People, privations and public policy priorities [5]

By UGO ONUOHA CALAMITY of unimaginable proportion will befall this already fragile country if the economic reform programme of Nigeria’s president, Alhaji Bola Ahmed Tinubu, fails. And the prognosis for its success is not looking good. Tinubu’s SAP 2.0 is almost a wholesale clone of Ibrahim Babangida’s SAP 1.0 of about 40 years ago. That endeavour failed. There’s nothing yet to suggest that its successor will succeed. Though Babangida was a military ruler, his own SAP and its implementation had a human face and a humane touch.Tinubu’s SAP 2.0 is different. Its prescriptions are wide ranging and their implementation ostensibly designed to punish and pauperise and crush Nigerians. Last week, we said that in the concluding part of our intervention today, we will analyse how the country’s “burgeoning [external] debt, lingering cost of living crisis, currency devaluation, increasing despondency and hopelessness among Nigerians, diminishing faith in democracy, general distrust and mistrust of politicians, among others, will most likely constitute strong, even fierce, headwinds to the ongoing economic agenda [of Nigeria’s president, Alhaji Bola Ahmed] Tinubu”. So we will strive to drill them down and examine how a few of these issues could constitute a drag in the quest for economic recovery. We will start with the continuing devaluation of the Naira. Fortunately for us someone has done a historical story on the trajectory of the devaluation of the currency over the decades. About three months ago, one Winifred Amase traced the purchasing power of the Naira over the years, using N100 to illustrate. She wrote on the platform of Voronoi, an organisation that asserts that it visualises data to provide “answers to the world’s questions”. Voronoi’s infographic and historical narration on The Price of 100 Naira over the decades was published on May 26, 2025, the eve of the second anniversary of the rule of Tinubu. Under the headline: ‘Once, N100 Had Serious Buying Power’, Voronoi claimed that “In 1973, N100 could buy 20 bags of rice”. It’s important to remind ourselves that in the 1960s, ‘70s, and even the ‘80s, rice was not our staple food. In the 1960s and the 1970s rice was meal for the elite and the well heeled, and a Sunday Sunday delight for the rest in the cities. For the rural poor, and they are the overwhelming majority, rice was a rare meal reserved for festive seasons such as Christmas, New Year, Easter etc. Children and some adults eagerly looked forward to such occasions. Today, rice meal has been demystified, so much so, that it has become a routine, indeed a daily food stripped of its alluring trappings and garnishing. On the average, a 50kg bag of rice now costs about N80,000 in a country where the minimum wage is N70,000. But back to Voronoi’s jarring findings. The same N100 that could buy 20 bags of rice about 50 years ago can barely procure two pure water sachets. “As at January 2025”, Voronoi continues, “it’s [N100] value had dropped so significantly that it could only purchase two pure water sachets. [Pure water aka sachet water is drinking water packaged in heat-sealed sachets. It usually holds around 35cl of drinking water]. This infographic charts the decline in the purchasing power of N100 from 1960 to 2025 – highlighting over six decades of inflation and currency devaluation”. For context, it said that Algeria which gained its independence two years after Nigeria’s, had by 2024 “overtaken Nigeria as the third largest economy in Africa, with its economy maintaining a significantly stronger exchange rate in which 1 Algerian Dinar equals approximately 12 Naira”. Voronoi was mindful to state that Naira was introduced as Nigeria’s national currency in 1973. Another person also ran a commentary on the trajectory of the value of the Naira vis-a-vis the United States Dollars in the last 50 years and counting. The commentator said it was $1:N0.58k in 1973 when Gen. Yakubu Gowon was in office; $1:N0.63k in 1974; $1:N0.61k in 1975 under Gen. Murtala Muhammed; under Gen. Olusegun Obasanjo who succeeded the slain Muhammed in 1976, the exchange rate was $1:N0.62k and later during his tenure fell to N0.68k in 1978; in 1979 during the time of the first executive president of Nigeria, Alhaji Shehu Aliyu Shagari, the exchange rate was N0.59k to one United States Dollar. In 1983 during the first incarnation of the man who turned out to be the country’s affliction, one dollar exchanged for N0.72k and N0.76k in 1984: in 1985 with Gen. Ibrahim Babangida as military president, the rate was $1:N0.89kobo. That year was the end of the innocence of the Naira. By 1986 and with the introduction of SAP 1.0, the value of the Naira began the precipitous journey down the slippery slope against the Dollar and the other world currencies. It started from N2.2k to N9.91k in 1992. Then came Gen. Sani Abacha in 1993 and $1 exchanged for N21.90k and down to N84. 56k in 1997. At the demise of Abacha and Abdusalami Abubakar took over in 1998, the exchange rate was N84.70k:$1. Nigeria returned to democracy in 1999 with the election of Obasanjo as a civilian president. Here’s how the Naira value fared in the eight years of Obasanjo: 1999, $1:N90; 2000, $1:N105; 2001, $1:N106; 2002, $1:N113; 2003, $1:N127; 2004, $1:N130; 2005, N136; 2006, N131.80k. President Umaru Yar’Adua took office in 2007 with $1 exchanging for N125, but in 2008 a dollar exchanged for N120 in what appeared to be an arrest of the free fall of the Naira. But in 2009, the Naira dropped to N171 to the dollar. Under the presidency of Goodluck Jonathan in 2010 the exchange rate fell from N171 to N199 in 2014, the last full year of his presidency. Gen. Buhari became the elected president in 2015 and the rate fell to N300/$, and left office in 2023 with the rate at N460. Between 2023 and 2024, the first year of President Tinubu, the exchange rate of the Naira fell from N460 to N1,483 to one US