Former Anambra State Governor and 2023 Labour Party presidential candidate, Peter Obi, has criticised President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s recent boast of achieving Nigeria’s 2025 revenue target ahead of schedule, describing it as insensitive against the backdrop of widespread hardship and unpaid entitlements.
In a post shared via his verified X handle on Thursday, Obi said that celebrating revenue milestones while retirees and small business owners are left in despair shows a lack of compassion from the Federal Government.
“Having met our revenue target for the year ahead of schedule, we should show sensitivity and compassion to the suffering masses by deploying resources to critical areas that will help to create jobs to alleviate the people’s hardships,” Obi stated.
The former governor highlighted that several economic institutions are struggling to access funds, with their inability to meet staff and bank obligations already crippling small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).
He further condemned the government’s handling of pensioners and ex-servicemen, many of whom continue to protest unpaid pensions and gratuities despite years of service to the nation.
“It is shameful that those who built this nation with their sweat, those who defended it with their lives, and those who have fulfilled their contractual obligations are reduced to begging for what is rightfully theirs, even after the government boasts of excess revenue,” Obi said.
He stressed that revenue figures are meaningless if they do not translate into tangible improvements in citizens’ lives. “Achieving revenue targets means nothing if it does not impact the lives of the people, if those who serve and build the nation are left with unpaid entitlements in their difficult years, and SMEs are crippled by debts,” he noted.
Obi urged the Tinubu administration to prioritise integrity, social responsibility, and the welfare of Nigerians, insisting that the nation cannot continue on a path that plunges its people deeper into “debt and despair.”
Reiterating his campaign mantra, Obi concluded: “A New Nigeria is POssible.”
