Tinubu’s mounting debt: Why Nigerian youths must demand transparent loan governance

Nigeria is borrowing at a scale that should command sober national attention—especially from the younger generation. Borrowing is not inherently reckless. Every serious economy uses debt to stabilise transitions, finance infrastructure, and unlock growth. The question is whether Nigeria is governing these borrowings with discipline and transparency to protect the generation that will ultimately repay them.

The borrowing record

According to the Debt Management Office, Nigeria’s total public debt as of September 30, 2025 stood at approximately ₦153.29 trillion (about $103.94 billion at the official reporting rate), representing a quarterly increase of roughly ₦900 billion from June 2025. About 53 percent is domestic, while roughly 47 percent is external. Since President Bola Tinubu assumed office in May 2023, Nigeria has expanded borrowing across multilateral institutions, the international capital market, sovereign Sukuk issuances, oil-backed liquidity facilities, and regular domestic bond and Treasury Bill auctions. Fresh commitments from the World Bank since mid-2023 are widely reported at about $8–9 billion. The African Development Bank has approved $500 million in late 2025 and a further $200 million in early 2026.

Nigeria returned to the Eurobond market in November 2025, issuing about $2.35 billion across 10- and 20-year tranches. A February 23, 2026 bond auction raised roughly ₦524 billion at stop rates between 15.50 and 15.74 percent. These figures frame the governance questions. Are there institutional systems robust enough to translate these borrowings into visible productive capacity capable of expanding output and strengthening public finances? And how explicitly are future generations being considered in decisions that will bind them for decades?

The numbers that matter

Public debate often leans on debt-to-GDP as reassurance. By that metric, Nigeria does not appear extreme compared to heavily indebted advanced economies. But GDP does not repay debt; revenue does. The binding constraint, therefore, is debt service relative to revenue. Commercial borrowing priced near nine percent in dollar terms only intensifies that pressure. In the proposed 2026 federal budget of roughly ₦58 trillion, debt service is projected at between ₦15.52 trillion and ₦15.9 trillion — about 27 percent of total expenditure. Against expected federal revenue of approximately ₦34.33 trillion, this represents roughly 45 percent of projected revenue. By comparison, combined allocations for education (₦3.52T), health (₦2.48T), defence/security (₦5.41T), and infrastructure (₦3.56T) total about ₦14.97 trillion — less than projected debt service—underscoring the crowding-out effect. In concrete terms, Nigeria is projected to spend more servicing existing debt than funding four critical development and security pillars combined.

That narrowing fiscal space — not the headline debt figure alone — is the structural vulnerability. Debt is sustainable when revenue grows and borrowed funds expand productive capacity. It becomes constraining when revenue lags and borrowing finances stabilization without transformation.

The government’s test case

Government officials argue that current borrowings are necessary to unwind inherited distortions: fuel subsidy backlogs, foreign exchange arrears, and the power sector’s liquidity crisis. They emphasise concessional terms and improved revenue performance following subsidy removal and exchange-rate unification, noting that non-oil collections rose sharply in 2025, exceeding targets by over 40 percent. These points deserve acknowledgment. But they do not settle the question. Reforms intended to strengthen public finances should reduce reliance on aggressive borrowing, not normalise it. Concessional debt is cheaper, but it must still be repaid.

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The decisive issue is whether borrowing is being converted into productive capacity fast enough to expand revenue and permanently ease fiscal pressure. With more than half of Nigerians experiencing multidimensional poverty and household purchasing power under sustained inflationary strain, that conversion is urgent. If infrastructure gaps remain visible and productivity fails to rise, borrowing risks stabilising symptoms rather than correcting structural weaknesses. Debt sustainability will ultimately be tested by shocks that cannot be legislated away — oil downturns, exchange-rate weakness, higher refinancing costs, or growth underperformance. Without sustained revenue expansion beyond oil and one-off reforms, debt service will continue to compress development spending.

That burden will not fall primarily on today’s policymakers. It will fall on the young.

The moral dimension

There is also a moral dimension that public discourse often overlooks. A responsible parent does not incur debt without tying it to something that strengthens the household — education, shelter, enterprise — and matching liabilities with assets capable of sustaining repayment. Nations are not families, but stewardship follows the same principle. A generation in political power holds authority in trust. It administers the future; it does not own it. Borrowing is therefore an intergenerational decision.

If debt is contracted, government must translate it into tangible productivity-enhancing assets—reliable and affordable grid electricity, efficient logistics—rails, roads, seaports and airports, competitive agriculture, digital infrastructure, and stronger revenue institutions. Leaving liabilities without building capacity is not merely imprudent; it is unjust to those who had no voice in the decision.

Nigeria’s young population cannot vote retroactively on today’s borrowing decisions. But they will live with the consequences. That is why debt governance is not only an economic question. It is a moral one.

A framework for transparent debt governance

What, then, should young Nigerians demand?

First, fiscal rules anchored not only on debt-to-GDP but on debt service relative to revenue, with enforceable thresholds. Second, a public loan-to-project dashboard linking borrowing to specific projects, milestones, disbursement schedules, and measurable outputs—megawatts delivered, kilometres completed, irrigation hectares expanded, and broadband penetration increased. Third, a productivity test before major debt is contracted, including a cost-benefit disclosure and clarity on whether a project is self-liquidating or purely budget-financed. Fourth, explicit management of foreign exchange and refinancing risk, with limits on high-cost commercial borrowing.

Fifth, the press must follow the money to outcomes. Youth organisations — including NANS — can demand periodic town halls and transparent disclosure of loan-funded projects.

The institutional balance

Debt governance becomes more demanding in periods of concentrated political dominance. When one political party controls the Presidency, 31 of 36 state governments, and a supermajority in the National Assembly, the burden of institutional self-scrutiny increases rather than diminishes. In such circumstances, Nigerians should demand that the National Assembly move beyond routine approval to performance audit — conducting quarterly oversight hearings, publishing independent audits, and enforcing consequences for non-performance. Opposition political parties, as institutions of democratic accountability, must insist on project-level transparency and measurable results — and demonstrate fiscal seriousness through coherent, evidence-based alternatives.

President Tinubu himself once spoke forcefully in opposition about fiscal discipline and public debt management. Democratic accountability is cyclical. Standards demanded in opposition must be upheld in government. Nigeria has also experienced moments of fiscal reset. Under President Olusegun Obasanjo, international negotiations in 2005–2006 secured substantial debt relief and reduced external exposure. That episode demonstrates what fiscal discipline and diplomacy can achieve. Today’s rising debt accumulation makes that contrast instructive.

Why youth must lead this conversation

Nigeria is one of the youngest nations in the world. Materialising the demographic dividend depends on building an economy that generates sufficient productivity to absorb and empower its youth. Debt contracted today will be serviced over decades. Today’s primary school pupils, secondary school students, university undergraduates, and young professionals will shoulder the repayment burden. They will pay. That is why this debate must be structural, not partisan.

Young Nigerians should ask: What asset is being built with debt in my name? How will it accelerate industrialisation? What revenue stream will service this obligation? What reform reduces the need for further borrowing tomorrow? Will future governments borrow again to refinance today’s obligations, repeating the pattern seen in the power sector?

Debt can build power gridsand industrial clusters. Or it can entrench rollover dependency.

Nigeria is in a high-debt reform phase. The difference between transformation and stagnation will be decided not by rhetoric, but by disciplined governance. Debt is not the problem. Debt without institutional accountability is.