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“The age of reform has done its work. Now begins the age of prosperity,” President Bola Ahmed Tinubu declared on Thursday, as he assured Nigerians that the country had moved beyond the difficult phase of economic reforms and entered a new era focused on shared and widespread prosperity.
Tinubu, in his 66th Independence Day address to Nigerians, said the reforms undertaken by his administration since 2023 had corrected the country’s economic direction and laid the foundation for sustainable growth, with the government now focused on translating those gains into improved living conditions for citizens.
According to the President, Nigeria’s economy had grown by over four per cent in 2026, while inflation had fallen substantially from its peak, oil theft had reduced, foreign reserves had been rebuilt and the foreign exchange market had stabilised. He also said the country recorded its highest-ever non-oil export revenue in 2025, exceeding $6 billion.
Tinubu acknowledged that the reforms had imposed real hardships on Nigerians, but argued that the difficulties were consequences of correcting longstanding economic distortions rather than problems created by the reforms. He likened the pre-2023 economy to a patient with cancer who had been given painkillers instead of treatment, saying his administration chose to confront the underlying problems.
He said the next phase of his administration would centre on reducing the cost of living by lowering the cost of production and transportation, increasing agricultural production, expanding irrigation and mechanisation, improving storage and transport infrastructure, and strengthening roads, railways and ports linking farms and industries to markets.
The President also placed job creation, enterprise and industrial development at the heart of the new phase, promising greater use of gas for industrialisation, support for businesses and factories, wider digital connectivity, skills development and improved access to infrastructure and finance. He said his ambition was to see more Nigerians producing goods, more Nigerian farms feeding cities and industries, and more Nigerian businesses competing in the global market.
Addressing vulnerable Nigerians, Tinubu said his administration would continue strengthening social protection, education financing, healthcare and other essential public services. He cited the National Social Register, Nigerian Education Loan Fund and CREDICORP among initiatives designed to support low-income households, students and working Nigerians, stressing that such programmes were intended as a bridge towards prosperity rather than a substitute for it.
The President said Nigeria could not erase in four years the challenges accumulated over generations but could change their direction. Declaring that the country had “corrected its course,” Tinubu urged Nigerians to move forward with renewed hope, insisting that the nation’s destination was “a Nigeria of abundance and opportunity” where prosperity would be broadly shared.
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