– ‘Deep trouble’ –
“With depleted foreign reserves, falling oil prices, leakages and debts, the Nigerian economy is in deep trouble and will require careful management to bring it round,” the president said, not mincing words about the state of the economic crisis.
Low oil prices have hammered government revenues, leaving thousands of public workers unpaid for months, weakening the naira currency to historic lows and forcing state projects to be shelved.
He described Nigeria’s current level of electricity output as “a national shame”, with residents of Africa’s top oil producer facing interminable power cuts that can last for days, and sometimes weeks.
“We will not allow this to go on,” Buhari said.
The speech recalled the country’s pre-colonial history and leaders, listing a series of tribal monarchs whose legacies are still celebrated in the areas where they reigned.
“The blood of those great ancestors flow in our veins,” Buhari said, while blasting the comparatively poor performance of Nigeria’s leaders since independence from Britain in 1960.
“Some of their successors behaved like spoilt children breaking everything and bringing disorder to the house,” the president said.
He noted that after an unprecedented election win that saw the opposition defeat a sitting president for the first time in Nigeria’s history, his administration was “basking in a reservoir of goodwill and high expectations”.
“We have an opportunity,” Buhari said. “Let us take it.”
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