Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar has criticised the administration of President Bola Tinubu over reports that the Federal Government is negotiating a fresh $1.25bn loan from the World Bank, warning that Nigeria is sinking deeper into unsustainable debt without visible gains for citizens.
Atiku, in a statement issued on Sunday through his media aide, Olusola Sanni, described the proposed facility as further evidence of what he called the Tinubu administration’s “reckless” and “habitual” dependence on borrowing, despite worsening economic hardship across the country.
The former vice president said it was disturbing that an administration elected on promises of economic revival had become associated with what he termed “industrial-scale borrowing” while millions of Nigerians grapple with inflation, rising energy costs, food insecurity and declining purchasing power.
“This borrowing binge is becoming reckless, opaque, and dangerously habitual.
“The loans are coming with a burden of weight too heavy for Nigerians to bear. Nigerians were told these loans were for infrastructure, power, and economic recovery. Yet the average citizen still lives in darkness, roads remain death traps, businesses are collapsing under crushing energy costs, and hunger has become a national epidemic,” Atiku said.
