By Omeiza Ajayi
Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar has accused the President Bola Tinubu administration of mortgaging Nigeria’s crude oil earnings through undisclosed financing arrangements, demanding full disclosure of the terms involved.
His Senior Special Assistant on Public Communication, Phrank Shaibu, said in a statement on Monday that the Presidency’s own defence of its economic record had inadvertently confirmed the concern, rather than dispelled it.
“In attempting to rebut our position, the Presidency inadvertently strengthened it. It admitted that despite higher international crude oil prices, Nigerians cannot fully benefit because substantial volumes of the nation’s crude have already been committed under crude-backed financing arrangements,” the statement read.
The presidential candidate of the African Democratic Congress, ADC, described the admission as an indictment rather than a defence, arguing that if the nation’s future oil earnings had already been encumbered, the administration had merely replaced one fiscal burden with another.
Atiku posed a series of questions he said the government must answer publicly, including who authorised the transactions, how many barrels of crude had been pledged, the repayment terms attached, how much revenue had so far been received, which projects the funds financed, and who the counterparties to the deals were.
“These are not political questions; they are constitutional questions about transparency and accountability,” he said.
The former Vice President linked the oil disclosure demand to the administration’s defence of its removal of the fuel subsidy, noting that the Presidency could not simultaneously claim victory over subsidy while explaining away missing oil revenues by pointing to obligations created by subsidy financing.
“That contradiction speaks louder than any press statement,” he said.
Atiku argued that transparency, not propaganda, remained the true test of fiscal responsibility, adding that a government unwilling to disclose the terms of its crude-backed borrowing had no basis to lecture Nigerians on prudence.
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