- Atiku Abubakar fired back at President Bola Ahmed Tinubu after the president claimed prosperity was near and living conditions were getting better
- The former vice president’s statement, issued through aide Phrank Shaibu, challenged Tinubu to stop blaming past governments after more than three years in office
- Atiku said his own administration would invest in manufacturing, education, and agriculture to unlock Nigeria’s youthful population as an economic asset
Legit.ng journalist Ridwan Adeola Yusuf has over nine years of experience covering politics, elections, public affairs, and governance in Nigeria and Africa.
FCT, Abuja – Atiku Abubakar, former vice-president and presidential candidate of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), on Friday, July 31, questioned what Nigeria President Bola Tinubu meant when he said “prosperity is on the horizon” and that “the quality of life is improving,” asking whether the president was describing a country different from the one millions of Nigerians wake up to every day.
The reaction was contained in a statement signed by Phrank Shaibu, Atiku’s Senior Special Assistant on Public Communication, obtained by Legit.ng. In the statement, Shaibu said the president’s comments exposed a dangerous disconnect between the country’s leadership and the people they govern.
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ADC’s Atiku tackles Tinubu again
“Mr. President says prosperity is on the horizon. Nigerians are asking: whose horizon? Certainly not that of the market woman whose capital has been wiped out by inflation. Not that of the civil servant whose salary now expires before the month begins,” Atiku said in the statement.
He went further to cite farming communities displaced by armed groups, families mourning victims of attacks, and households that have quietly cut down on daily meals just to survive.
On the administration’s habit of pointing to inherited problems, Atiku was direct: “The Constitution did not swear President Tinubu into office to explain history. It swore him into office to change it. Every administration inherits problems. Great leaders are remembered for solving them, not for endlessly rehearsing them.”
The former presidential candidate argued that after more than three years in power, the Tinubu government had run out of room to shift blame. He said history would remember the administration for what he called “unprecedented hardship, institutionalised fiscal recklessness, and one of the greatest appropriation scandals in the annals of our nation.”
‘Population not Nigeria’s problem’ – Atiku
Atiku also took aim at the president’s reported comments linking Nigeria’s population to its economic difficulties. He drew a comparison with China, arguing that Beijing did not become a global economic force by treating its large population as a liability.
“China became prosperous because visionary leadership transformed that population into its greatest economic asset through sustained investment in manufacturing, infrastructure, education, technology, and export-led industrialisation,” the statement read.
Atiku said an administration under his leadership would pursue aggressive investment in manufacturing, agriculture, skills acquisition, and export-driven industries, adding that Nigeria’s youth were the country’s “greatest strategic advantage.”
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He also pushed back against what he described as the president’s suggestion that past hunger should make Nigerians more tolerant of present hardship. “Nobody ‘elected’ Tinubu to eliminate the hunger of 1940. Nigerians ‘elected’ him to confront the hunger of today,” Atiku said.
The statement closed with a call for the president to step away from official briefings and engage with the realities ordinary Nigerians face. “If the President truly believes that the quality of life is improving, then one must respectfully remind him that the Nigeria he is talking about exists only in his head,” Atiku said.
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Atiku: retirement rumours aimed at slowing ADC
Earlier, Legit.ng reported that ahead of the 2027 elections, Atiku accused ‘anti-democratic elements’ of attempting to create confusion and dampen the momentum of the ADC.
According to a statement by the ADC presidential candidate’s media office, insinuations that he had quit active politics were fake news, as he prepared to challenge Tinubu.
Source: Legit.ng