$1.5bn: Don’t Grant Fresh Loan to Tinubu, APM Tells World Bank, Others

Chuks Okocha in Abuja

The Allied Peoples Movement (APM) has urged the World Bank and other international lenders to protect the interests of over 200 million Nigerians by withholding fresh loans from the ‘squandermaniac’ All Progressives Congress (APC) administration led by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu.

The APM strongly condemned the attempt by President Tinubu to embark on what it described as further mortgaging of the future of millions of Nigerians with a fresh $1.5 billion credit from the World Bank, “even when his administration does not have any clear-cut strategy to repay the over N166.7 trillion debt accumulated under his watch.”

In a statement by the National Publicity Secretary, Abubakar Yusuf, the opposition party stated: “It is unacceptable that, even with the trillions of naira derived from the removal of the subsidy on petrol, the Tinubu administration is engaged in its morbid appetite for borrowing, with nothing to show apart from weakening the value of the naira, thereby crippling our productive sector and reducing the purchasing power of the average Nigerian.

“It is distressing that, whereas the APC administration always claims that the loans are for plausible causes, most of the funds are diverted to the private pockets of a corrupt cabal while Nigerians continue to struggle with collapsed infrastructure and unemployment, with over 140 million citizens unable to afford their daily meals.”

According to the spokesman of the APM, “Since President Tinubu assumed office in 2023, Nigerians have endured extreme hardship, excessive taxes, and the high cost of electricity, transportation, food, basic Medicare and other necessities of life.”

He stated that the scale of the food crisis was reflected in the assessment of the World Food Programme, which estimates that about 35 million Nigerians face acute food insecurity in 2026.

“Most disturbing is that, in the face of President Tinubu’s calamitous misrule, which has plunged our nation into misery and a ‘dark tunnel of uncertainty’, the APC is arrogantly bandying false performance claims and even has the temerity to be contesting the 2027 presidential election.

“It is clear that the APC is mistaking the patience and level of tolerance of Nigerians as a sign of weakness, perhaps believing that they have been conquered. The APC must be made to understand that they are pushing Nigerians to the precipice and there is a limit to which a people can stomach under such circumstances.”

The APM, as a party, he said, was committed to the well-being of Nigerians and restated its call to international financial bodies, including the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, and other international lenders such as China and the United States, among others, not to give any fresh credit to the Tinubu administration, as such was not in the general interest of the nation.

“Nigerians have reached unanimity to vote out the Tinubu-led APC administration in January 2027. Such an ‘outgoing’ administration should not be entrusted with any credit facility on behalf of our nation,” he stressed.

The APM assured Nigerians that, when elected, its presidential candidate, Engr. Seyi Makinde, would reset governance by placing greater emphasis on transparency, fiscal discipline, productive investment, effective utilisation of the nation’s resources and revamping of the productive sector to ensure a new lease of life for all Nigerians.