Nigeria’s debt profile is no longer just rising; it is rocketing. With the nation’s total debt now suffocating at ₦159.28 trillion, every Nigerian — man, woman, infant — theoretically owes ₦724,000. These are not statistics. They are indictments. They are receipts of governance without results, of promises without performance.
This is no longer economics. This is betrayal.
For years, Abuja has sold borrowing as a bridge to prosperity. Citizens were told: endure today, loans will build tomorrow. Tomorrow came. Tomorrow is empty. Poverty is multiplying. Unemployment is a pandemic. Basic amenities — light, water, roads, drugs — are still miracles for millions.
Where did the money go? The roads are still death traps. The grid still collapses like a drunk. Hospitals are consulting rooms without drugs. Schools are lecture halls without teachers. Yet the debt meter keeps ticking. ₦159.28 trillion borrowed. Zero transformation delivered.
This debt is no longer abstract. It sits on the back of the market woman frying akara in the rain. It chokes the graduate selling data by the roadside. It strangles the civil servant whose salary can’t buy a bag of rice. Nigerians did not borrow this money. But Nigerians are paying for it — in hunger, in anger, in hopelessness.
Let’s be clear: Debt is not the crime. Theft of results is. Nations borrow to build. Nigeria borrows to bleed. We borrow for budgets, but we budget for waste. We borrow for projects, but we project propaganda. We borrow for the future, but mortgage it to cronies.
So we ask: At what point does borrowing become looting with paperwork? At what point does “infrastructure loan” become “election funding”? At what point does government stop explaining and start answering?
Nigerians are not begging. Nigerians are billing. We demand receipts. Show us the kilometer of road per billion borrowed. Show us the megawatt per trillion loaned. Show us one teaching hospital built, not just flagged off. If you cannot, then stop mortgaging our children for your incompetence.
Debt without development is not policy — it is plunder. Debt without transparency is not governance — it is robbery with a pen.
Until then, ₦159.28 trillion is not a figure. It is a tombstone. It is the monument of broken promises. It is the weight crushing 200 million backs. It is proof that a system can owe the world, yet deliver nothing to its own.
Enough of borrowing without building. Enough of excuses without electricity. Enough of debt without dignity.
E-signed: Comrade James Onifade
Advocate for Good Governance and A Better Judicial System
