₦airaland Forum

Tinubu Government To Nigerians: 'We Have Said Our Reforms Won't Be Easy But Haters Are Planning To Overthrow Us'

As Nigerians groan under excruciating economic hardship worsened by President Bola Tinubu’s reform policies, his Special Adviser on Information and Strategy, Bayo Onanuga, has turned to a 2022 warning by former Emir of Kano, Muhammadu Sanusi II, as a justification for the administration’s painful decisions.

Onanuga, in a post shared Tuesday, lashed out at critics of the Tinubu-led government, describing them as “haters of Nigeria’s progress” who are allegedly scheming to destabilise the country’s “most focused, most transformative administration in history.”

Referencing a statement made by Sanusi at the Kaduna Economic and Investment Summit, the presidential aide claimed that the former Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) governor had already prepared Nigerians for the current suffering under Tinubu’s watch.

Onanuga wrote: "Emir Sanusi warned Nigerians what to expect from President Tinubu’s reforms. ‘It’s not going to be easy,’ he said. ‘If anybody tells you it would be easy, don’t vote for him.’ Just two years after Tinubu began implementing the reforms, the haters of Nigeria’s progress are banding together to overthrow an administration that has been the most focused, most transformative in our history.”

The former Emir had made the comments in 2022 at a public event where he cautioned Nigerians against supporting politicians who promise ease and prosperity without first acknowledging the economic mess the country had sunk into.

Sanusi had declared: "Please let me request from our politicians. You must prepare the minds of Nigerians for difficult decisions.

Anybody who tells you that it is going to be easy, please don’t vote for him. It is either he is lying to you or he doesn’t know what job he is going to do.”

He had further warned that no administration would be able to navigate Nigeria’s dire economic condition without taking drastic and painful decisions, including overhauling the oil subsidy regime and electricity tariffs.

“You cannot, with this level of debt service, with this level of collapse in revenue, with this level of poverty, take corrective decisions. Tariffs on the electricity sector will have to be corrected. Tariffs in the oil sector have to be corrected.

“But before we correct that, we have to deal with the opportunities for rent-seeking. You have to close off the inflated numbers, the false numbers,” he stated.

Sanusi, a consistent critic of Nigeria’s corrupt subsidy regime, also advocated a probe into petroleum subsidy payments by previous administrations.

He called for transparency and accountability in the system: “They must give names of the ships that came, and we must verify if those ships were in Nigeria on that date. You must bring evidence. That is what the law says. There must be proof before you pay the subsidy,” Sanusi said.

jmoore:

The beginning of their wailing has just started.

SoftSport:
True that. Rome wasn't built in a day, and similarly Nigeria's transformation under Tinubu's great reforms will take time, patience, and perseverance.

thesicilian:
Nothing good comes easy. You can't repair a country that has been battered for ages in just a few months.

lightwind:
The same thing that was said about Buhari and 8 years passed nothing changed rather we faced total hardship etc.
The same APC have come again with same statement