Nigeria still has good politicians and technocrats with knowledge, skill and historical depth. The problem is that these politicians are not currently in power.
And due to their absence, we are left with mediocrities, Kool-Aid drinkers and clowns to run this country. Some days ago, one of the president's special advisers who attended the 2025 Conference of the Africa and Middle East Depositories Association in Lagos read a speech on behalf of the vice president that reaffirms "Nigeria will grow into a trillion-dollar economy within the next decade."
Whoever comes across this caption will ask whether these people live in the same Nigeria as the rest of us. I know it is futile to remind the administrators of this administration that they are not on the right trajectory. And I understand the Tinubu government is under the presumption that governance has ended. The economy is waiting on a self-fulfilling prophecy since the implementation of Tinubunomics, mainly on fuel subsidy removal, unification of exchange rates, and devaluation of the naira.
I am also aware that this is not the time to expose the country's weaknesses in front of fellow emerging Africans and Middle Easterners. But it is also not the time to present fictitious predictions. The statement sounded like something from a snake oil merchant desperately looking to collect investors' funds. A seasoned administrator would know that the IMF's world economic outlook is released in April, and global business leaders will be reading it keenly.
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The IMF has projected the Nigerian economy to shrink by 48 per cent. This means almost half of the Nigerian economy has been wiped out in just two years. The GDP of 2023 was $363.82 billion, and the IMF projects the 2025 GDP at $188.27 billion. The IMF growth forecast, taking inflation into account, suggests that Nigeria's real GDP growth is expected to be 3.0% for 2025, which is a downgrade from the previously projected 3.4% growth for 2024.
These few numbers can tell the story of the economy, and business leaders have that at their fingertips. With internet technology and a smartphone, everyone can access the IMF data, charts and more. With a calculator, one can verify that it would take Nigeria almost 56 years to grow from $188 billion to $1 trillion using the IMF's 3 per cent growth rate. It will take 35 years at 5%; 25 years at 7%, and 18 years at 10%.
Nigeria would need to grow at about 18 per cent annually to grow from $188 billion to $1 trillion in 10 years, which is in the region of China's highest-ever accelerated growth in 1964 and 1970. For the record, China never returned to that level again. To return to its 2023 GDP, which is double its predicted GDP, Nigeria needs to grow at almost 7 per cent for 10 years. This is very unlikely under normal economic conditions.
For comparison, China's fastest growth periods achieved about 10 per cent yearly in the 1980s and 1990s. On the contrary, statements like this explain why Nigerians use the government's intellectual limitations as proof of their own superiority. Knowing this, our politicians have turned politics into a drama because they know viewers are more interested in being entertained by our TV news stations than being informed. They have turned the country into a circus, in the Roman sense.
Using data is one politically correct way of cautioning the government. But the administrators do not care about what is being presented or whether it is true. They are more concerned about optics. So long as economic transactions are ongoing in the country, they do not care about who represents them and what they say in public places, especially at international conferences. In all seriousness, the presenter would have been more accurate in predicting where he would be in the next decade than repeating the fantasy of a trillion-dollar economy.
Even senior administrators of this administration, like Cardoso and Edun, have stopped this delusional prediction. But then again, one should not be surprised. The government is being defeated by the policies it created. And as Nigeria continues to rely on imports, Trump's tariff shock will impact the global supply chain more, which will cause more volatility in the Nigerian economy and lead to more undesirable outcomes.
As things stand, food prices are soaring, companies are closing down, and some are shifting bases, relocating or moving operations to neighbouring countries. Despite activating the rebasing trickery, the IMF expects the inflation rate to hit 26.5 per cent in 2025 and reach 37 per cent in 2026. This year's inflation rate forecast is 76 per cent higher than the 15 per cent inflation predicted in the budget. It is clear that Nigeria will not see that anticipated growth without lower input costs for production, especially in the agriculture and manufacturing sectors. But this government is not willing to have that discussion with itself or with experts. A good example is how China became a trillion-dollar economy in 1998, within 18 years, up from just $191 billion in 1980. It did so by focusing on export-led manufacturing and attracting global firms. The state invested heavily in infrastructure and education. Between 1980 and 2010, the Chinese GDP grew at an average of nearly 10% per year. Like Nigeria, the size of its population helped sustain rapid growth, albeit with a disciplined labour force and a high savings rate.
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It is clear that growth will suffer if Nigeria keeps depending on importing the goods that can be produced locally. Cheaper electricity, fuel, and other machinery that complements labour in production are needed to make this work. But this government is doing the opposite with Tinubunomics. We still rely on imports. Major imports are refined petroleum oil products that will help our industries. This can be achieved if our refineries are functional.
Investing in education will boost our productivity. Security improvements and infrastructure will attract investors. To say the least, these are low-hanging fruits that can be achieved with the proper form of governance. Talking about a delusional trillion-dollar economy in an economy whose output has halved is a mockery of the citizens whose wealth has evaporated. No country ever talked itself into wealth. The art of government is to create conditions where ordinary effort can produce extraordinary results. This can only come from the painful correction of errors of Tinubunomics. Nigeria must remember: growth is not magic; it is method.
