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By Francesca Hangeior

Former Governor, Central Bank of Nigeria, Mohammed Sanusi, has said it is an injustice to blame the administration of President Bola Tinubu for the current economic hardship the country is facing.

Sanusi said the country is battling a failing economy due to mismanaged economic policies of the past eight years.

He stated this while speaking virtually on Sunday at a religious event in Abuja.

He said he would not join those who are bent on criticising Tinubu over the current economic challenges in the country.

Sanusi said, “I have been, over the years, talking about the pending crisis ahead of the current economic hardship. Any economist who has studied monetary policy in the last eight years knows that Nigerians will fall into this difficult situation.

“The difficult situation Nigerians are facing is just the beginning (if the right decision is not put in place) because Nigeria is not exceptional; such situations happened in Germany, Zimbabwe, Uganda, and Venezuela.

“The previous administration turned adamant about our appeal for corrective measures (on the economic policy). I have said in the presence of the now sitting president in Kaduna state, any politician who tells you that things will be easy, don’t vote for him because he is lying. People merely dismissed my advisory as a political statement.

“If I am to be fair and just to President Bola Tinubu, he is not to blame for the current hardship; for eight years, we were living a fake lifestyle with huge debt from foreign and domestic debts. The Central Bank of Nigeria owes over N30 trillion, which resulted in debt service surpassing 100 percent.

“I can’t join other Nigerians criticising Tinubu on the current economic hardship, and I am not saying he is a saint free from wrongdoing, but in this current economic situation, President Tinubu is not to be blamed. I will also speak if I see any wrong economic policy of the Tinubu administration in the future, Stated.

He added that Tinubu’s decision to remove fuel subsidy should be applauded.

He said, “It’s injustice for anyone to blame the Tinubu administration for the current economic hardship because there is no other alternative than the removal of the fuel subsidy. After all, Nigeria cannot even afford to pay the subsidy. In the last eight years, the Central Bank continued to print more money, and the naira continued to depreciate. There is too much naira in circulation because the CBN is printing the currency without restraint.

“The economy was poorly managed, and they are not willing to take advice; in the last eight years, apart from sycophancy, nothing has been done; those sycophants are those buying the dollar at the rate of N400 and selling it at the rate of N600 to N700.

“A boy who has no record of service has a private jet and owns houses in Dubai and England just because he is buying dollars at so a rate and selling them.

“I can only plead with the people to endure the hardship, and those who have the means to help the downtrodden should do so.

“I am also pleading with commoners to live according to their earnings; we must not peg our lives above our earnings in this difficult situation where people are looking for what to eat.”

During his inaugural speech in 2023 after the general elections, Tinubu announced the removal of fuel subsidy.

He stated that the country could no longer maintain it, noting that the trillions of naira yearly spent to sustain the subsidy were meant to better the healthcare and transportation sector, schools, housing, and national security, among others.

However, following the removal, Nigerians had been thrown into hardship from the soaring cost of food to increased drug prices.