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Sanwo-Olu: Delivering on THEMES developmental agenda
It is over two years that a successful banker and seasoned administrator, Mr. Babajide Sanwo-Olu took over mantle of leadership as the 15th Governor of Lagos State. Sanwo-Olu, who was once a three-time commissioner and Managing Director/CEO of the Lagos State Development and Property Corporation (LSDPC), took the oath of office along with his deputy, Dr. Obafemi Hamzat on May 29, 2019.
Governor Sanwo-Olu, in his inauguration speech, spoke passionately on his plans for Lagos State, especially his dream of a ‘Greater Lagos,’ anchored by a six-pillar THEMES developmental agenda.
Governor Sanwo-Olu is passionate about Lagos and his vision for the Centre of Excellence has made him to deliver good governance and dividends of democracy to millions of Lagosians within his 834 days in office. With massive support and cooperation from his deputy, Dr. Hamzat and other members of the State Executive Council as well as major stakeholders in Lagos State, Governor Sanwo-Olu has taken Lagos to a greater height.
Governor Sanwo-Olu has shown leadership in managing the affairs of Lagos State and protecting the citizens of the state, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. Since Lagos became the epicenter of the pandemic in Nigeria in February 2020, the governor has been up to the task assuming the position of Incident Commander and ensuring that the pandemic is well managed in Lagos State and today, Nigerians have a relief from the deadly virus as infections rate has reduced drastically going by daily account of the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC).
Apart from COVID-19 pandemic, Lagos was also hit last year by massive destruction of properties worth billions of naira destroyed during last year’s #EndSARS protests hijacked by hoodlums. Despite these challenges, Governor Sanwo-Olu took the bull by the horn to put Lagos on the path of success through the Lagos Rebuild initiative.
Governor Sanwo-Olu, who seems to be very conscious of the number of days and years he is constitutionally allowed to spend in office as a democratically elected Chief Executive of the Centre of Excellence, believes that his mid-term in office must be marked with visible and iconic projects that will cut across all the sectors itemised in the THEMES’ developmental agenda, despite the negative impact of the global COVID-19 pandemic and the #EndSARS protest that almost grounded Lagos as a results of hoodlums hijacking peaceful agitations by Nigerian youths.
Speaking at the “2021 State of the State Address” held at the Lagos House, Ikeja on Thursday May 27 in commemoration of his second year in office, which was attended by his deputy, Dr. Obafemi Hamzat, members of his cabinet, traditional rulers, political gladiators, captains of industries and media executives, among others, Governor Sanwo-Olu said the Greater Lagos collectively envisioned by Lagosians is closer now than ever before.
Traffic Management and Transportation
The Babajide Sanwo-Olu administration has developed a reliable intermodal system of transportation by investing heavily in waterways and light rail transportation system as well as road transportation to make life easy for Lagosians.
The State Government has reduced traffic congestion in different parts of Lagos by resolving key gridlock points, maintenance of road infrastructures, decongestion of traffic by connecting more communities with new link roads and bridges, provision of intelligent transport systems to optimise the transport network and completion of ongoing strategic transport projects in rail, water and road. The administration has developed Lagos Bus Reform Initiative, which is designed to provide comfortable and reliable bus service for commuters. Governor Sanwo-Olu, few months ago commissioned 500 First and Last Mile Buses to ease transportation system in Lagos. The incumbent administration also has a success story in the water transportation.
In works and infrastructure, the Babajide Sanwo-Olu administration within two years delivered 51 iconic projects in Lagos State. Among the iconic projects are Pen-Cinema fly over, ramp and road networks at Lagos-Ogun boundary and other parts of the State. The administration also constructed and rehabilitated 301 inner roads in the 20 Local Government Areas and 37 Local Council Development Areas (LCDAs). It also commissioned the Oshodi-Abule Egba BRT lane and rolled out hundreds of buses plying different routes in Lagos State.
Health and Environment
Babajide Sanwo-Olu’s administration has also made significant impact in touching the lives of millions of Lagosians in the areas of health and environment, which is the second pillar of the THEMES developmental agenda. The incumbent government in the last two years, believes that nothing should be spared to give Lagosians quality health care. It has made a lot of intervention in the health sector for Lagos residents to feel the presence of the government, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The proactive and efficient management of the COVID-19 pandemic by Lagos State Government has been adjudged as the most significant achievement of the Health and Environment pillar of the THEMES development agenda.
The State has also witnessed improved capacity and capability in area of infrastructure and personnel. Aside from the comprehensive renovation of medical facilities at Ebute-Metta Health Centre, Harvey Road Health Centre, General Hospitals at Odan, Isolo and Ketu-Ejinrin, the State has also developed new facilities, such as the New Massey Children Hospital, New General Hospital in Ojo, and a Rehabilitation and Mental Health facility in Ketu Ejinrin.
The State Government is also building a 300-bed Isolation Centre and a Research Institute at IDH, Yaba. The administration recently commissioned three Oxygen Plants and new Doctors’ Quarters built at Gbagada and Isolo. The administration has also improved maternal and child health care in Lagos State, with the inauguration of the Mother and Child Centres (MCCs) in Eti-Osa, Igando, Badagry and Epe.
In the Environment, the Babajide Sanwo-Olu administration within two years in office has invested significantly in the waste collection capacity of LAWMA. It has also increased the capacity of PSP operators from 320 compactor-trips to 720 compactor-trips daily, and commissioned a mini-effluent treatment plant to determine waste toxicity before release into the atmosphere. The administration has also made significant improvement in Drainage management and maintenance.
Education and Technology
Education and Technology is the third pillar in the THEMES Agenda of the Babajide Sanwo-Olu administration and since his assumption in office on May 29, 2019, Governor Sanwo-Olu has never paid lip service to education in the State.
The incumbent administration has completed more than 1,097 school projects in just two years. It built six Secondary Schools, provided over 100,000 tables and chairs, built 450 classrooms and provided 2,000 hostel beds in model schools. It also introduced EKO EXCEL – an education reform programme targeted at developing highly skilled teachers through training, support and motivation. The EKO EXCEL initiative has reached about 1,009 schools, 13,000 teachers and 450,000 pupils.
Since the inception of the administration, over 2,000 teachers have been recruited for public secondary schools. It has also stretched the opportunity for continuous learning with the establishment of additional 21 Adult Literacy Centres, which took the number of such centres in Lagos State to 1,284.
It is also worthy of note that the global ranking of Lagos State University (LASU), the state-owned tertiary institution has gone up. It is a reflection of the level and quality of support provided to tertiary institutions in Lagos State by the incumbent administration. LASU moved to prominence, and occupies a regal position in the hierarchy of universities in Nigeria. Like LASU, other Lagos State-owned institutions have received both ample materials and financial support that have adequately strengthened their operations and boosted their competitiveness internationally. The administration has also concluded plans to upgrade Lagos State Polytechnic (LASPOTECH) and Lagos State College of Education (LACOED) to Universities.
As a State that caters for its students, Lagos State Government paid a total sum of N218, 795,000 million as bursary awards to 6,411 students of the state’s origin in various higher institutions of learning to support their education. The government also provided sum of N217, 732,955.44 million as scholarship awards to a total number of 981 beneficiaries.
The popular narrative that teachers’ rewards are in heaven is changing gradually with Lagos State Governor, Mr. Babajide Sanwo-Olu, as he preaches that teachers’ reward should no longer be in heaven but on earth. He believes that teachers should reap the reward of their labour while on earth and not after death. This new belief made Governor Sanwo-Olu present handsome rewards to teachers adjudged to have made quality impacts in Lagos State’s teaching service. Setting new records of reward for teachers in the State, Governor Sanwo-Olu few months ago presented three-bedroom and two-bedroom flats to two teachers and also rewarded 13 teachers and school administrators with a brand new cars each at the Year 2020 Teachers’ Merit Award organised by the Ministry of Education for making quality impacts in the State’s teaching service.
Lagos State Government under Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu is standing up to the call to implant technology at the heart of everything in Lagos. The vision of becoming #DigitalLagos or a smart city of relevance, has started to crystallise with the laying of 3,000km fibre across the State. The administration has covered 1,800km, which has provided connection to 100 schools and 12 hospitals.
Riding on the Fibre infrastructure is the Smart City Project, which will enhance traffic management and security, with the planned installation of about 2,000 cameras at strategic locations. The test-run has begun, with the installation of about 150 smart cameras on the streets.
As part of the measures put in place for formal and informal education, the Ministry of Women Affairs and Poverty Alleviation through the Women Affairs Department organised a series of programmes and activities aimed at improving the status of Women in Lagos State and making them economically independent. The Lagos State Employment Trust Fund (LSETF) has also provided financial support to residents of Lagos State for jobs, wealth creation and employment. It has promoted entrepreneurship by improving access to finance, strengthening the institutional capacity of MSMEs and formulating policies designed to improve the business environment in Lagos State. So far, the initiative has supported over 14,646 small businesses in Lagos State and created more than 123,720 jobs, especially for young persons in the State.
Making Lagos a 21st century economy
The fourth pillar of the THEMES developmental agenda is Making Lagos a 21st century economy. To achieve this, the incumbent government has recorded a milestone in infrastructural development in various parts of the State, amongst which is heavy investments by public and private sectors at the Lekki Free zones. Lagos State Government has also provided business-friendly environment and ease of doing business for many investors to set up business empires in the Centre of Excellence.
The Babajide Sanwo-Olu administration has also made significant progress in the area of housing by increasing access to home ownership with emphasis on first-time home owners and enhancing the rent-to-own policy; maintaining existing and newly commissioned housing schemes through facility managers to prevent dilapidation of estates and renewal of dilapidated estates.
Within two years in office, Lagos State Government through the Ministry of Housing has completed and commissioned 492 homes unit at Alhaji Lateef Kayode Jakande Gardens in Igando, 360 homes at Prince Abiodun Ogunleye Estate in Igbogbo and 124 home units at Lekki Phase 1. The Ministry of Housing through Joint Ventures agreements has provided 252 two bedroom Bungalows at Lagos State Affordable Public Housing Scheme Idale, Badagry; 124 homes at LagosHOMS Lekki Phase II and 132 homes at Babatunde Raji Fashola Estate at Iponri.
Lagos State Government through the LSDPC provided six units of two bedroom flats in Olutunda Ilupeju, 120 home units at Courtland Villas at Igbokushu, Eti-Osa and Bayview Estate Ikate-Elegushi with 100 units (32 units three-bedroom flats and 68 units 4 bedroom Terraces with Maid’s room) and Sunnyville Apartments located in Nob Oluwa, Ogba (32 units of 2 bedroom flats).
It is noteworthy that the Babajide Sanwo-Olu’s administration strengthened its policy of delivering homes to Lagosians through the existing Rent-To-Own Mortgage System. Under this arrangement, individuals are required to pay only five per cent of the cost of the housing unit as the commitment fee and the balance spread over a period of 10 years with minimum interest obtainable under the scheme.
The Sanwo-Olu administration has done so much in the area of agriculture and food security. Lagos has developed and commenced implementation of a five-year Agricultural and Food Security Road Map. The full implementation of the strategy will enable the state to achieve 40 per cent sufficiency in food production by 2025.
With initiatives such as the Agro Processing, Productivity Enhancement and Livelihood Improvement Support (APPEALS) Project amongst others, which were designed to empower, train and build capacity development of the youth and women, especially in selected key value chains such as fisheries, poultry, rice, aquaculture and horticulture, the State Government has trained and empowered thousands of farmers in the State.
The State Government under Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu unveiled a five-year Agricultural Road Map between year 2021 to 2025. This road map will enable the State Government actualise her dreams of food security within the stipulated time frame.
The long awaited 32 metric tonnes per hour Imota rice mill, one of the largest in sub-Sahara Africa is at over 85 per cent completion stage. When completed it will provide over 250 thousand direct and indirect jobs across different value chains.
Entertainment and Tourism
Among the numerous transformational initiatives deployed to strengthen the socio-economic positioning of Lagos State globally, the energy of the city, fuelled by a thriving entertainment industry is unmistakable. And this is why Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu has made huge investment in Entertainment and Tourism, the fifth pillar of the developmental agenda.
Aside from landmark facilities and initiatives like the J.K Randle Centre for Yoruba history, Glover Memorial Hall, Lagos Theatre in Badagry, Badagry Museum and major Tourist attractions in Badagry, the incumbent administration is also working with the Federal Government to rehabilitate the National Arts Theatre Iganmu into a world class entertainment, fashion, music, technology and cultural hub as a deliberate and purposeful mission to boost the tourism appeal of Lagos State.
The Babajide Sanwo-Olu administration’s empowerment drive through partnerships with the Ebony Life Academy and Del York Creative Academy, is yielding positive result with no fewer than 2,000 youths receiving training in different aspects of cinematography; such as Scriptwriting, Directing and others. This is aimed at unlocking the huge talent and potential in the creative arts space.
The administration has also launched the Lagos Creative Initiative (LACI) for focused development of the creative industry, which has birthed the 100-hecterLagos Film City in Ejinrin. Besides, it has given financial support in excess of N1billion to operators to cushion the effect of COVID-19 on the industry.
Security and Governance
In line with the Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu’s THEMES Agenda, the administration has worked tirelessly to ensure that Lagos is safe and secure for the residents of the State and investors. As at today, security agencies in Lagos State can boast of modern day armoury. On Thursday, June 10, President Muhammadu Buhari joined Governor Sanwo-Olu to officially handover patrol vehicles and various security equipment to security agencies in Lagos State. The equipment were; 150 Double Cabin Vehicles, 30 Saloon Patrol Vehicles, 1,000 Ballistic Vests, 1,000 Ballistic Helmets, 1,000 Handheld Police Radios/Walkie Talkies, 100 Security Patrol Bikes, two Armored Personnel Carriers (APCs), four High Capacity Troop Carriers, two Anti-Riot Water Cannon Vehicles and Office/Command Furniture and other Ancillary Support Resources.
Lagos State Civil Service, which has many ministries, departments and agencies are role models to many states in Nigeria as a result of several developmental strides of the Babajide Sanwo-Olu administration.
Despite delivering on his campaign promises, Governor Sanwo-Olu is not looking back as he is marching on towards the attainment of the “Greater Lagos” dream.
The Federal Government on Wednesday defended its $21.7bn supplementary external borrowing plan submitted to the National Assembly, describing it as a strategic investment programme rather than debt accumulation.
It revealed that the administration it succeeded had printed over N30tn, equivalent to more than $20bn at the time, and the country is still absorbing its inflationary impact.
The Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Taiwo Oyedele, made the claim when he briefed State House correspondents after the Federal Executive Council meeting presided over by President Bola Tinubu at the State House, Abuja.
Oyedele, who spoke on the state of the economy, had presented 10 memos, all of which were approved by the council.
The first, he said, was a €155.9m credit facility from Deutsche Bank and other banks to upgrade 132/33kV substations under the Presidential Power Initiative Phase One, which he said would improve power reliability for homes and businesses and lower energy costs. The second was a $970m syndicated term loan from Standard Chartered and the Africa Finance Corporation for rolling stock on the Karu–Maradi rail line, intended to boost freight, regional trade, and the Northern Economic Corridor while reducing logistics costs.
The third was a €76.8m credit from the ECOWAS Bank for Investment and Development to Bauchi State for a transport infrastructure development programme, covering rural and urban roads and farm-to-market access routes to support food security.
The fourth was an approval for non-intrusive inspection scanners for the Nigerian Customs Service to speed up cargo clearance, reduce smuggling and misdeclaration, and intercept contraband and small arms.
He explained, “As I said, there were 10 of them. I’ll just briefly speak to about four of them. One of them was a 155.9 million euro credit from Deutsche Bank and some other banks directed at upgrading about 132/33 kV substations and a few other ones. There are five of them, actually, five new ones under the Presidential Power Initiative Bash One. Essentially, this is a government intervention that will help ensure more reliable power for homes and businesses and lower energy costs.
“Another memo was with respect to a $970m syndicated term loan by Standard Chartered Africa Finance Corporation on rolling stock for the Karu-Maradi rail line. What is the essence of this? This will give us shipper freight, regional trade, the Northern Economic Corridor and lower prices for logistics, inflation and price levels.
“Another one was 76.8 million euros. This is from the ECOWAS Bank, and it is credit to Bauchi State for the Transport Infrastructure Development Programme, and this is going to help us with rural and urban roads, and to build farm-to-market access roads that will help with food security.
“And finally, council approved the investment in a non-intrusive inspection scanner for technical support, repairs, and maintenance to the Nigerian Customs Service. What is the essence of this? It will help with faster cargo clearance, less smuggling, and less misclassification. And we can then detect when some evil people want to bring in contraband and dangerous small weapons to our country.”
On the $21.7bn supplementary external borrowing plan, obtained by our correspondent from a presidential aide, Oyedele pushed back against critics who had described it as debt, insisting that the Tinubu administration was simply investing in critical infrastructure.
“So, another part of this presentation is on the borrowing plan that was presented to the National Assembly. Altogether, if you convert the euro amount and add it to the dollar amount, it comes to $21.7bn. And we’ve seen some people with commentary saying that we are borrowing X, Y, Z.
“I’m pleased and excited to inform you that actually this does not qualify as borrowing. This qualifies as investment, and I will explain that to you in the next few minutes. Now, so what is this all about? This is an amount or a plan.
“First and foremost, this is a plan. It doesn’t even mean that we borrow all of it. So it’s a plan. The average lifespan of the project under this plan is five years, by the way. So, this means countries need to plan. You can’t be doing everything based on spontaneity and randomness. Now, these amounts, about $10.6bn out of it, are for investment in transportation infrastructure,” he explained.
According to the document, the plan covers 46 projects across 11 sectors, with 29 on concessional or blended terms.
Transportation led with $10.6bn, including sections of the Lagos–Calabar and Sokoto–Badagry highways and the Kano–Kaduna Metro Rail. Ten flagship projects accounted for 58 per cent of the total, at $12.5bn.
The social sectors, agriculture, energy, social protection, climate, and education, totalling $4bn, will be funded entirely on concessional terms.
According to the document, about $7.9bn will come from multilateral and bilateral development partners, led by the World Bank with $5bn at an average rate of 2.1 per cent.
The remaining 11 lender groups include regional development finance institutions, export credit agencies, and commercial banks.
For the commercial component, the average indicative rate is 7.8 per cent, below the 9.1 to 9.6 per cent yield on Nigeria’s November 2025 Eurobond.
Oyedele attributed the gap to credit rating upgrades by Fitch, Moody’s, and S&P.
He noted that $4.8bn of the total was for subnational and agency borrowing, with $3.3bn going directly to states and $1.45bn channelled through agencies and development finance institutions including the Bank of Industry, Development Bank of Nigeria, Transmission Company of Nigeria, and electricity distribution companies.
“The Federal Government has the constitutional duty to be the interface for all external borrowing. So when people say we are borrowing $21.7bn, they need to know that a significant chunk is for states, the FCT, and agencies, not for the Federal Government alone,” he said.
Drawing a comparison with private sector financing, Oyedele argued that the plan would generate returns well in excess of its cost.
He argued, “If Aliko Dangote was going to save money to build his refinery, it would not have been built in his lifetime. He had to take the financing to make it happen. $20bn is now listed in less than four years, and the value has more than doubled. This is exactly what we are doing for our country.
“There are people who will tell you borrowing is bad. You just need to ask them: in which country on this planet do you run an economy without borrowing? To the extent that you borrow one naira to create value of more than one naira, you should please borrow more.”
On food price stability, which was adopted by the council as a priority resolution, Oyedele said the Federal Government was pursuing a national approach coordinated with state governments under the National Economic Council’s 90-day action plan.
“The short term is to ensure that in the coming months, leading up to the end of the year, the price of the most important staple items, rice, yam, beans, maize, remains stable or comes down,” he said.
He said the government would map the gap between local consumption and local production to calibrate targeted imports, adding that only unprocessed brown rice would be imported to preserve local milling jobs and processing capacity.
Over the medium and long term, the plan envisaged expanded irrigation farming to allow year-round agricultural production, improved crop yields through science, and significant reduction of post-harvest losses.
“We will not only be food sufficient; prices will be stable and affordable, and we will export, and a lot of it will be processed before we export. There is nothing that says people cannot be rich doing farming. This is the level we are getting into,” Oyedele said.
Speaking earlier, Oyedele contrasted the state of the economy in May 2023, describing Nigeria as having been weeks away from a full economic collapse when the Tinubu administration took office.
He said, “Inflation was at 22.41 per cent, and our reserve was net of $859m, not even enough to cover one month of imports. We had a spread between the official rate and the parallel rate of over 60 per cent premium, enabling round-tripping by the highly connected, while businesses, including manufacturers, could no longer access foreign exchange.
“We had printed altogether over N30tn to spend, and the impact of that amount, at the time, this was more than $20bn, is what we are dealing with today in inflationary pressure. Debt service at the time was consuming 97 per cent of revenue, nearly 100 per cent, and about 27 states could no longer reliably pay salaries. They were owing arrears of pension and gratuities.”
He said without the reforms, Nigeria would have slipped into hyperinflation and a full currency collapse far more severe than the devaluation that has taken place.
On petrol subsidy removal, Oyedele traced the policy to 1973, noting that a litre of premium motor spirit sold for six kobo then and N195 when the subsidy was removed in 2023, a 3,050-fold increase over 50 years that never resolved the underlying problem.
“Each time we increased the PMS price, Nigerian people suffered for it, but no benefit came. This is the first time in that half-century that the problem has now been solved, and the benefits are now accruing to our country,” he said.
The minister said growth had accelerated from 2.74 per cent in May 2023 to 4.43 per cent as of the second quarter of 2026, more than 60 per cent improvement, and Nigeria’s dollar-term growth rate in the first half of 2026 stood at 17 per cent, placing it among the world’s fastest-growing economies.
“This is the reason why we are classified by the IMF as one of the top 10 countries in the world contributing to global GDP growth,” he said.
On inflation, Oyedele said the September 2026 print of 14.63 per cent was down from 20.98 per cent a year ago and from a peak of about 34 per cent at the height of the inflationary pressure.
He added that month-on-month food inflation had fallen by 1.55 per cent, describing it as deflation in food prices.
Foreign reserves, he said, had risen to an 18-year high of over $55bn, with net reserves now exceeding $45bn, up from less than $1bn three years ago, a 45-fold increase.
The naira, currently trading between N1,330 and N1,350 to the dollar, was projected to appreciate further.
“Even the IMF estimates that the naira is about 25 per cent undervalued. So anybody who wants to bet against the naira should make provision for their losses. The currency to hold is the naira, even more than the US dollar or pound sterling,” Oyedele said.
He said the tax-to-GDP ratio rose from barely 7 per cent in 2023 to about 12.5 per cent at the end of 2025, while the debt service-to-revenue ratio fell from 97 per cent to under 60 per cent and was still declining.
Federation Account allocation grew 44 per cent from 2024 to 2025, with a projected 50 per cent growth from 2025 to 2026, and a real growth rate, stripping out inflation, of over 80 per cent across the two years.
Internationally, he said Fitch, Moody’s, and S&P had all upgraded Nigeria’s credit rating, with outlooks recently adjusted from stable to positive. Nigeria had also exited the Financial Action Task Force grey list and the European Union’s deficiency list, he added.
Responding to what he described as a recurring question about the gap between macroeconomic improvements and the lived experience of average Nigerians, Oyedele cited a series of direct interventions.
He stated, “To date, we have N372.6bn disbursed through NELFUND to more than 1.5 million students, which means their parents and guardians do not have to worry about tuition and stipend. We have more than 10 million households that have received cash transfers worth more than N600bn, and the target is to reach at least 15 million households,” he said.
Over 800,000 micro, small, and medium enterprises had received single-digit subsidised loans, mostly through the Bank of Industry, he added. Also, low-income earners earning up to N100,000 per month had been exempted from personal income tax, while small businesses with annual turnover of not more than N100m, representing about 97 per cent of over 40 million small businesses, were exempted from corporate income tax, VAT obligations, and withholding tax deductions.
The minister also noted that the capital market had grown from about N30tn to over N160tn, a more than fivefold increase in three years, and that more than 90 per cent of capital market investors were small investors who had been granted capital gains tax exemptions.
Council, he said, adopted a resolution to target single-digit inflation by the end of 2027 or earlier, stabilise and reduce food prices, and sustain fiscal discipline through the election cycle.
Oyedele’s defence comes amid criticism of President Bola Tinubu’s request to the National Assembly for approval of the loan plan.
The presidential candidate of the African Democratic Congress, Atiku Abubakar, the Makinde/Daura Campaign Council and others have criticised the Federal Government’s borrowing plan.
On Tuesday, Atiku urged the National Assembly to suspend consideration of the request until the Federal Government made public the projects the loans were intended to finance.
President Bola Tinubu has blamed his political opponents for hunger and poverty in Nigeria, saying his administration is working to address the challenges.
Tinubu spoke on Saturday at the All Progressives Congress presidential campaign flag-off rally at Ranchers Bees Stadium in Kaduna State ahead of the 2027 general elections.
“I have an argument. I hear my opponent talking about hunger, poverty. Who created it? They did! They created the hunger, they created the poverty. We are trying to eradicate it,” the President said.
He also defended his administration’s record on salary payments and praised governors for their performance.
Nigeria’s debt interest payments exceed revenue by ₦1.5 trillion
“We pay salaries regularly. Our governors are working. I am proud of them. They are developing,” he said.
The Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Senator George Akume, has said the North should support President Bola Tinubu for a second term in 2027.
He insisted that any Northerner seeking the presidency in 2027 would be working against the region’s interests.
Akume said the North should allow Tinubu to complete his political project before considering another presidential bid in 2031.
The SGF stated this on Saturday while addressing Benue State indigenes resident in Kaduna ahead of the flag-off of the All Progressives Congress presidential campaign in the state capital.
He urged Northerners to remain united and resist political ambitions capable of dividing the region ahead of the 2027 general elections.
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“The North must remain united and focus on its collective interest rather than allow individual ambitions to divide us,” Akume said.
The former Benue State governor argued that the region needed to consider its long-term political interests and the implications of the 2027 presidential election for its future.
He said, “President Bola Tinubu should be allowed to complete his political project before the North considers its own presidential ambition in 2031.”
Akume also cautioned against attempts to divide Northerners along political, religious and personal lines, stressing that unity remained essential to the region’s political relevance.
“We must not allow political, religious or personal differences to undermine our common interests. The strength of the North lies in our ability to work together,” he said.
The SGF further called for peaceful coexistence and cooperation among Nigeria’s diverse ethnic and religious communities, saying national development depended on unity.
He urged the people to examine political developments carefully and avoid being misled by individuals whose ambitions might conflict with the broader interests of the region.
The meeting brought together Benue indigenes living in Kaduna and other political stakeholders to discuss issues affecting their community, political representation and engagement with leaders at the national level.
The APC presidential campaign flag-off in Kaduna is expected to bring together party leaders, supporters and political stakeholders from across the country.
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