnosis provided by Robert Rotberg and John Campbell, two prominent US intellectuals – the latter a former United States ambassador to Nigeria to boot: ‘Nigeria has long teetered on the precipice of failure,’ they argue.

“Unable to keep its citizens safe and secure, Nigeria has become a fully failed state of critical geopolitical concern. Its failure matters because the peace and prosperity of Africa and preventing the spread of disorder and militancy around the globe depend on a stronger Nigeria.”

Nigeria’s reforms not looking good – IMF

Presenting the IMF’s report at the Lagos Business School on Friday, IMF Deputy Director, Catherine Patillo, said the economic growth is expected to remain stagnant in Nigeria this year.

The report urged Nigeria to close the gender gap in a bid to improve its Gross Domestic Product (GDP), saying that could grow the GDP by 30 per cent.

The report said: “Resource-intensive countries (RICs) continue to grow at about half the rate of the rest of the region, with oil exporters struggling the most.

“Second, both domestic and external financing conditions remain tight. Third, the region has recently witnessed several episodes of political fragility and social unrest. Political and social pressures are making it increasingly challenging to implement policy adjustments and reforms.”

The IMF projected “significant increases” in Ghana, Botswana, Senegal and others, but said Nigeria was confronted with “adjustment fatigue” citing the double-digit inflation which is not backing down anytime soon.

“Inflation is still in double digits in almost one-third of countries, including Angola, Ethiopia, and Nigeria, and above target in almost half of the region, particularly where monetary policy is not anchored by exchange rate pegs.

“Significant increases are anticipated in Ghana, as it continues reestablishing macroeconomic stability; Botswana and Senegal, reflecting rising resource exports (diamonds, oil, and gas); and Malawi, Zambia, and Zimbabwe, as they recover from drought. Growth is also expected to improve in South Africa, given positive post-election sentiment and a reduction in power outages,” the report said.

It added, “In the face of popular frustration, there is also an opportunity to work to mobilize support for large, deep reforms, of the sort that, for instance, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya and Nigeria are pursuing.

“Realizing this opportunity requires rethinking reform strategies, to build and maintain pro-growth coalitions among constituent leaders and the general public. This will require greater attention to communication and engagement strategies, reform design, compensatory measures and rebuilding trust in public institutions.”

The report said the average economic growth rate in the region would remain at 3.6 per cent for the full year 2024, but Nigeria’s growth rate, put at 3.19 per cent, was below the average.

The IMF report also touched on the rising debt burden, saying debt service capacity is generally low.

“In almost one-quarter of countries, interest payments exceed 20 per cent of revenues, a threshold statistically associated with a high probability of fiscal stress. And rising debt service burdens are already having a significant impact on the resources available for development spending.

“The median ratio of interest payments to revenues (excluding grants) currently stands at 12 per cent. Some three-quarters have already witnessed an increase in interest payments (relative to revenue) since the early 2010s (comparing the 2010–14 average with the 2019–24 average). In Angola, Ghana, Nigeria, and Zambia, this increase in interest payments alone absorbed a massive 15 per cent of total revenue,” the report stated.

Former President Olusegun Obasanjo says Nigeria must appoint new, credible leaders for the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) with short tenure to prevent corruption and re-establish trust.

Obasanjo spoke during the Chinua Achebe leadership forum held at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut, USA.

In his keynote address at the forum titled ‘Leadership failure and state capture in Nigeria,’ Obasanjo described the 2023 general elections as a “travesty”.

The former president said reforming the electoral system is a key issue for the country, adding that INEC officials need thorough vetting to prevent partisan appointments.

“As a matter of urgency, we must make sure the INEC chairperson and his or her staff are thoroughly vetted,” Obasanjo said.

“The vetting exercise should yield dispassionate, non-partisan actors with impeccable reputations.

“Nigeria must ensure the appointment of new credible INEC leadership at the federal, state, local government, and municipal—city, town, and village levels—with short tenures—to prevent undesirable political influence and corruption and re-establish trust in the electoral systems by its citizens.

“The INEC chairperson must not only be absolutely above board, but he must also be transparently independent and incorruptible.”

Obasanjo said Nigeria must prevent electoral interference at every level, protecting elections from foreign and local malevolent actors to safeguard democratic integrity.

He added that there should be an implementation of clearly defined financial regulations for political campaigns to ensure transparency and accountability.

“On the local level, we should implement and enforce clearly defined financial regulations for political campaigns and establish effective control and enforcement mechanisms to ensure compliance with financial regulations,” the former president advocated.

“And intensify activities to prepare and secure the voting infrastructure, such as safeguarding the technology used to collate, transmit, verify, and disseminate election results.”

Obasanjo alleged that INEC intentionally failed to utilise the bimodal voter accreditation system (BVAS) and election viewing portal (IReV) technologies during the 2023 presidential election.

“The BVAS and IReV are two technological innovations that, prior to 2023, were celebrated for their potential to enhance the accuracy and transparency of our election results, eliminate the threat of election rigging, and boost public trust in electoral outcomes,” he said.

“These technologies were touted by the INEC chairman himself. In the end, these technologies did not fail.

“INEC willfully failed to use or implement them, which resulted in widespread voting irregularities. It was a case of inviting the fox into the henhouse”

President Bola Ahmed Tinubu yesterday left for Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, to attend the 19th G20 Leaders’ Summit.

The President who left Abuja last night after rounding off his bi-lateral meeting with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, will attend the summit on the invitation of host President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.

The summit holds today and tomorrow.

The theme of the summit is  “Building a Just World and a Sustainable Planet.”

According to a statement issued by his Special Adviser on Information and Strategy, Bayo Onanuga, the gathering will bring together leaders from the world’s largest economies, alongside representatives from the African Union, the European Union, and key international financial institutions.

The summit’s agenda includes discussions on combating global hunger and poverty, reforming international governance structures, and advancing sustainable development and energy transition efforts.

These topics align closely with Nigeria’s long-standing advocacy for global institutional reforms and its aspirations for a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council.

On the sidelines of the summit, President Tinubu is expected to hold bilateral meetings to further Nigeria’s socio-economic reform agenda.

Accompanying the president is a high-level delegation, including Foreign Affairs Minister, Ambassador Yusuf Tuggar; Minister of Livestock Development, Idi Mukhtar Maiha; Minister of Art, Tourism, Culture and Creative Economy, Hannatu Musawa; Minister of State for Agriculture and Food Security, Dr. Aliyu Sabi Abdullahi; and the Director-General of the National Intelligence Agency, Ambassador Mohammed Mohammed.

Members of the G20 are: United States, United Kingdom, Russia, Canada, China, France, Germany, Argentina, Australia, Brazil, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Republic of Korea, Mexico, , Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Turkey, and the European Union.

[TheNation]

Governor Umar Namadi’s government of Jigawa State has introduced a new digital tax payment system to enhance revenue collection and address the issue of multiple taxation.

Dr Nasiru Sabo Idris, the Chairman of the Jigawa State Internal Revenue Service (JIRS), announced the launch of the Jigawa Integrated Tax Administration System (JIGTAS), which is intended to modernize the processes of revenue mobilization and payment throughout the state.

During a recent event in Dutse, Idris highlighted that a workshop was conducted for accountants and revenue mobilizers from various ministries, departments, and agencies (MDAs) to improve their skills in effectively utilizing the new system.

The JIGTAS system is specifically designed to facilitate the collection and remittance of internally generated revenue (IGR) across MDAs.

In a related development, the Akwa Ibom State Government has announced plans to fully digitize all tax collection processes starting in the 2025 fiscal year.

The Executive Chairman of the Akwa Ibom State Revenue Board, Okon Okon, disclosed this during a media briefing in Uyo on Sunday.

He explained that the implementation of electronic assessment, e-tax clearance processes, e-filing of tax returns, and the automation of registration and reporting processes is expected to significantly enhance revenue generation in the state once the digitalization initiatives are put into action.