By Olawumi Oyehan
Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike, has declared that President Bola Tinubu remains the only credible leadership option for Nigeria, insisting that no other potential presidential contender has demonstrated the courage or capacity to confront the country’s long-standing economic challenges.
Speaking at his monthly media briefing on Tuesday in Abuja, Wike defended Tinubu’s economic reforms, particularly the removal of petrol subsidy, describing the decision as the boldest taken by any Nigerian president in decades.
According to him, while the reforms have imposed temporary hardship on Nigerians, they have strengthened the finances of state governments, improved infrastructure funding and ended the era when states depended on bank loans to pay workers’ salaries.
”Asiwaju is the only person we have now. He has not done everything, and nobody says he has, but he has shown the courage to take decisions others refused to take. Give him credit for that,” Wike said.
The minister argued that Nigerians should not expect an economy weakened over many years to recover within a short period.
”When problems have accumulated for over 15 years, people expect them to be solved in one year. It doesn’t work that way. Healing takes time, but it will happen,” he said.
Wike described the fuel subsidy regime as “a cancer,” recalling that as governor, he had to rely on bank borrowing to meet salary obligations because of declining allocations to states.
”The fuel subsidy consumed over ₦3 trillion at a time. Today, states receive more money. Pensioners are being paid, governors no longer queue before bank managers to borrow money just to pay salaries, and there are more resources for infrastructure,” he said.
He maintained that leadership is defined by the willingness to make difficult decisions rather than by popular sentiment.
”Everybody agreed that subsidy was a scam, but no president had the political will to remove it. President Tinubu took that decision. No decision is 100 per cent perfect, but leadership is about taking responsibility,” he added.