The African Democratic Congress has described President Bola Tinubu’s 2026 price range proposal as a debt entice disguised as reform, warning that the plan depends on extreme borrowing and unrealistic income projections that may additional mortgage Nigeria’s future and deepen the nation’s fiscal disaster.
ADC, in a press release issued on Monday by its Nationwide Publicity Secretary, Bolaji Abdullahi, mentioned the price range merely entrenches what it described because the Tinubu administration’s sample of fiscal irresponsibility and unrealistic projections.
On Friday, President Tinubu introduced the ₦58.18 trillion 2026 Appropriation Invoice to the Nationwide Meeting, expressing optimism a few gradual {economic} restoration and pledging tighter fiscal controls.
Whereas presenting the “Funds of Consolidation, Renewed Resilience and Shared Prosperity” earlier than a joint sitting of the Senate and Home of Representatives, the President mentioned the proposal is designed to construct on current macroeconomic enhancements, rebuild confidence, and translate stability into broad-based advantages for Nigerians.
In its response, the coalition occasion claimed the 2026 price range merely rehashes the failed and largely unimplemented 2024 and 2025 budgets and is prone to endure the identical destiny, with most execution deferred to a different yr.
“The doc introduced earlier than the Nationwide Meeting on December 19 is a debt entice masquerading as a price range. The federal government claims it would spend ₦25.68tn on capital expenditure, but with a projected deficit of ₦23.85tn, it’s clear that nearly each single bridge, street, or challenge is being funded by high-interest debt. Even with a clear capital plan in place, this alone requires concern.
“Nevertheless, it’s much more alarming when the federal government borrows mindlessly to fund opaque and infrequently frivolous expenditures. It’s one factor to squander present revenues on the excesses of the state, however it’s an unpardonable sin to lift huge money owed to fund reckless spending, successfully burying our youngsters underneath a mountain of debt obligations earlier than they even enter the workforce,” ADC said.
It additionally described the Tinubu-led APC authorities as chaotic, accusing it of attempting to run a number of budgets directly resulting from its incapacity to conclude previous price range cycles correctly.
ADC said, “Though it was introduced as a Funds of Consolidation, Renewed Resilience and Shared Prosperity, what was introduced was solely a consolidation of fiscal recklessness and renewed wishful considering which have change into the hallmark of the Tinubu administration. If authorised, the one factor this price range is able to sharing is extra debt and higher distress within the years forward.
“The 2026 price range proposal solely copies the templates of the failed, unimplemented, and maybe unimplementable 2024 and 2025 budgets and can probably finish the identical approach, with the majority of its implementation pushed to a different yr.
“We’re witnessing a authorities trying to construct a home on quicksand, presenting a brand new fiscal framework at a time when the 2025 price range has solely simply been repealed and reenacted, in a show of unprecedented fiscal chaos and administrative incompetence.
“The reality is, Nigeria is caught in a fiscal mess. However fairly than confront these issues, the Tinubu administration has continued to kick the can down the road, believing it might conceal the yawning cracks underneath mountains of unsustainable debt that mortgage the longer term technology, whereas indulging in {financial} profligacy.”
ADC mentioned the administration ignores a fundamental {economic} actuality, noting that financial changes or central {bank} actions can’t repair an financial system with out fiscal self-discipline and credible budgets.
It continued, “Governments could prolong price range implementation durations or handle a number of supplementary budgets, however working three or extra nationwide budgets concurrently is President Tinubu’s unique contribution to fiscal chaos. It has by no means occurred earlier than on this nation.
“Total, what’s most evident is the administration’s penchant for turning fiscal planning right into a hole ritual and political ceremonies that mock the struggling of the Nigerian individuals. Whereas revenues had been pushed to ₦20tn in 2024—a determine pushed extra by the pains of forex devaluation than by real {economic} productiveness—the federal government had the audacity to double its projections to ₦40tn for 2025 and even increase it to ₦58.57tn in 2026. This isn’t imaginative and prescient; it’s fantasy.
“The 2026 price range, which stays dangerously scant on element, embarks on one more unsustainable enlargement constructed on a basis of quicksand. At a time when oil projections are weakening, and international costs are dipping as tensions in Europe present indicators of cooling, the Federal Authorities has inexplicably set a benchmark of $64 per barrel. As a substitute of adopting a conservative posture to protect the nation from international volatility, it’s chasing a ₦34trn income goal that’s completely disconnected from actuality, particularly now that the substitute ‘bounce’ supplied by the devaluation of the naira has absolutely evaporated. One wonders if this authorities ever considers various eventualities aside from those who go well with its mindset.
“Maybe most terrifying is the sheer scale of the deficit and what it reveals about this authorities’s lack of concern for the subsequent technology. This administration behaves as if there might be no Nigeria after it. A price range that plans to generate ₦34tn in income whereas borrowing ₦24tn is an admission of fiscal insolvency. In no sane or useful fiscal system would a deficit-to-revenue ratio of 70 per cent be thought of acceptable and even contemplated in any respect.”
ADC mentioned the administration has reached a lifeless finish and seems trapped by its personal propaganda.
It continued, “The basics of this 2026 price range doc betray a complete abandonment of income credibility and deficit administration. The results of this incompetence are already staring us within the face. Pushed by the dual engines of devaluation and surging borrowing, Nigeria’s debt servicing prices have exploded from ₦12.63tn in 2024 to a projected and staggering ₦15.52tn in 2026. There isn’t a fiscal doctrine on earth that justifies a path of excessive deficits paired with such astronomical servicing prices.
“This administration has hit a wall, and it’s clear that they’re blinded by their very own propaganda. The Federal Authorities of Nigeria is in determined want of a brand new pair of eyes and a radical departure from this path of smash to rebuild a fiscal construction that serves the individuals fairly than simply the collectors.