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ABUJA – The presidency has lashed out at the opposition camps over what it described as attempts to discredit the achievements of President Bola Tinubu, owing to the forth coming general elections in 2027.
Special Adviser to the President on Information and Strategy, Bayo Onanuga, took to an opinion piece to respond to critics of the president, saying no administration comes close to Tinubu’s achievements in the last three years since he mounted the saddle of leadership.
Onanuga also insisted that no amount of campaign of calumny against the president will derail the president from his developmental strides.
He said Tinubu’s reforms are mostly felt at the regional and state levels, such that governors who were highly indebted to their staff, now sing praises of the Federal Government because of what they draw from the federation account monthly.
Onanuga said, “With politicking intensifying ahead of the January 2027 election, opposition politicians have escalated their campaign of misinformation and calumny to diminish the impact and achievements of this administration over the last three years.
“Two years ago, when the administration was struggling to deal with the unintended consequences of its historic reforms, the campaign would have made sense. But not anymore, as the administration can rightly claim bragging rights for what it has achieved against all odds and why the international community is applauding it for putting Nigeria irrevocably on the path of growth and development.
“The impact of the three-year-old government is best felt at the subnational level – state and local levels. States that hitherto were unable to pay salaries by May 2023, with months of unpaid obligations to their workers and pensioners, are now doing so with ease and dreaming big about infrastructure. In every state I have visited, I have seen this development. Ogun, my state, Oyo, Nasarawa, Enugu, Ebonyi, Kaduna, Kano, Kebbi, Katsina, and others have witnessed development projects spring up, thanks to President Tinubu’s re-engineering of the federation’s finances and increased allocation to the states. When local councils begin to receive their allocations directly from the Federation Account, the Tinubu effect will ensure that more governance cascades down to the 774 local councils.
“State governors who have benefited from this policy have openly admitted that increased allocations have enabled them to bring social and infrastructural development to their states. Many opposition PDP governors who joined the APC did so for this reason—not for the baseless claim that President Tinubu bribed them. Governor Abdulrazak said in December 2024 that his administration embarked on more projects in the first 18 months of Tinubu’s presidency than in his first four years.
“The governor of Ebonyi, Nwifuru, who is building iconic underpasses and overpasses in Abakaliki, credited his ambition to President Tinubu. Governor Peter Mbah similarly attested to this, crediting the naira rain from the centre for his programmes. And Nasarawa State Governor Abdullahi Sule, who understands how Tinubu’s financial re-engineering and the end of the subsidy regime have increased the states’ fortunes, said President Tinubu “has taken the bullets for all of them.”
He admitted that the reform agenda of the president has not been rosy, adding that Tinubu has taken more bullets to birth a viable fiscal reform for the country.
According to Onanuga, despite the toll occasioned by the war against insurgency, Tinubu has not relented in ensuring that the military and other security personnel get required equipment to face the battle headlong.
According to him, “It has not been all rosy the past three years, especially in the area of making our people safe from the band of bandits and terrorists. While the armed forces have been locked in an asymmetrical war against these heartless elements, neutralising their leaders and foot soldiers in several theatres of conflict, the displaced terrorists are attacking vulnerable areas in some of the states, killing and kidnapping.
