VICE President, Kashim Shettima, has again blamed his fellow All Progressives Congress (APC) member and immediate past President, Muhammadu Buhari, for the unmitigated economic calamity Nigeria and its citizens are going through due to the removal of the petrol subsidy and floating of the Naira following years of unsustainable borrowings by his administration.
Speaking at the 2nd Chronicle Roundtable, organised by 21st Century Media Services, held at Ladi Kwali Hall, Abuja Continental Hotel, Abuja, on Thursday, May 2, Shettima acknowledged that what President Bola Tinubu met on assumption of office was a “death sentence” economic crisis, even as the President and his team continue to echo the message of hope for a better tomorrow.
According to Shettima: “The year before we took office, Nigeria’s debt service-to-revenue ratio had grown to 111.8 per cent. The anticipated debt crisis may sound like fancy economic jargon to the man on the street, but you and I are in a better position to understand how such miscalculations have played out in other countries. It’s an economic death sentence.”
Offering further explanation on why the Tinubu-led administration removed fuel subsidy, the vice president lamented Nigeria’s debt crisis under Buhari, adding: “In plain terms, our debt servicing was such that if you earned, say, N100,000, the entirety of the money wasn’t only paid to your debtor; you were forced to borrow an additional N11,800 to pay the debtor. How do you intend to survive this, and how many more loans before you become a pariah?”
At the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) conference last August, Tinubu had said: “Can we continue to service external debts with 90 per cent of our revenue? It is a path to destruction. It is not sustainable.
“We must make the very difficult changes that are necessary for our country to get up from slumber and be respected among the great nations of the world.”
