It began as a cartoon circulating wildly on social media on the day of the conference.
The image celebrated a fictitious award: the “Loan D’or”, a caricature of the famous “Ballon D’or” for what it mockingly described as “outstanding achievement in borrowing and passing the burden like a boss.”
Beneath the human imagery of the cartoon were the cryptic words: “Bills going up↑, No Light, No Job, Na GOD dey help us!”
The cartoon spread like wildfire. But nowhere was the subject it lampooned examined with greater seriousness than at the “17th Blakey’s National Tax & Economic Conference” held in Lagos under the theme: “The Master’s Borrowings in Nigeria.”
Four guest speakers, including Mr. Emeka Atuma, Dr. Patrick Ossai PhD, Pastor Felix Jarikre, and Mrs. Gloria Okwuosa, dissected Nigeria’s borrowing story from economic, psychological, social, and spiritual dimensions, a debt profile that has alarmed analysts and ordinary citizens alike.
At the centre of the debate is a fundamental question: can Nigeria sustain its current borrowing trajectory while still building the productive capacity needed to repay its obligations? What moral burden does today’s debt place on generations not yet born?
The analysts delivered a verdict that was by turns alarming, analytical, and deeply philosophical.
Chief Blakey Okwudili Ijezie, founder of the Blakey Ijezie Foundation and convener of the conference, set the philosophical tone in his keynote address with a critical question he said history will ask of this generation: “Not how much did we borrow — but what did we build with what we borrowed?”
What the guest speakers’ data shows:
The entire gamut of the fiscal picture presented by the guest speakers reveals a debt profile that has expanded dramatically under the current administration.
Dr. Ossai said the scale and speed of Nigeria’s debt accumulation is frightening, citing reliable sources of his data including Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), and the Debt Management Office (DMO). Hear him:
- Nigeria’s public debt stood at approximately N87.38 trillion when the Tinubu administration assumed office in May 2023
- By December 2024, debt had risen to N144.67 trillion — a jump of over N57 trillion in roughly 18 months
- By December 2025, debt stood at N149.28 trillion, with projections pointing toward N193 trillion by end-2026 if current trends hold
- The 2026 budget stands at N68.32 trillion — 2.8 times the size of earlier budgets — against a deficit of N23.85 trillion
- In 2023, budgeted revenue was N24 trillion; actual revenue was approximately N10 trillion, leaving a deficit of N11 trillion financed by N8 trillion in borrowing
- Domestic T-bill issuance to finance budget deficits ran at N9.62 trillion in 2023, N7.8 trillion in 2024, and N8.5 trillion in 2025, with N10.07 trillion projected for 2026
- The debt-service-to-revenue ratio peaked at 97% in 2023 before declining to approximately 48–49% in 2025, aided partly by GDP rebasing
- The debt-to-GDP ratio rose from 29.4% in 2023 to 42.5% in 2024, before dropping to 39.8% in 2025 following economic rebasing
All the speakers agreed that the scale and speed of debt accumulation over a very short time is frightening, and raises serious fiscal sustainability concerns.
More insights:
For many participants at the conference, Nigeria’s borrowing pattern signals a decisive and dangerous shift — from development financing toward what one speaker described as survival financing.
- Speakers across disciplines agreed that borrowing is not inherently wrong, but drew a conclusion that Nigeria’s borrowing has become structurally detached from productive investment.
- The administration has secured significant external facilities, including World Bank financing of approximately $8.75 billion across 14 projects in power, health, education, and social intervention
- Multilateral loans estimated at $10 billion for infrastructure and budget support
- However, most domestic borrowings have been directed at financing recurrent budget deficits rather than capital assets capable of generating future revenue — a pattern speakers described as fiscally unsustainable.
- The N22.7 trillion in Ways and Means advances inherited from the Buhari administration was securitised into a long-term loan of approximately 40 years, restructuring a legacy liability without eliminating it.
- A key concern raised was the geographic concentration of major loan-funded projects, with speakers arguing that in a federation of 36 states, borrowing benefits must reflect federal character and be distributed evenly across all geopolitical zones.
- The IMF’s assessment that 63% of Nigerians now live below the poverty line — even as the government pursues further external borrowing — sharpened the debate around the human cost of Nigeria’s fiscal posture.
Yet, as participants examined both the data and the governance behaviour behind it, a broader consensus emerged: the deeper problem is not borrowing itself, but the absence of a transparent, productivity-linked framework that ties every loan to measurable economic returns.
Convener’s comments:
In his keynote address, Chief Blakey Okwudili Ijezie, said borrowing is an intergenerational ethical instrument rather than merely a fiscal tool.
- “Nations are not judged by the ease of their choices. They are judged by the wisdom of their stewardship,” said the retired Chartered Accountant.
- “Every loan contracted in the name of Nigeria is ultimately contracted in the name of Nigerians — not merely today’s Nigerians, but tomorrow’s Nigerians as well.”
- “Honestly, transparently, and truthfully, I do not know where much of the borrowed money is going,” he said.
- He cited the Lagos Coastal Highway as a project whose visible output does not appear to justify its reported cost.
- “Is that road truly Nigeria’s most urgent development need? My answer is an emphatic no.”
- “One of the best decisions President Bola Tinubu made was appointing Taiwo Oyedele to lead the tax reform effort. In my view, tax reform is the administration’s most significant achievement,” Ijezie pointed out taxation as only remarkable achievement of this administration.
He added, however, that implementation has slowed considerably due to political headwinds, and expressed hope that reforms would be pursued more comprehensively after the elections.
The experts weigh in:
The industry and academic experts elaborated extensively on both the data and the structural risks embedded in Nigeria’s current trajectory.
Dr. Patrick Ossai, who titled his presentation as “The Thrills and Flops of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s Borrowing Policies”, acknowledged measured progress on debt sustainability ratios while sounding a sharp warning on pace and purpose.
- “Not just the scale — the speed with which they are accumulating this debt is frightening,” he said, noting that annual borrowing under the current administration has been claimed at N49 trillion, compared to N4.7 trillion under Buhari — more than Nigeria borrowed in its first 55 years of independence.
- He also warned against the growing pattern of borrowing to service existing debt.
- “You are compounding interest. You are extending the burden to the future generation,” he said.
- Echoing BudgIT’s Seun Onigbinde has cautioned that taking loans quarterly is more dangerous than wasted public revenues because it mortgages income not yet earned.
Mr. Emeka Atuma, a Banking & Finance expert and Data Scientist, brought the discussion home, challenging the government’s budget arithmetic directly.
- “When you do your budgets, you estimate how much you are going to earn, you estimate what you want to spend — the difference is what you should borrow. Not the two together,” he said.
- He questioned why the 2026 budget had been pushed to N68.32 trillion without a credible financing plan, and argued that the fiscal problem is partly one of disclosure.
- “The real problem is not that we are not taxing enough — it is that we are not disclosing what we are taxing, and we are not implementing what we have already designed,” Mr. Atuma submitted.
Pastor Felix Jarikre addressed the psychological and spiritual underpinnings of Nigeria’s debt culture, examining how the psychology of easy oil money has eroded national discipline and how communities now bear the social weight of fiscal recklessness long after policy cycles turn.
Mrs. Gloria Okwuosa, a PhD candidate at Covenant University, grounded the discussion in academic and wellness frameworks, exploring the social and human development consequences of a fiscal posture that consistently prioritises creditor confidence over citizen welfare.
What you should know:
Nigeria’s public debt is estimated at approximately N149.28 trillion as of December 2025, with projections suggesting it could approach N193 trillion by end-2026.
- The debt-service-to-revenue ratio peaked at 97% in 2023 — meaning N97 of every N100 earned went to debt repayment.
- Debt-service-to-revenue ratio improved to approximately 48–49% in 2025 following GDP rebasing and fiscal adjustments.
- The 2026 budget of N68.32 trillion carries a deficit of N23.85 trillion, with domestic borrowing projected at N10.07 trillion to cover the shortfall.
All four conference speakers agreed that borrowing is not inherently wrong but condemned the lack of a transparent, productivity-linked framework connecting loans to measurable economic outcomes.
Speakers warned that continuing to borrow primarily to finance recurrent deficits, without commensurate productive investment, places an unjust and compounding fiscal burden on future generations of Nigerians who had no voice in contracting the debt.
