The budget ritual

EVERY year, it unfolds with a familiar cadence. The fanfare, the presidential assent, the grandiose titles, and the staggering figures that numb the mind. The Nigerian government has once again performed its annual ritual: the presentation and approval of the budget. For 2025, the Federal Government unveiled a N54.99 trillion budget, christened the “Budget of Restoration: Securing Peace and Rebuilding Prosperity.” Yet, beneath this veneer of ambition and hope lies a disturbing reality of fiscal disarray, a crippling addiction to debt, and a profound disconnect from the lived experiences of the ordinary Nigerian. The 2025 budget has not a blueprint for restoration; it is a script for continued stagnation.

Let us first confront the most alarming spectre haunting this budget: the nation’s unsustainable debt habit. The Federal Government’s approved expenditure of N49.74 trillion is to be funded by a projected revenue of only N36.35 trillion, leaving a cavernous deficit of N13.39 trillion. This gap is to be bridged, as always, by borrowing. Astonishingly, even before the end of the  2025 fiscal year, in the first ten months of this year, the government had already borrowed N17.36 trillion—a figure that overshoots its own prorated borrowing target for that period by a staggering 55.6 percent. With plans to secure an additional $2.35 billion via Eurobonds, the total borrowing for the cycle could balloon to N20.74 trillion. This borrowing binge creates a vicious and self-defeating cycle.

The single largest allocation in the entire 2025 budget is not for education, healthcare, or infrastructure; it is N16.33 trillion for debt service. This means Nigeria is borrowing colossal sums not to build a future, but merely to pay the interest on past loans. It is a fiscal treadmill that is accelerating, leaving future generations shackled by the liabilities incurred today, with little to show in productive assets. This leads to the second critical failure: the chasm between proposal and reality. As Seun Onigbinde, co-founder of BudgIT, rightly pointed out, there is a “gross disconnect” in the government’s budgeting process. The numbers on paper bear little resemblance to the outcomes on the ground. While N14.85 trillion is allocated for capital projects, history has shown that the actual implementation of these projects is often delayed, underfunded, or abandoned. The 2025 capital budget, for instance, is not expected to have commenced until the end of September 2025, leaving only three months for execution. What, then, is the value of a “Budget of Restoration” that rests for three-quarters of the year?

This theatre of the absurd is not confined to the federal level. A tour of the states reveals a similar pattern. Lagos State, with the country’s largest sub-national budget of ₦3.37 trillion, still grapples with reports of underfunded hospitals. Niger State’s budget saw a meteoric 153.7 percent increase from 2024, largely funded by loans and grants, raising questions about its absorption capacity and the tangible impact on its citizens. While many states proudly allocate more to capital than recurrent expenditure, a noble goal in theory, the execution remains a monumental challenge. Furthermore, with over a quarter of cumulative state expenditure in 2024 going to service debt, the financial noose is tightening across the federation.

The most egregious aspect of this ritual is the sheer grandiloquence and obscurantism that often accompanies it. We need not look further than the now-proverbial example of former Cross River State Governor, Ben Ayade, whose budgets bore titles like “Budget of Kinetic Crystallization” and “Budget of Olimpotic Meristemasis.” While an extreme case, it encapsulates a pervasive attitude: the use of lofty, often meaningless, jargon to mask a vacuum of concrete, actionable plans. These fanciful titles are a smokescreen, distracting from the fact that budgets should be practical tools for development, not abstract academic exercises.

What, then, is the purpose of a budget? It is a moral document that reflects a government’s priorities. It should address the crushing realities faced by millions: the lack of electricity, the dilapidated schools, the collapsing healthcare system, and the pervasive insecurity. Yet, Nigeria’s budgets consistently reveal misplaced priorities. Funds are routinely allocated for new official vehicles and laptops while existing ones are not maintained. More insidiously, budgets have become a sophisticated tool for legalized larceny, where theft is cleverly hidden within obscure subheads, and the common man is the worse for it.

The ritual must end. The political class must move from crafting documents for academic and media acclaim to delivering real, progressive, and life-changing budgets. This requires, first, a commitment to fiscal discipline to break the debt cycle. Second, it demands transparency and accountability in implementation, ensuring that allocated funds are fully released and properly utilised. Third, it necessitates citizen participation in the budgeting process, making it a bottom-up exercise rather than a top-down imposition.

The Nigerian people are tired of the annual dance of billions and trillions. They are weary of budgets that promise “Blush and Bliss” but deliver only blight and hardship. It is time to replace the ritual of restoration with its tangible reality. The 2026 budget, like its predecessors, stands at a crossroads. It can either be another chapter in Nigeria’s national story of fiscal folly, or it can mark a decisive break from the past. The choice, ultimately, rests with those in power. They must now demonstrate, through action, that they are elected to work, not to perform an endless, deceptive dance. Nigerian leaders must choose to work, not to dance.