Former President Olusegun Obasanjo has dismissed President Bola Tinubu’s justification for national borrowing, declaring that the country’s continuous accumulation of debt remains a deadlier threat to future generations than the leprosy disease.
Speaking on Friday at the 3rd Ajibosin Annual Symposium held at the Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library in Abeokuta, Ogun State, Obasanjo fired back at recent remarks by President Tinubu downplaying the country’s debt burden. He described the current economic justifications for excessive borrowing as unacceptable.
“For anybody to say debt is no leprosy is absolute nonsense. Debt is worse than leprosy, because leprosy destroys only one person. Debt destroys generations…”When I started my farm 47 years ago, one naira to the dollar was one naira to one dollar 85 cents. What has Nigeria done in 47 years that we now have N1,500 naira to the dollar? What have we done?”, Obasanjo stated.
The former President also condemned the influence of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) on Nigeria’s economic policies. He argued that foreign institutional directives were never designed for the prosperity of developing nations.
During the symposium, which focused on leveraging artificial intelligence for grassroots development, Obasanjo also warned against the unchecked adoption of foreign technologies. He stated that blindly adopting foreign economic models and artificial intelligence without localized control remains a path to national destruction. He also stated that innovations introduced by powerful foreign countries could easily become tools of exploitation if African leaders failed to establish sovereign control and adequate safeguards.
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