For Too Long, Nigeria’s Leaders Chose Morphine While the Cancer Spread. – President Tinubu

President Bola Ahmed Tinubu on Thursday used a medical analogy to defend his government’s economic reforms, telling Nigerians in his Independence Day address that earlier leaders treated symptoms rather than underlying problems.

In the speech, delivered to mark 66 years of independence under the theme “From Reforms to Prosperity,” Tinubu compared the country to a cancer patient given only pain relief. “Nigeria was like a sick patient who receives the terrible news that he has cancer,” he said. Previous governments, he added, “chose morphine while praying for a miracle that never came.” His administration, he said, chose instead “to excise the cancer.”

Tinubu said the reforms that followed were difficult and that their side effects were real, but he argued they confronted existing weaknesses rather than creating them. He cited figures including economic growth of more than 4 percent this year, a decline in inflation from its peak, reduced oil theft, rebuilt foreign reserves, a more stable foreign-exchange market, and non-oil export earnings of more than $6 billion in 2025, which he described as a record.
He said international observers, journalists, NGOs and multilateral institutions had concluded that the reforms had strengthened Nigeria’s economic stability, and that foreign direct investment had continued to rise.

The president said the “emergency treatment” phase was over and that the government’s focus would now shift to “shared and widespread prosperity.” He defined that as lower living costs, more productive farming, reliable power, access to credit, jobs for young people, and affordable food, transport and education.

He outlined plans to expand irrigation and dry-season farming, improve access to seeds and fertiliser, increase mechanisation, and invest in storage, roads, railways and ports. Savings from lower production and logistics costs, he said, should eventually reduce market prices.

Tinubu also pointed to social programmes, including support for poor households, the National Social Register, education loans, consumer credit through CREDICORP, and timely payment of salaries and pensions. He said these measures were intended as a bridge while the government sought to reduce poverty over time, adding that decades of low productivity and weak institutions could not be reversed in four years.

He urged Nigerians not to abandon the reforms in favour of restored subsidies and said the country should not “look back.” He closed by wishing citizens a happy Independence Day.