Former Vice President and presidential candidate of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), Atiku Abubakar, has criticized President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s economic stewardship, describing the administration’s market-driven policies as a destructive experiment that has impoverished millions while expanding government revenue.
In a fierce response to the Presidency’s dismissal of his proposed fuel subsidy intervention, Atiku stated that mistaking the citizens’ capacity to endure severe hardship for sound economic governance reveals a fundamental lack of understanding.
Speaking on Friday through a statement issued by his Senior Special Assistant on Public Communication, Phrank Shaibu, the ADC flagbearer pushed back against accusations of economic inconsistency leveled by the administration.
“If economic ignorance had a presidential seal, Tinubu and his family would be its official logo,” Shaibu said.
“Here is an administration that detonated simultaneous fuel-price, exchange-rate, and cost-of-living shocks across a fragile economy, watched millions become poorer, and now struts around Abuja demanding applause for the wreckage. That is not reform. It is economic arson followed by propaganda about the ashes,” Shaibu added.
Atiku noted that while monthly Federation Account Allocation Committee (FAAC) disbursements to state governments have grown exponentially, the surge in government liquidity has failed to translate into tangible welfare improvements for ordinary households struggling with food inflation and diminished purchasing power.
“Hungry Nigerians cannot boil FAAC figures for dinner. Businesses cannot power factories with presidential speeches, workers cannot pay transport fares with macroeconomic grammar, and parents cannot settle school fees with statistics manufactured for State House applause,” Shaibu quoted Atiku as saying.
Addressing the fuel subsidy debate, the ADC candidate accused the Federal Government of maintaining an opaque financial structure that continues to drain public funds despite official declarations that subsidy payments had ceased. He referenced audited state oil accounts allegedly containing approximately N17.5 trillion classified under energy security costs and petroleum under-recoveries.
“Tinubu told Nigerians subsidy was dead. Yet NNPC’s audited accounts reportedly contain approximately N17.5 trillion in energy-security costs and petroleum under-recoveries,” Shaibu noted.
“So what exactly did Tinubu remove? If subsidy is dead, why are under-recoveries alive? Tinubu removed the relief but retained the opaque costs,” Shaibu continued.
Clarifying his economic blueprint, Atiku explained that his proposed oil sector policy is not a return to an open-ended fuel subsidy regime, but a targeted, capped, budgeted, time-bound, and independently audited production-support mechanism designed to stabilize prices, stimulate domestic refining, and cushion households against systemic shocks.
He further challenged the Presidency to account for public finances, specifically demanding a full reconciliation of approximately N30 trillion in Federation Account revenues, transfers, and deductions, alongside the N12.8 trillion Service-Wide Vote in the national budget.