Oye to Tinubu: Turn $53.11bn FX reserves, 4.43% growth into cheaper food, more jobs

By Merit Ibe

Chairman, Alliance for Economic Research and Ethics LTD/GTE, Dele Oye, has urged President Bola Tinubu’s administration to turn recent economic gains into lower food prices, more productive jobs and better living standards for Nigerians.

Oye said the government deserved credit for taking difficult economic decisions over the past three years, including the removal of petrol subsidy, foreign exchange reforms, the end of monetary financing of fiscal deficits, rebuilding of external reserves and tighter monetary policy.

However, he said macroeconomic stability was only the beginning, stressing that the success of the reforms should ultimately be judged by their impact on ordinary Nigerians.

In a statement titled, “The Economy Is Stabilising. Now Let the People Feel It,” Oye said Nigeria’s recent economic figures showed signs of improvement.

He cited foreign exchange reserves, which reached a 17-year high of $53.11 billion as of August 24, 2026, as evidence of stronger external buffers.

He also pointed to the National Bureau of Statistics’ report that Nigeria’s economy grew by 4.43 per cent year-on-year in the second quarter of 2026, up from 3.89 per cent in the previous quarter, with both the oil and non-oil sectors recording stronger growth.

According to Oye, the figures suggest that the economy is moving from merely surviving to gaining momentum, but stronger reserves and economic growth would not automatically improve Nigerians’ welfare.

He said, “Nigerians should be honest enough to acknowledge progress when progress has been made and courageous enough to say when progress has not yet become prosperity.

“The Tinubu administration deserves credit for taking decisions that many Nigerian governments postponed for years.

The removal of the petrol subsidy, the movement toward a more market-based foreign-exchange regime, the abandonment of monetary financing of fiscal deficits, the rebuilding of external reserves, and the tightening of monetary policy were politically costly measures.

“They imposed pain, but they also confronted distortions that had been quietly weakening the foundations of the Nigerian economy.”

Oye said the reforms had given Nigeria a clearer economic direction, a more credible foreign exchange framework and stronger external buffers.

He noted that the International Monetary Fund reported that Nigeria’s gross international reserves, based on the Central Bank of Nigeria definition, rose from $40 billion at the end of 2024 to $46 billion at the end of 2025, while net reserves increased from $23 billion to $35 billion.

He also welcomed the broader-based economic growth, saying stronger performance in both the oil and non-oil sectors was a positive development.

“The IMF estimated 4.0 per cent growth for 2025 and is forecasting 4.1 per cent for 2026, with services and non-oil activity doing much of the heavy lifting,” he said.

Despite the improvements, Oye warned that millions of Nigerians were still struggling with poverty and food insecurity.

He cited an IMF assessment that estimated poverty at 63 per cent at the national poverty line and 27 million Nigerians facing food insecurity in autumn 2025.

He said the figures highlighted the gap between economic performance and the daily reality of households.

Oye urged the government to move from economic stabilisation to measures that directly improve Nigerians’ lives.

“President Tinubu’s administration has done something important: it has begun to move Nigeria away from denial,” he said.

“It has acknowledged that subsidies, opaque foreign-exchange regimes, deficit monetisation, weak revenue mobilisation, and fragile financial institutions cannot deliver national prosperity.

“But courage at the beginning of reform must become competence at the point of delivery. The administration now has to convert stabilisation into lived security.”

According to him, government must make the economy “not only investable, but inhabitable; not only credible to markets, but useful to families; not only resilient on paper, but humane in practice.”

Oye said the impact of reforms should be measured by the experiences of ordinary Nigerians rather than economic statistics alone.

“The trader, farmer, teacher, apprentice, nurse, transport worker, student, and small manufacturer are not impatient spectators waiting for theory to mature. They are the economy,” he said.

He called for greater focus on food affordability, job creation, business opportunities and improved public services.

“The measure of the Tinubu economic project will therefore not be whether Nigeria can recite its reserves, growth rate, debt ratio, or reform catalogue,” Oye said.

“The measure will be whether a young Nigerian can work hard without being crushed by disorder; whether a family can eat without choosing between food and medicine; whether an honest business can compete without bribery; and whether public revenue can be seen in public good.”

“Nigeria has begun to stabilise. Now it must begin to heal. That is the passage from policy to people and from insight to impact,” he added.