IMF, World Financial institution and the Recolonisation of Nigeria
By Umar Farouk Bala,
In Might 2023, instantly after assuming workplace, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu boldly carried out two of essentially the most aggressive coverage reforms demanded by the Bretton Woods establishments: the removing of the gasoline subsidy and the liberalisation of the alternate fee.
These strikes, applauded by each the Worldwide Financial Fund (IMF) and the World Financial institution, had been bought to Nigerians as mandatory steps towards financial stability and long-term progress. But, barely two years later, the identical establishments are projecting a grim future for the very individuals these reforms had been meant to uplift.
In line with the World Financial institution’s “Africa’s Pulse” report of April 23, 2025—launched on the sidelines of the just lately concluded Spring Conferences in Washington—poverty in Nigeria is predicted to worsen considerably over the subsequent 5 years.
The report predicts a 3.6 proportion level improve in poverty via 2027 in international locations like Nigeria and the Democratic Republic of Congo—each resource-rich but fragile economies. This projection is just not solely disheartening but in addition contradictory.
If the much-heralded reforms had been alleged to result in progress, why is poverty deepening? To know this paradox, we should look at each Nigeria’s latest coverage trajectory and the position of its exterior advisors.
Upon assuming workplace, President Tinubu swiftly ended Nigeria’s decades-old gasoline subsidy regime—an motion that sparked quick inflationary strain. The worth of petrol tripled, dragging up meals and transportation prices.
For tens of millions of Nigerians already on the brink, the influence was devastating. Inside months, protests erupted throughout the nation. Starvation, job losses, and failing companies turned widespread.
In the meantime, the naira’s worth plummeted following the choice to drift the foreign money, sending the price of imported items hovering. Amidst this local weather of financial ache, the IMF and World Financial institution remained curiously enthusiastic.
Their endorsements of Nigeria’s reforms gave the federal government a harmful sense of validation, regardless of the large outcry over the crippling influence of those draconian insurance policies.
Tinubu, emboldened by reward from overseas, even boasted that he deserved a Guinness World File for his sweeping adjustments. However for abnormal Nigerians, there was no trigger for celebration—solely survival.
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The contradiction lies in the truth that whereas Nigeria is implementing the textbook prescriptions of its worldwide collectors, it’s also descending into deeper socioeconomic chaos.
And this isn’t the primary time. The Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP) of the late Nineteen Eighties, one other IMF-backed initiative, equally resulted in devaluation, subsidy removing, and industrial collapse.
Textile factories shuttered, inflation soared, and poverty unfold like wildfire. Historical past, it appears, is repeating itself. The core challenge is just not that reforms are inherently dangerous—financial reform is significant for any nation’s progress.
Nonetheless, when reforms disproportionately burden the poor, enrich the elite, and are available with out accountability or transparency, they develop into damaging quite than developmental.
Within the case of Nigeria, there may be little to indicate for the billions borrowed underneath the banner of reform. Infrastructure is crumbling, healthcare and training are underfunded, and corruption continues unchecked.
Curiously, whereas the World Financial institution applauds gasoline subsidy removing, it admits that Nigeria should still be paying subsidies—suggesting a scarcity of readability and even transparency. Much more puzzling is the Financial institution’s silence on how a lot has really been saved and the way these financial savings are being utilised.
As an alternative of asking laborious questions on authorities spending—on luxurious jets, inflated budgets, and political patronage—the Financial institution urges Nigeria to “keep the course” for one more 10 to fifteen years.
For a nation the place over half of its 233 million individuals reside in poverty, that may be a dangerously tone-deaf prescription. One should then ask: what do the IMF and World Financial institution really need from Nigeria? Is it significant growth or just compliance?
Their historical past means that debt servicing, coverage alignment, and market liberalisation matter extra to them than human influence. Poverty, in any case, doesn’t present up in quarterly reviews. However it’s felt day-after-day in Nigerian properties the place households now select between a balanced eating regimen and gasoline.
Nigeria deserves reforms—however not the type that strangle its individuals within the title of fiscal self-discipline. True reform should include compassion, oversight, and a relentless concentrate on bettering the lives of residents—not simply balancing books for the advantage of international lenders.
Till then, the query of the Bretton Woods establishments’ true intentions in Nigeria stays unanswered—and more and more, deeply troubling.
Umar Farouk Bala is a serving corps member on the PRNigeria Centre, Abuja. He could be reached at: [email protected]
