By Lemmy Ughegbe, Ph.D
When President Bola Ahmed Tinubu stood before a joint session of the National Assembly on 19 December 2025 to present the 2026 Appropriation Bill, the moment was framed not merely as a constitutional ritual, but as a referendum on the direction and durability of his reform project.
The President described it as a “Budget of Consolidation, Renewed Resilience and Shared Prosperity.” The more searching question Nigerians must now ask is whether this budget truly consolidates reform or merely extends transition pains under a more confident narrative.
The speech was carefully calibrated. It was sober in tone, dense with statistics, and attentive to public fatigue. Tinubu acknowledged the hardship occasioned by reforms without romanticising it.
That candour alone marks a departure from the denialist optimism that often colours budget rhetoric in Nigeria. Yet acknowledgement is not resolution. The real test lies in whether the figures, priorities, and execution commitments correspond with the lived realities of ordinary Nigerians.
The headline numbers are striking. Total projected expenditure of ₦58.18 trillion against expected revenue of ₦34.33 trillion leaves a deficit of ₦23.85 trillion, about 4.28 per cent of GDP. This gap is not trivial. While it falls within the range government officials describe as manageable, it reinforces the uncomfortable truth that Nigeria remains heavily dependent on borrowing. Debt servicing alone, estimated at ₦15.52 trillion, continues to consume a disproportionate share of national resources, squeezing fiscal space for social investment.
The administration’s defence is that this deficit underwrites stabilisation. Tinubu points to improving macroeconomic indicators as justification for cautious optimism: GDP growth of 3.98 per cent in the third quarter of 2025, inflation easing from over 24 per cent in March to 14.45 per cent by November, improved oil output, stronger non-oil revenue performance, and external reserves climbing to a seven-year high of roughly 47 billion dollars.
These indicators matter. Inflation moderation, in particular, offers psychological relief in a country where food prices have become a daily source of distress. Yet macroeconomic aggregates often conceal distributional pain. The central question remains whether stabilisation is being felt beyond spreadsheets and into homes, classrooms, hospitals, and markets.
A closer look at sectoral allocations between the 2025 and 2026 budgets clarifies the administration’s underlying priorities. Defence and security spending rose from approximately ₦4.9 trillion in 2025 to ₦5.41 trillion in 2026.
This increase reflects continuity rather than escalation. Insecurity continues to dominate Nigeria’s fiscal imagination, underscoring how deeply terrorism, banditry, and violent criminality shape governance choices. The issue, however, is no longer how much Nigeria spends on security, but how effectively it spends it. Defence has consistently absorbed some of the most significant allocations in successive budgets, yet insecurity persists.
Without parallel investments in intelligence coordination, criminal justice reform, accountability, and civil–military trust, rising defence spending risks reinforcing a cycle where expenditure grows but outcomes remain elusive.
Education allocation increased modestly from about ₦3.3 trillion in 2025 to ₦3.52 trillion in 2026. This aligns with the administration’s emphasis on access, particularly through the Nigerian Education Loan Fund, which has supported over 788,000 students nationwide.
While the increase is welcome, it remains incremental in a sector burdened by decaying infrastructure, staff shortages, frequent industrial actions, and declining learning outcomes. Student loans expand access, but they do not resolve the more profound quality crisis.
Without sustained investment in basic education, teacher development, research funding, and tertiary infrastructure, Nigeria risks widening enrolment without improving competence.
Healthcare allocation also rose, from approximately ₦2.3 trillion in 2025 to ₦2.48 trillion in 2026, bringing health spending to about six per cent of the budget net of liabilities. This is supplemented by promised external support, including over 500 million dollars in United States-backed health interventions.
While the increase signals intent, it falls far short of transformation. Nigeria remains well below the Abuja Declaration benchmark of 15 per cent. Incremental improvements may stabilise programmes, but they are insufficient to resolve systemic challenges such as medical brain drain, weak primary healthcare coverage, and out-of-pocket expenditure that continues to push households into poverty.
Infrastructure spending increased from roughly ₦3.2 trillion in 2025 to ₦3.56 trillion in 2026, reflecting the administration’s belief that roads, rail, energy, ports, and agriculture are the conduits through which reform becomes visible to citizens. Here, the implications depend almost entirely on execution.
Nigeria’s problem has never been a lack of infrastructure plans, but a surplus of abandoned projects and cost overruns. The renewed emphasis on completing priority projects rather than spreading resources thinly across too many sites could mark a quiet but meaningful shift from ambition to delivery, if sustained.
Taken together, these comparisons suggest a government firmly in consolidation mode rather than expansion mode. The increases are real but measured, shaped by the heavy burden of debt servicing and the desire to project fiscal discipline after two turbulent reform years.
Security continues to crowd out social spending, while education and health improve incrementally rather than dramatically. Infrastructure remains the bridge between reform rhetoric and lived experience.
The language of consolidation is revealing. Tinubu is no longer selling shock reforms; he is disciplined in sales. Repeated assurances of stricter budget execution, tighter fiscal controls, and digitised revenue mobilisation suggest an administration that understands reform credibility now depends less on bold announcements and more on consistent delivery.
Yet history urges caution. Similar promises have adorned previous budgets, only to falter under weak enforcement and political compromise. Execution remains Nigeria’s perennial weakness.
Tinubu himself acknowledged that by the third quarter of 2025, only about 17.7 per cent of the capital budget had been released, mainly due to the rollover of 2024 capital projects. While the explanation is plausible, it also exposes systemic inefficiencies. Citizens do not live in fiscal transition periods; they live with unfinished roads, unreliable power, and overstretched hospitals.
Perhaps the most politically consequential element of the 2026 budget is its narrative. Tinubu is asking Nigerians to believe that sacrifice has purpose and that pain has an endpoint. This is a risky appeal in a society where patience has often been exploited.
Trust will not be rebuilt through eloquence alone. It will be restored when projects are completed, prices stabilise sustainably, institutions function predictably, and public value becomes visible.
The President is correct on one central point: the most crucial budget is not the one announced, but the one delivered. The year 2026 will test whether consolidation translates into completion, whether resilience yields relief, and whether prosperity becomes a shared experience rather than an elite abstraction. For now, the numbers are on the table. The burden of proof has shifted decisively from rhetoric to results.
Dr Lemmy Ughegbe, FIMC, CMC
Email: lemmyughegbeofficial@gmail.com
WhatsApp ONLY: +2348069716645
